the Mighty Avengers #11 - Marvel

Victor Von Doom really pulled out all the stops on this one. Last issue, he, Tony and Bob were returning from an inadvertent trip to the past. But Victor's been doing some homework, and other things, in the past with Morgan Le Fay. He's decided that as smart as he is, it would still be wise to have other options to attack his opponents with. So he's been studying the dark arts . . from the master. Anyways, on their way back to the present, Victor used some kind of magic to give himself about a half-hour lead. He figured that would be about all the time he would need to turn the tables on Tony and Bob. In that time, he also went back to the castle Le Fay, to learn how to create an army. Not an army of men . . " . . an army of the devil's creatures". He returns to the present with them, and captures all the Avengers. Remember, he's still within that half-hour lead, so his ultimate goal is to set a trap for Tony. He wants to overload his system, rendering him moot, and then take his armor and reverse engineer it. The trap works, but somehow Jessica uses her energy discharge to take out the arcane tethers that are holding them. Which makes Natasha incredibly suspicious afterwards. And Carol zips out and gets to Tony in time to give him a split second warning. The blast still takes out his systems, but . . it doesn't kill him. And, with a little help from Bob, he's able to reboot. They capture Victor, and the day is won. But for Tony, it doesn't really feel like a victory. And, they're not going to get much down time because next issue we go right into Skrull Invasion! Personally, I think Brian Bendis is doing a fantastic job with these titles. Still a little to much inner dialogue for my tastes. Victor pretty much explains his whole plan to us . . . in his head . . in-between a conversation he's having with the rest of the Avengers. I understand the purpose, and the effect. But, to me, it's just distracting. Plus, I think, most readers are smart enough to fill-in the in-between stuff. Maybe not. But I like to give people credit. I'm also really glad the Mark Bagley has come on board as the penciller. Him and Brian work very well together. It's seems like the titles back on track now . . time-line wise . . so we'll all be going in to this Skrull Invasion together. Fan-frikkin-tastic!