We’re less than a week away from The Marvels and excitement is in the dumpster! What has become of the MCU? I know I’m still going to see the film opening night and hopefully enjoy myself. Until then, how about some comics? Like Avengers and Batman!

Comic Book of the Week goes to Scarlet Witch #10 for a fun, if slightly anticlimactic finale to probably my favorite comic of the year.

Meanwhile, I’m planning to finish off the Spider-Man 2 game this weekend. It’s been a blast, though perhaps not as powerful a blast as the first two games. Still fun, and I hope we get plenty more in this series. Honestly, they should just keep the graphics/gameplay the same and just keep putting out DLC chapters every few years. I’d be happy with just that.

Comic Reviews: Avengers #7, Batman/Catwoman: The Gotham War: Scorched Earth #1, and Scarlet Witch #10.

Avengers #7
Writer: Jed MacKay
Artist: C.F. Villa
Colorist: Federico Blee
Letterer: VC’s Cory Petit

I didn’t really care for the opening storyline for this Avengers run, but I don’t want to give up on it just yet.

The Avengers battle a giant monster in the ruins of the world, with their entire universe dying around them. And one-by-one, they all fall, with Scarlet Witch the last to stand. But before she dies, she realizes that someone is narrating all of this, and she spots him: Nightmare! She awakens to find the Avengers all asleep, except for the Vision, of course. But he’s been attacked by Myrddin and the Twilight Court, who have come to kill Kang the Conqueror.

Comic Rating: 6/10 – Pretty Good.

C’mon! We just got finished with the Ashen Combine, and now we’ve got the Twilight Court?! I’m all for introducing new villains for the Avengers to fight, but are they only going to fight vaguely cosmic, menacingly named squads? Perhaps I’m rushing to judgement. Perhaps the Twilight Court will surprise me. But I’m not going to hold my breath. I’m willing to see what happens, but this issue was disappointing. It’s a big, bombastic issue that ends with a ‘it’s all a dream’ twist, then drops a less-than-interesting cliffhanger on us. It’s still a fun issue, but not a very promising one, in my opinion.

The issue itself is pretty good. The Avengers wearing some classic costumes fight a giant, rampaging monster, all while a solid narrator voice describes the heroic action. So it’s neat. And points for putting Thor in that costume for this dream sequence. The art does a great job presenting this scenario and it comes off fine. It’s just the Nightmare reveal and the Twilight Court reveal that are bugging me. Neither inspires confidence for the story to come. But I’m going to keep reading because I don’t want to give up on another Avengers comic or another MacKay comic so soon.

TL;DR: Strong writing and strong art don’t make up for an otherwise lackluster story and a disappointing cliffhanger ending.

Batman/Catwoman: The Gotham War: Scorched Earth #1
Writers: Tini Howard and Chip Zdarsky
Artists: Mike Hawthorne with Nikola Cizmesija
Inkers: Mark Morales, Wade Von Grawbadger and Cizmesija
Colorist: Arif Prianto
Letterer: Clayton Cowles

And so Gotham War comes to an end as a far different event than when it started.

Gotham War has changed. Batman and Catwoman are now on the same side after Vandal Savage took control of Catwoman’s thief army and set them to work gathering the pieces of his original meteor so he could re-power himself and grant immortality to Scandal. He’s also set a squad of classic Bat-villains loose on Gotham City, armed with weapons from the Batcave. Robin (Tim) takes them on and gets captured, so Batman touches base with the rest of the family and sends them to save Tim, while he takes on Vandal and Catwoman looks into her squad.

It all builds to Vandal summoning a new asteroid, Jason nearly sacrificing himself to stop it and then Catwoman and Vandal disappearing into a meteor explosion. In the end, Batman bids his family farewell to go off and do his own thing (and Catwoman is probably fine).

Comic Rating: 5/10 – Alright.

So the psychological battle between Batman and Catwoman over her attempt to reduce crime in Gotham was transformed into a Vandal Savage super-villain plot, with her heroes putting their differences aside to stop him from destroying Gotham. All the intrigue about Savage buying Wayne Manor was just so he could raid the Batcave for weapons and give them to some villains who get taken out pretty easily by the Batfamily. And in the end, Catwoman gets to disappear for a while and Batman has an excuse to cut the family off and go more solo than normal. Eh. Color me disappointed. It doesn’t help that the art isn’t up to the usual standards. It’s solid art, just not big, bombastic, epic story finale art. The whole issue just feels a little lackluster after the great start of the story.

TL;DR: The ending of the story is far less interesting and just more generic superhero comic than the start of the story.

Scarlet Witch #10
Writer: Steve Orlando
Artist: Sara Pichelli
Colorist: Frank William
Letterer: VC’s Cory Petit

Sadly, this is the final issue of this awesome comic book run! It’s coming back in a few months, but will it be the same?

Scarlet Witch faces off against Hexfinder, who gives a run down of her back story and how her powers are based on an alchemical staff. Joseph, her puppet, summons a Mysterium cage, diluting weakening Wanda’s powers. But Wanda still holds her own, until Darcy convinces Joseph to step up to the plate and betray Hexfinder. He turns all of the Mysterium into some new metal and Wanda is able to defeat the villain for good. Joseph dies, and Wanda turns the new metal — which has healing properties — into a healing garden.

Comic Rating: 8/10 – Very Good.

This is an excellent issue that tells a fun and exciting story as our hero takes on the bad guy. My only nitpick is that it feels a little anti-climactic, despite all the build-up to Hexfinder. She shows up, exposits how her powers and backstory work, and then she’s dispatched just as easily as every other villain Wanda has battled in this comic series. Hexfinder seemed really cool. And I liked her backstory and her powers. And maybe she’ll be back. But this first battle was over pretty quickly, especially once Wanda got her powers working. The whole arc with Joseph was great, and it fits in nicely to the final battle and the victory. I’m not saying the storytelling is the problem. It just feels…rather slight. Like, the whole thing takes maybe 10 minutes? Wanda didn’t even know Hexfinder existed. Then she shows up and gets defeated in a matter of minutes.

But that’s a minor complaint to an otherwise solid issue. The writing and art are as good as they’ve always been on this comic, and it’s a real, damn shame that this series is coming to an end. It’s probably my favorite comic of the year. I know it’s going to come back as a joint Scarlet Witch & Quicksilver series, with Steve Orlando back writing, but will it still be as good? Is it going to be a Sensational She-Hulk situation, where the revamp and new #1 don’t really change anything? I hope so. Not sure why adding Quicksilver to this comic is supposed to help. But maybe we’ll get more Luna, and more stories of Wanda being the cool aunt to her hip, young teen niece! That would be fun! I’m going to hope for the best.

TL;DR: The final issue of this very awesome comic wraps things up quickly, but is no less a fun read.

The comics I review in my Hench-Sized reviews are just the usual comics I grab from Comixology any given week, along with a few impulse buys I might try on a whim. So if there are any comics or series you’d like me to review each week, let me know in the comments.

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