Siege: Young Avengers #1

Jun 2010
Sean McKeever, Mahmud Asrar

Story Name:

Underneath it all


Synopsis

Siege: Young Avengers #1 synopsis by Rob Johnson
Rating: 4 stars
Asgard (hovering outside Broxton, Oklahoma) has fallen (in Siege #3) and Young Avengers Hulkling and Wiccan are flying over the ruins. As Wiccan travels via magic force-bubble he tells his winged boyfriend why he originally called himself the Asgardian and dressed more like Thor (YAv#1-5). He's always been a Norse mythology geek.

Their teammate Speed zooms up and says he's been looking for the others. Stature and Vision are OK but he can't find Hawkeye (Kate Bishop) and Patriot. Then he rushes off to help as many survivors as he can. We see that Kate and Eli Bradley are trapped in a pocket under the rubble of Asgard.

Billy Kaplan and Teddy Altman continue flying above the ruined city looking for survivors but finding only the dead. Wiccan can't understand why Asgard had to get destroyed. Hulkling blames the whole hero community for not stopping Norman Osborn much earlier. Meanwhile Tommy Shepherd is pushing himself to the limit to speed-carry survivors out of the city. And Kate is spurring Eli on to use his super-soldier serum strength to push the trapping rubble out of the way to give them an exit. But Patriot is worried that he'll bring the whole thing down on them. Kate says it'll fall and kill them eventually anyway, so they may as well *try* to escape.

Billy and Teddy hear a noise and see Wrecker and 2 of his Wrecking Crew fighting the 3rd, Thunderball. TBall thinks they shouldn't desecrate Asgard, but the others just want to loot the ruins for whatever they can find. So Eliot Franklin gets beaten up and the other 3 have they're own way. Hulkling thinks they should leave them to it and go looking for injured Asgardians to help, but Wiccan uses his magic to encase them in rocks. However the villains easily break free.

Speed is frantically digging into debris hoping to find his missing comrades, or just anyone. But down below somewhere Kate has hatched a plan which Eli vetoes as too dangerous - she wants to blast their way free with explosive arrows. Kate asks why Eli is suddenly averse to taking risks. He answers by kissing her. (They once went on a date which didn't go well. But here Eli is indicating he doesn't want to risk *her* life.) He is saved from too much embarrassment by a shift in the rubble over them opening up a wide crack. Hawkeye tells Patriot to hold it open while she wriggles into it.

Up above Hulkling fights Bulldozer and Piledriver while Wiccan tackles the boss man, Wrecker. Billy asks him why he's pillaging the place he got his powers from (accidentally from the Norn Queen in Thor #148, and the Wrecking Crew got *their* powers from him) - has he no respect? Dirk Garthwaite basically answers no. As the other 2 pummel Hulkling, Wiccan unleashes lightning bolts which fry all 3 villains.

Exhausted Speed meets Ronin (Clint Barton, the original Hawkeye) who bucks him up by telling him he's doing everything anyone could ask of him. Elsewhere Hulkling and Wiccan embrace, and Billy tells Teddy how his father used to read him Norse myths when he was little (until 1 day in a fit of pique he told his dad he hated the stories).

Down below Kate plants some explosive arrowheads deep in the crevice, and says she can feel a draft of air. Then she backs out. She tells Eli to keep holding the crack open until she fires another arrow in to detonate the explosives, and let go straight away so the closing gap will protect them from the blast.

Up above Billy and Teddy hear an explosion, and then see a whirlpool of dust and small rocks funnelling down a hole. And then Patriot's shield breaks through to the surface, followed by him and Hawkeye. The pair say they're alright (but exchange glances). Teddy tells them he's seen Vision and Cassie Lang fighting beside Captain America. And Tommy runs up to join them, glad to see everyone OK.

Speed then speeds off to do more rescuing. Hulkling and Wiccan fly after him, bantering about Billy's Norse nerdity - and his awesome thunderbolts. Kate tells Eli it was a hell of a kiss, before they too rejoin the fray.


 

Review / Commentaries


Siege: Young Avengers #1 Review by (November 27, 2018)
5 Siege 1-shots have connected covers by Marko Djurdjevic. They can be laid out in the order Captain America, Spider-Man, Loki, Young Avengers, Secret Warriors.

Victor Olazaba helps Scott Hanna with the inking, and Jorge Maese helps Matt Milla with the colours.

