Comic Book Critic

Writer: Brian Michael Bendis

Artists: Mike Deodato, Howard Chaykin

Colors: Rain Beredo, Edgar Delgado

Letters: Joe Caramagna

Cover: Mike Deodato, Rain Beredo

Editors: Lauren Sankovitch, Tom Brevoort

Marvel Comics – May 2011 – $3.99

New Avengers #10 leads into Marvel’s big Spring cross-over event – Fear Itself – and the story is split into a past/present narrative. The current storyline is illustrated by Mike Deodato, while the past is done by Howard Chaykin. The cover, by Deodato and Beredo, features Kraven the Hunter, Dum Dum Dugan, Ulysses Bloodstone, Dominic Fortune, Namora, and Sabretooth from 1959.

While the Avengers are locked in battle with Superia, Mockingbird is injured and our heroes try their best to save her from dying. This takes up most of the present storyline, while in 1959, Nick Fury and Dum Dum Dugan travel around the world seeking to form a ‘Black Ops Initiative’ by request of the President. Their goal: Take down the Red Skull who is seeking to establish a Fourth Reich. The team assembled by Fury and his pal includes everyone on the cover plus Ernst Sablinova, the original Silver Sable.

The 2 storilines seem to have nothing in common and are very different in tone; Deodato presents an all-out urgent battle in the present and Chaykin’s more deliberate illustrative style depicts the different type of action in the past. Howard Chaykin’s artwork is always a delight and he doesn’t disappoint on this book.

Other than the fact that Fury is assembling a new Black Ops team to do the dirty work that The Howling Commandos wouldn’t do, I don’t see much of a tie-in to Fear Itself. The stop-start nature of the storytelling didn’t really appeal to me and I would have rather seen the 2 tales separated and not intertwined. Otherwise the story was enjoyable, and I’m looking forward to reading more as Fear Itself unwinds.

- The Comic Book Critic

Comic Book Critic Rating: 7.0