Avengerous Tales 2.8 - Avengers #86-#87

To read Avengerous Tales 2.7, go here!

When did this comic turn into an old EC horror story?

We start with a kid watching television.

 

Watching TV was so much work back then.  That’s not even a joke, it’s just a statement.

The tiny hands tune into the Squadron Supreme’s jet, containing Nighthawk and the dimension-hopping Avengers.  They’re on their way to Atomic City to stop the other Squadron members from launching the solar rocket that will cause the sun to overheat and melt the Earth like so much ice cream.

The rest of the Squadron still ain’t buying it.

 

If you’re wondering why Nighthawk didn’t just call them to tell them to stop the launch, they apparently agreed to maintain radio silence to diminish the chances of foreign sabotage.  Then on top of that, he had to land the ship, leaving the Avengers on their own to stop the rocket.  They don’t quite succeed, as you can see from the panel above, but Scarlet Witch once again proves her badassery by trapping the rocket in an energy bubble, buying enough time for Nighthawk to run over and explain the situation to his teammates.

The Squadron apologize for the misunderstanding, but everyone’s still puzzled about how the rocket could possibly cause any harm.  There’s no weaponry on it; it’s just meant to orbit the sun… as far as they know. 

See, the Squadron didn’t build the rocket themselves.  It’s actually the work of a ten-year-old called Brain Child, a mutant with so much intelligence that he was designing weapons for the military at an age when most kids are busy starting their Pokémon collection.

 

Yeah, it’s not like he’s a kid with feelings or anything, ya jerkweed.

Fed up with being an outcast, Brain Child demands to continue his work at a secluded island off the west coast.  He’s so valuable to them that the military agrees, and it’s to that island that our heroes now go.  It’s also from that island that Brain Child watches them approach, and he’s not at all happy that his plan to destroy the Earth (yes, including himself) was foiled.

The minute the Avengers and the Squadron land on his island, Brain Child confesses to his crimes and tries to blow them all up.  The heroes decide to split up into teams of two to gain access to Brain Child’s hideout.

 

Ah, it’s one of those days, is it?  Also, I’m like eighty percent sure amoebas don’t have eyeballs.  Ninety percent, even.

Brain Child continues attacking them with gluey walls, evil minions, and so forth until he’s quite worn out from all the activity.  Hyperion and Goliath decide now’s a good time to sneak up on him, but Brain Child still has a few tricks up his sleeve.  Or a chair, which he throws at Goliath’s face.

Goliath gets the last laugh, though, when he uses Hyperion’s unconscious body as a projectile weapon to knock out Brain Child.  Dr. Spectrum then uses his magic jewel thingamajig to turn him into a real boy at last.

 

Er, just how much of his memory did you erase?  I mean it’s great that he’s no longer a genocidal maniac and that he’ll have a shot at a normal life, but isn’t he going to wonder about the giant holes in his memory?  How are his parents going to explain that?

“Mommy, Daddy, I don’t remember what we did last weekend.”

“You spent the past few years working for the military and plotting the world’s demise!  Oh, uh, I mean.  Swim practice.”

(Speaking of his parents, why the heck did they let him move to an abandoned island in the first place?!)

Meanwhile, on the Avengers’ homeworld, Thor and Black Panther finally ran out of tots to give toys to and have called in Iron Man to help them locate their lost teammates with a dimensional scanner.  They succeed and pull their four lost teammates back home, where Goliath laments that Captain America is not around to hear about his grand victory in another dimension.

Our story ends with the Vision wondering if they are truly home or if they’re in yet another parallel universe.  “We may live out our lives—tell ourselves we do not care—but will we ever truly—know?” he asks.  So, y’know, if you don’t like current canon, there’s your out.  Goliath, Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver, and Vision have been on a parallel Earth all this time.  Ta-da!

Brain Child’s story really does read to me like something you’d see in Tales of the Crypt back before the Comics Code Authority kicked in.  The only difference is that it’s got superheroes and a happy ending instead of some horrifying ironic conclusion.