The YAv appear in many other Siege issues.
They were all together in Siege #2 as Captain America assembled his forces and then sent them to Asgard. In between Stature and Vision were contacted by Amadeus Cho in Mighty Av #35 and agreed to help him stop the Thunderbolts getting hold of the Spear Of Odin.
They were seen arriving in Asgard and taking part in the initial fighting in Siege #3, some of which was mirrored within Av: Initiative #34. Speed was sent on a special mission within Siege#3 to take an Iron Man armour to Tony Stark in Broxton. Wiccan, Stature and Vision also showed up in Siege: CA. But then Stature and Vision made a side trip to TBolts #141-143 (with parts also seen in MAv#36) to meet up with Cho and US Agent (all 4 used to be in the now-disbanded MAv) and fight the TBolts for the Spear. When Hulking says this issue that he saw the duo fighting beside Cap he referred back to Siege: CA, at this point they're actually doing the TBolts stuff.
The team will remain scattered for the rest of Siege. Stature and Vision will finish their TBolts adventure. The assembled heroes face Void at the end of Siege #3 and the beginning of Siege #4, also shown in Siege: Embedded #4 and the end of TBolts #143. Stature, Vision and Wiccan will be shown in some of these places. Then Loki will use the Norn Stones to empower the heroes against Void, and Patriot and Wiccan will cameo during this event in Siege #4, Siege: Embedded #4 and New Av #64. Stature and Vision will watch in the end of MAv#36 as Void kills Loki. Wiccan will be on hand as Norman Osborn is finally taken away in Siege #4.
There are several Aftermath bits to Siege. While they are surveying the ruins of Asgard the big 3 (Cap, IM and Thor) are whisked off to an adventure in the 9 Realms in the Av Prime mini-series. Several YAers are on hand in YS prime #5 when they get back. And then most YAv'ers are seen at the party at then end of Siege #4 (and the beginning of NAv(2010)#1) where the question of who will be in the next Avengers is raised.

Before Siege Stature and Vision had effectively quit the YAv and joined Henry Pym's Mighty Avengers. The rest of the YAv were dragged into an MAv adventure in MAv#28-31. Then Stature cameoed with some other MAv'ers in Hulk #601 before S&V and the rest of MAv visited the Inhumans in the Kree Empire in Realm Of Kings: Inhumans #1-2 (and the end of MAv#31 and the beginning of MAv#32). Meanwhile the rest of the YAv except Speed appeared in a tale in CA#600 before Vision was part of CA:REBORN #3-6 where of course Cap returned from not-death. Then Vision rejoined Stature in the MAv for MAv#32-34 and Hulk #606-607 before the team disbanded in a flashback in MAv#35. Meanwhile Speed rejoined the other 4 still-YAv'ers for Nomad: Girl Without A World #4, after which Hulkling was temporarily arrested along with other aliens on Earth in SWORD #3, and Wiccan joined other magic-users for Dr Voodoo #4-5.

After Siege the whole team will be considered (and rejected) by Steve Rogers for the rebuilt Avengers in Av(2010)#1, and then in a tale in Uncanny X-Men #526 as Magneto learns about Speed and Wiccan being his 'grandchildren' via Scarlet Witch. Then they each appear in various issues of I Am An Avenger. In the midst of which Stature and Vision will be in CHAOS #1 and Wiccan in its #2, Stature will interview for the job as nanny to baby Danielle Cage in NAv(2010)#7, and Vision will attend the funeral of Human Torch in Fantastic Four #588 and Winter Soldier in Fear Itself #7.1: CA. All this leads up to the swan song of the team in the Av: Children's Crusade limited series.



> Siege: Young Avengers comic book info and issue index

Elektra

Excelsioring your collection:
statue
Holy smokes, Batman!
(The Boy Wonder)

Mahmud Asrar
Scott Hanna
Matt Milla
Marko Djurdjevic (Cover Penciler)
Marko Djurdjevic (Cover Inker)
Marko Djurdjevic (Cover Colorist)
Additional Credits
Letterer: Dave Sharpe.
Editor: Bill Rosemann. Editor-in-chief: Joe Quesada.

Characters

Listed in Alphabetical Order.

Hawkeye
Hawkeye

(Katherine Elizabeth Bishop)
Hulkling
Hulkling

(Theodore Altman)
Ronin
Ronin

(Clint Barton)
Wiccan
Wiccan

(William Kaplan)
Wrecker
Wrecker

(Dirk Garthwaite)

Plus: Patriot (Elijah Bradley), Speed (Thomas Shepherd), Young Avengers.