Avengerous Tales 2.32 - Avengers #132-Giant-Size Avengers #3

To read Avengerous Tales 2.31, go here!

I guess Steve Englehart got a hand cramp halfway through working on these next two issues, because while the plot is credited to him, our current editor and former writer Roy Thomas has once against picked up the pen and provided us with pleasure and punches aplenty.

Two pages in and Kang’s plan has already sprung a leak.

In other words, Frankenstein is not and never has been under Kang’s total control.  OOPS.

So while Frankie’s off following his own destiny, Thor tries and fails to hammer his way out of the maze.  For some reason he decides that becoming Donald Blake might serve him better and transforms into his alter ego.  This backfires almost immediately as Frankenstein comes round the corner and Blake freaks out, swinging his cane at the monster, who in turn attacks and prompts him to turn back into Thor.  Well that sure was pointless.

Thor decides not to beat up Frankenstein, instead letting him go and following him to see if Frankie will lead him to Kang.

But let’s return to Vietnam for a minute.  Remember that hooded guy who appeared for one panel back in Issue 130?  Well he’s back now.  Indeed, he never truly left.

 

His Sherlocking is interrupted by the cops, whom he punches while fleeing.  He hides out in an alley, where we discover that it was he who summoned the Swordsman’s spirit from the grave.  He does it again, and they have a brief chat about how Mantis will be back soon because destiny fate etc.

Back with Kang...

 

Despite being shocked at the appearance of Wonder Man and the original Human Torch, the Vision fends off his attackers and phases through a wall to (relative) safety.  The Unliving Legion then go after the other Avengers, tracking down Iron Man and Hawkeye (who stumbled into each other) as well as Mantis.  How does it go?

 

 

 Things could be better.

 

This keeps up and they’ll be able to get a group discount rate at the funeral home.

So not a whole lot going on this issue, really.  Just a lot of fighting and a wee bit of set-up for next time.  The story concludes in Giant-Size Avengers #3 which, like Giant-Size Avengers #2, is not available online (that I know of) and so I’m scanning from my inferior physical copy.

The dying Vision tells Mantis that the Ghost pulled Vision’s own trick of jamming a hand into an enemy’s chest and allowing it to solidify there, which somehow caused the Ghost to disintegrate but also was super mega effective at hurting Vision.

 

Fortunately we all know that Marvel would never permanently kill off the Vision, because otherwise this would be too sad. T_T

All of a sudden Midnight reappears to challenge Mantis to a battle to the death.  This is yet another crinkle in Kang’s grand scheme: he had ordered his minions to bring Mantis to him alive, since he still thinks she’s the Celestial Madonna and his best shot at becoming ruler of Earth.  But Midnight has been away from Kang’s side for too long and his mind control has worn off, so now all Midnight cares about is proving himself the best kung-fuer around.

Fortunately for Mantis, Midnight ain’t exactly Midnighter and she teaches him a thing of three.  By the time she knocks him out, though, the Vision has mysteriously disappeared.  While she was busy schooling Midnight, Frankenstein’s monster reappeared in our story, instantaneously bonded with Vision over the fact that they both push the boundaries of humanity in different ways, and carted him off like he’s King Kong and he just found his Fay Wray.

Moving from Kong to Kang, we see that our would-be conqueror has once again sent Wonder Man and the Human Torch after the Vision, and Baron Zemo is tired of playing the lackey and tries to convince Kang to give him a promotion.

 

I can’t believe I’m saying this but... go, Kang!

And if that wasn’t enough for you, a brief trip back to Earth informs us that Libra has broken out of prison.  Given his previous track record, he’s probably worried about Mantis and has gone to find her.  Jarvis, however, doesn’t know that, and tries to tell the Scarlet Witch (the only Avenger to remain behind when the others went to Vietnam) about the incident.  She refuses to leave her room, yelling at him in a frightening, not quite human voice to leave.  Just what are she and Agatha Harkness doing in there?  Sadly, we don’t find out this issue.  Back to limbo!

The Human Torch and Wonder Man find Frankenstein with the Vision, who is just barely alive.  Frankie puts the smackdown on Wonder Man for trying to kill Vision, but he does let the Human Torch examine our unconscious android.  As we already know, the Vision was constructed from the Human Torch’s old body, but it comes as a big shock to old Torchie.

Meanwhile, Thor has found Iron Man’s body and sworn to, well, avenge his comrade’s death.  When he stumbles upon Kang, he goes a bit hammer-crazy, only to be intercepted by the recently revived Wonder Man.

