Tales from the $3.99 Bin! - Secret Invasion

Well, it’s about that time of the year again. I’m stuck between what black thing I’ll be wearing Wednesday (got to get plans though), I’m looking at that pesky corn candy, and I’ll probably break out into the "Thriller" dance. I’ll also link that Tim Curry song from The Worst Witch again. That still makes me laugh. Instead of doing something monster-based, I think I’m going to go the sci-fi horror genre. These next two posts will talk about the 2008 Marvel crossover, Secret Invasion. Here, I’ll just be talk about the main series while the other post will be about the event itself.

I was pretty much into Secret Invasion when it first was hinted at in 2007. A lot of stuff had gone on in the Marvel Universe at that point, and I was psyched. I even had the money to keep up with it this time! I got all 8 issues of the crossover and a couple of New Avengers tie-ins. Since then, I really haven’t heard much about this one. Unlike Civil War, this event has kind of been looked over. Now that I’ve reread the main series, I can kind of see why. I’ll get to that later, though. For this and the next post, I decided to go all in on this one. I pulled out the books and perused Marvel Unlimited for all this stuff, so I’m ready!

Brian Michael Bendis wrote the main series. BMB was pretty much the Marvel architect at this point. It’s still weird to see him at DC. Anyway,  Avengers Disassembled, Secret War, and House of M were his babies. Leinil Francis Yu was the penciller. Before this, he was penciling along with Bendis on New Avengers. I also got to mention my favorite Superman origin, Superman: Birthright, since Yu was the artist. Man, even BMB had to get in on Superman. Mark Morales handled the inks and Laura Martin did the colors. So, what happens when the Skrulls’ “secret” invasion ain’t no secret no more?

Secret Invasion

Writer: Brian Michael Bendis

Pencils: Francis Leinil Francis Yu

Inks: Mark Morales

Colors: Laura Martin

Letters: Chris Eliopoulos

Editor: Tom Breevort

SYNOPSIS

The main series starts out years ago as Skrull soldiers meet another Skrull (who was revealed to be Queen Veranke) and tells her that the Skrull homeworld has fallen. They believe Earth is their new home and they also have a hatred for the superheroes. We then skip to the present where Iron Man shows Reed Richards and Henry Pym the Elektra Skrull that started this whole “Who Do You Trust?” mess. Suddenly, a Skrull ship crashes in the Savage Land. Iron Man heads off to join his pro-registration Avengers team, the Mighty Avengers. Meanwhile, Spider-Woman (who switched from New to Mighty) informs the renegade New Avengers about the crash. They both end up in the Savage Land when things go straight to hell.

The disguised Skrulls reveal themselves and sabotage places like SWORD headquarters, SHIELD, Baxter Building, and even Iron Man himself. A Skrull put an alien virus into Stark’s systems and that pretty much screws up everything (a lotta crap is running on Stark’s software/hardware).

I gotta say that these new Super-Skrulls were looking pretty cool.

While the Skrulls start to attack major cities and enter Earth’s orbit, the Avengers find out who is in the crashed ship. Heroes from other eras come out and it’s not clear on who’s the real deal. The Skrulls had basically found a way to make themselves undetectable to everyone, so everyone is sitting on knives  A fight breaks out between the two groups but is broken up when a T-Rex shows up. Ms. Marvel takes Iron Man elsewhere to recuperate and then heads back to New York where the main invasion is taking place. Stark then gets visited by Spider-Woman who is revealed to be Queen Veranke herself! She tries to mess with him, but Black Widow puts a stop to that. Veranke then escapes and heads back to the US.

Let see here:

Emma Frost and Beast still dressed weird in the day.

We got web-pits!

Luke on the right looks much better

Oh yeah, I don't like how BMB writes mainstream Marvel's Spider-Man. It's like he's trying too hard to be funny.

In space, Agent Brand of SWORD finds Reed Richards (who was captured by a Skrull impersonating Hank Pym) and takes him to the Savage Land. Richards ends up figuring out a way to see who’s a fake. When they make it to the Savage Land, we find out that the folk on the ship were all fakes. With all of that out of the way, both Avengers teams make it to New York and see the damage that was caused. Even though they were gone, you still had the Initiative, Nick Fury’s Secret Warriors, and the Young Avengers trying to save lives. The Skrulls also made their “Your Planet Belongs to Us” statement while they were gone.

I don't know why Nick Fury is pack that much heat... and I don't want to know. 

