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

Random Thoughts On... Al Ewing's Mighty Avengers

So how do I start this post out? Hmm…

“Wait, Al Ewing’s not black? I’m kinda shocked to find that out! Still, nice job dude!”

For a while now, I’ve been going through different runs of comics physically or through apps like Marvel Unlimited. One series I was somewhat curious about was Al Ewing’s run on Mighty Avengers. It was a series that was supposed to take lesser known known Marvel superheroes and team them up. The interesting thing was that the team was mostly full of minority characters. I was curious about getting the series, but when I saw Greg Land was doing the art, I said “Nah.” After re-reading it and it’s “sequel,” Captain America and The Mighty Avengers, I’m kind of regretting that.

Volume 2 of Mighty Avengers started to hit shelves in 2014 right as the umpteenth Marvel crossover, Infinity, was coming out. Luke Cage and a few other lesser-known heroes (including Spider-Man at times) decided to create a new team. Unlike the big-leagues, they were more interested in helping the common folk. They even set up a call center at their headquarters in Gem Theater. After 14 issues, the book was then relaunched as Captain America and the Mighty Avengers (CAATMA) just in time for Marvel’s other umpteenth crossover, AXIS. It then came to an end at nine issues as the next crossover event, Secret Wars, was starting up… are you seeing a pattern?

Anyway, I came across the series during my read-through of Johnathan Hickman’s runs on Avengers and New Avengers. I was going to talk about it last month, but I’m lazy when it comes to this stuff, so you’re getting it here. Al Ewing, who’s still at it these days, helmed the book for all its duration. The run did have multiple artists, though. On pencils, we had the aforementioned Greg Land, Valerio Schiti, Salvador Larroca, Luke Ross, and Iban Coello. Most of the pencillers like Ross, Larroca, Schiti, and Coello provided inks for their own work. Other inking was done by Jay Liesten. The colorists were Frank D’Amata, Edgar Delgado, Matt Milla, and Rachelle Rosenburg. The lettering was done by Cory Petit and Travis Lanham.

Okay, I can either pick Captain America, Ryu, Wolverine, or that weird catlady from Deathstalkers to beat this mofo.