New Avengers #42 Review

NEW AVENGERS #42
Written by Brian Michael Bendis
Art by Jim Cheung

There's not much to really say about New Avengers #42. It's a rather pedestrian read as we are systematically shown various scenes of the Skrull Queen replacing Spider-Woman, climaxing with the "fade to white" moment from House of M.

For those interested, she replaced Spider-Woman back when Hydra was operating on her to restore her powers. Whether they actually gave her her powers back or not remains to be seen, but I'd wager she's being held captive somewhere.

There's a cute scene with the Hank Pym Skrull that has the Queen and "Hank" joking about how he wasn't even invited to join the New Avengers and is basically another instance of Bendis bashing Pym. Doesn't bother me, as it was funny, but poor guy hits his wife once and now no one hesitates to throw him under a bus.

However, there was, if you ask me, a major continuity mistake on Bendis' part in this issue and, considering this issue's only purpose is to fit these events into continuity, it should never have happened when you realize he wrote every story that is contradicted by this issue.

I don't think it's unreasonable to ask for a little bit of consistency in the story.  

After Spider-Woman joins the New Avengers, she asks about Scarlet Witch and Tony and the rest of the team tell her about Disassembled, where she went nuts. This is fine, but Spider-Woman was actually there for Disassembled and can be counted among the large gathering of heroes assembled. On top of that, Spider-Man acts like he had no clue what happened during Disassembled, despite also being present for it and making jokes when they explain what happened in that event.

So, considering Bendis was writing those and is writing this and it's all supposed to be part of this big story he's been writing for so long and this issue's only reason for being was to finally fill fans in on these behind the scenes Skrull dealings, I don't think it's unreasonable to ask for a little bit of consistency in the story.

Verdict - Check It. Nothing really happens. All you needed to know was Spider-Woman was replaced when Hydra was set to give her her powers back. Rest is just filler if you ask me.

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