 

“DO YOU NEED ME TO SPELL IT OUT FOR YOU?  BECAUSE I’D BE MORE THAN HAPPY TO DO THAT.”

“WE WERE ON THE SAME TEAM, DUDE, I KNOW WHO YOU ARE!”

Wonder Man causes a cave-in, enabling his and Kang’s escape.  Not that a few puny tons of rock is enough to stop Thor, but anyway.  In another part of the maze, Hawkeye has made himself useful for once and located Immortus’s throne room, where Immortus and Rama Tut are still trapped.  Hawkeye tries to release them, but of course things can’t be that simple—Baron Zemo and his Adhesive X gun arrive to stop him.

While Hawkeye is pasted to the floor (and it’s a good look on him, I must say), Immortus offers to send Zemo back in time so he can prevent that purple sock being glued to his face.  We don’t yet know what Immortus’s motive is for making this offer—you’d think he’d have learned his lesson after his attempts at helping Kang and Rama Tut went SO WELL—but he does distract Zemo enough for Hawkeye to use his legs and teeth to line up a shot at the button that will free Immortus and Rama Tut from their prisons.

Okay, even I have to admit that’s pretty badass.  I mean Hawkeye’s still a dipstick, but he’s a badass dipstick.

Once Immortus and Rama Tut are free, Zemo demands that Immortus keep up his end of the bargain and send him back to the past.  Immortus... does this.

 

O_O Well that took a dark turn.  I mean, he’s a Nazi.  He deserved it.  But for a comic that previously killed off Zemo in an accidental landslide rather than with Captain America’s righteous fury, this is surprisingly harsh.

Back with Thor, who’s as tenacious about avenging Iron Man as Batman is about making himself miserable, he catches up with Kang and Wonder Man.  Kang thinks he has the edge, since Frankenstein and the Human Torch also turn up, but unfortunately for him, Torchie has also broken free of his mind control and...

 

So has ANY part of Kang’s plan gone right so far?  Because this whole comic has been one disaster after another.

Anyway, the Vision only has use of one arm, but he uses the other to help Thor trounce Wonder Man.  As his minions fall and/or bail, Kang suddenly remember he’s a time traveler and poofs himself out of there, which begs the question: if Kang can time-travel, then Rama Tut (his future self) should be able to time-travel as well.  Why doesn’t he use that power to escape the plastic tube and do something about the current situation?  Same goes for Immortus, who later confesses that he’s an even future-er version of Kang and Rama Tut.  Do the plastic tubes nullify their powers?  What are they just sitting there being useless for???

Not long after, everyone—both good guys and bad guys—get poofed into Immortus’s chambers.  Even the deceased Iron Man and Ghost are here... and they’re not as dead as we thought.

 

(Whoops that came out blurry.  Thor is saying "The sensation with pass, Iron Man.  Thou art alive again--and unharmed!"  Dang scanner.)

 

Long story short, Iron Man wasn’t actually dead, it’s just that limbo is dang weird and so for some reason he was moving at such a glacially slow pace compared to the others that they couldn’t hear his heartbeat or feel him breathe, leading them to believe he was dead.

Immortus then generously sends everyone back to where they belong.  Even Zemo is restored to non-protoplasm form, supposedly because Immortus wants to see him suffer some more but really because the writer has no backbone.  The only one not sent back to his time is the Human Torch, whom Immortus has allowed to stay so that he can figure out how he went from being himself to being the Vision.

I understand why Immortus would want to save his past selves in order to preserve the timeline that allowed them to develop into Immortus himself, but why the whole charade about pretending to want to help Kang destroy the Avengers?  Was this whole thing arranged just for the Human Torch’s benefit?  That seems a little extreme.  I mean, he’s the king of limbo with a machine that allows him to pluck whoever he wants from the timestream at his leisure.  Surely he could have figured out a plan that wasn’t “kidnap and try to murder a bunch of heroes.”*

And actually, while we’re on the subject, if Immortus is a future version of good guy Rama Tut, what made him turn evil again?  Ah, so many questions...

To read Avengerous Tales 2.33, go here!

Images from Avengers #132 and Giant-Size Avengers #3

*In the next issue he gives us some BS about how he wanted to teach Kang a lesson about how fate always wins, but from what I can tell, Kang didn’t learn diddlysquat.  He just ran off still determined to be evil forever and never become like goody-two-shoes Rama Tut.