Moving on to Issue Eighty-Seven, we see the team chillin’ at home, drinkin’ tea and celebratin’ not being dead.  Only T’Challa seems mournful, and when Iron Man asks why, he says it’s because he regrets not coming after his teammates and friends sooner.

Nope!  Just kidding.  He totally made the right call on the one.  He’s actually homesick, so the others ask to hear about Wakanda.  He decides to tell them his secret origin story.

 

There are so many Lion King references I want to make here.

T’Challa’s dad, T’Chaka, was a pretty awesome king according to his son.  And, as king, it was his responsibility to guard the Eternal Peak, the source of the nation’s invaluable vibranium, from greedy outsiders.

Cue greedy outsider: the Klaw arrives to get some vibranium for some evil scheme or other, and when T’Chaka refuses to share, Klaw shoots him dead.  A guy named N’Baza, T’Chaka’s most trusted advisor (WARNING WARNING DANGER WILL ROBINSON) and father of T’Challa’s best friend B’Tumba, takes over the country as regent since T’Challa’s still just a kid.  N’Baza sends both T’Challa and B’Tumba to various schools throughout America and Europe so that the former will make a good king someday (B’Tumba was just sent along to become an inevitable rival keep him company).

 
This really is The Lion King!

When T’Challa returns, N’Baza throws a bunch of tests at him to prove he’s “worthy” to be king, while claiming the tests were T’Chaka’s idea.  T’Challa has never heard of such tests but goes along with it despite his growing suspicions.  The last test consists of him putting on the panther suit for the first time, going all the way to the edge of their land and eating a forbidden herb that grows there. 

You’d think this would raise some red flags with T’Challa, since I’m pretty sure that stuff was forbidden for a reason, but he goes and does it anyway.  It’s only on the way back that he runs into trouble.  Specifically, Advanced Idea Mechanics.

 

AIM spots him and tries to blow him up, but the herbs he ate conveniently gave him cat-like reflexes instead of cardiac arrest.  Unfortunately, he can’t escape their Sonatron, a device that shoots out concentrated sound waves, and down he goes.

As they bring him to their leader, the AIM agents tell Panther about their plans for the vibranium: to send a rocket to the moon, beating out both the Russians and the Americans, and then to build a space station from which they will rule the world.  Speaking of AIM’s ruler, just who did betray T’Challa and all the Wakandas in exchange for truckloads of money?  Say it with me now:

 
Bitter about all the years he spent in T’Challa’s shadow, B’Tumba has him tied up so AIM can shoot him some more, this time for keepsies.  An AIM agent goads B’Tumba into making the fatal shot himself, but when it comes time to pull the trigger…

You leave Dean Martin outta this.

B’Tumba lets T’Challa go free, promising to talk about the whole I-just-betrayed-my-country-and-tried-to-have-my-best-friend-murdered thing after they’ve kicked AIM’s collective behind.  But of course, redemption equals death, and B’Tumba is killed in the ensuing battle.  He asks T’Challa not to tattle to his dad about all this, and T’Challa agrees.

Back in the present, Goliath makes a rather meta comment about how superheroes are doomed to angst and be miserable.  Also, it turns out that N’Baza has been ruling Wakanda in T’Challa’s stead ever since T’Challa became an Avenger, but he’s finally kicked the bucket, so now T’Challa has to decide whether to take over the throne or stay on as a teacher/superhero.  We end with him contemplating on a rooftop while Goliath confidently declares that Black Panther will choose to stay with him them.

I feel like the overall quality of the stories has been picking up lately.  This might be just a matter of personal taste—I think I’ve said before that the Bronze Age, which we are about a year into now, is my favorite—but the balance between excessively goofy and semi-serious is reaching a nice equilibrium.

Now watch the next few issues prove me wrong!

To read Avengerous Tales 2.9, go here!

Images from Avengers #86 and Avengers #87