Thor (who was off fighting Skrulls) goes to Central Park and sounds the alarm for the final battle. The Avengers, the Initiative, the Secret Warriors, the Young Avengers, and a few other heroes join. The Thunderbolts and the Hood’s cabal of villains even join the heroes’ side. The Skrulls show up on masse and after a few words, “Fighty McFightenstein” commences. When Queen Veranke gets injured, Skrull Pym enacts a bomb that was hidden within Janet Van Dyne, the Wasp. She grows, and it affects everyone. Thor is able to do… something to stop the bomb but at the cost of Janet’s life.

The fight then commences as Queen Veranke is still alive. She actually ends up getting take out by Norman Osborn, the former Green Goblin and leader of the Thunderbolts. The fliers then take to Earth’s orbit and pretty much end the invasion. It’s there where they find a ship that has the ones who were replaced like Hank Pym, Spider-Woman, and most SHIELD agents. In the end, SHIELD is dismantled, and Tony Stark is out of a job since he took the blame for the invasion. Norman Osborn (for some reason…) gets Stark’s job to head a new agency called H.A.M.M.E.R. The event ends as ‘ole Norman goes to Avengers Tower and meets an ensemble of villains that include Doctor Doom, Namor (?), Emma Frost (?), Loki (who was a female at this point?), and the Hood.

So, the Skrulls just left them alive on a ship somewhere for... reasons? I guess you don't want to kill off that many characters, so I guess it works.

OPINION

So, what did I think of the main series? I thought it was fine for the most part. The main series is nice, but it’s not handled as well as it could be. I’ll get to the qualms later, though. Bendis does try to aim high with showing the payoff to the stuff he took years to lay out. He brings in all the characters he’s played around with as well as some he will get to play with after the event. It’s pretty jam-packed and starts out pretty well. It’s cool to see the Skrulls put their plans into action. The Fantastic Four go down, The Avengers are off the table, SHIELD/SWORD are gone, Iron Man’s puking, and it’s all-out hysteria.

It could have been really easy to say Tony was a Skrull, but I'm glad they didn't go there. Gotta make Civil War count somehow. Also, we wouldn't have gotten his cool arc in Dark Reign.

Unlike Civil War, this event is simpler in who the villains are: the Skrulls. They’re fine for the most part here. While the main series pretty much goes the “We Want ‘Yo World” route, the tie-ins gave more depth them. Still, it was cool to see the Skrulls use different heroes’ and villains’ abilities. It did make for some nice visuals. As for our heroes, it’s nice to see them get thrown for a loop. At this point, the superhero community gone through some stuff with Civil War and other events. The Invasion feels like their version of The Two Towers or The Empire Strikes Back. I can’t say it’s the Return of the King since the next event, Siege, gets that title.

The artwork is good for the most part. Yu much brings the work he did in New Avengers over to this series and it works. He’s got a different inker and colorist here, so that scratchy look from the New Avengers series is gone. He knows how to do big battles well. The fight in the Savage Land and the final battles looked pretty good. Heck, it makes the series hold up even with story being so light. I also got to credit the colorist and inker since they also brought their A-game. There are times where it could get a little muddled and less cool, but the artwork is not the problem with this mini.

Okay, this was pretty funny.

Now, I did run into some problems with this mini. I’ll probably say more about this in the next post, but this thing went by too fast. After the first well-laid out issue, I was flipping through the rest of this. From what I can tell, the whole event is kind of brief. That’s not a bad thing, but that makes the thing feel so slight. We get a lot of fighting and little dialogue here. While that is cool since the artwork is nice, I wish there was more in the main series itself.

It also felt like it could have been easily taken place in four issues instead of 8. I get there was a lot of characters being thrown around, but it just felt too light. I also wasn’t a fan of some dialogue here as well. I tend to run into that more when BMB handles certain characters. I got no problem with most of his stuff and his Ultimate stuff, though. The ending is also a little underwhelming mostly because of the way BMB tells it. It’s a recollection of the final events. While the major reveals at the end that were cool, it just felt weird to tell it like that.

At least this event made me like Maria Hill more. Beforehand, she was such a unlikable lady.

In the end, the main series to Secret Invasion is kind of “whelming.” It starts out powerful but it slowly crawls to the end. At least the artwork was pretty good. I can see why Yu is currently on Captain America (good series, by the way). If you’re looking for an 8-issue mini that has the Avengers fighting an alien invasion, you might like this. I don’t know your tastes. I’m not done with this event yet, though. Next time, I’ll be talking about the event itself and may even mention things that were better than the mini-series itself. Until then, Peace, God Bless, and be careful out there.