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A review by btmarino84
Avengers Academy, Volume 1: Permanent Record by Christos Gage
4.0
This book sometimes ran into the trouble of repeating its themes again and again and again. It starts off as a book about young superpowered people and the troubles they are facing. Many of their powers are particularly difficult to deal with (one is a giant metal skeleton who can no longer feel most physical sensations, one is radioactively powered but that makes her poisonous to other people, one can change herself into gasses but her body is slowly coming apart and she may one day simply dissolve) so the angst level is high (as it should be. This is basically a teen high school book with superhero themes as well). The twist comes in that they were all "helped" by Norman Osborn (the Green Goblin) when was the head of Shield. Which means theyve been tortured and put through hell. Basically, the Avengers are training them because they think they are on their way to being supervillains and are hoping to change that.
So yeah, they hammer those themes home A LOT. They are bad guys, no they are good guys, no they are kids, etc. The good news is that the characters are great and Gage has such a wonderful handle on them (many of them are his creation, a couple are not) and on the main adult characters (Ant-man, Quicksilver, Tigra, Jocasta) that you come to really care about what could potentially happen to all these people. It handles its tie ins to AvX and Fear Itself really well too, increasing the drama.
My two favorite issues were the "Prom" one and the issue involving a football game between the Avengers and X-Men where the adults act like bigger kids than the kids. The humor and warmth in those two issues helped temper the sometimes overly dark little moments that come in the other issues and there's something so fun and emotional about both of those stories. It ends in the best place it could being a Big Two book, giving a sense of closure and ending for the characters and stories while still obviously leaving the characters available to future books and writers.
I'll definitely be keeping an eye out for them.
So yeah, they hammer those themes home A LOT. They are bad guys, no they are good guys, no they are kids, etc. The good news is that the characters are great and Gage has such a wonderful handle on them (many of them are his creation, a couple are not) and on the main adult characters (Ant-man, Quicksilver, Tigra, Jocasta) that you come to really care about what could potentially happen to all these people. It handles its tie ins to AvX and Fear Itself really well too, increasing the drama.
My two favorite issues were the "Prom" one and the issue involving a football game between the Avengers and X-Men where the adults act like bigger kids than the kids. The humor and warmth in those two issues helped temper the sometimes overly dark little moments that come in the other issues and there's something so fun and emotional about both of those stories. It ends in the best place it could being a Big Two book, giving a sense of closure and ending for the characters and stories while still obviously leaving the characters available to future books and writers.
I'll definitely be keeping an eye out for them.