New Avengers #1
Marvel Comics (January, 2005)
“Breakout” part 1
WRITER: Brian Michael Bendis
PENCILER: David Finch
INKER: Danny Miki
COLORIST: Frank D’Armata
LETTERER: Albert Deschesne
ASSISTANT EDITORS: Nicole Wiley & Molly Lazer
ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Andy Schmidt
EDITOR: Tom Brevoort
The Raft, another attempt as a supervillain prison, is visited by Matt Murdock and Foggy Nelson, who hired Luke Cage to be their bodyguard and are joined by superhuman SHIELD agent Jessica Drew, the original Spider-Woman. (This is when Matt was trying to prove he wasn’t Daredevil after his identity was exposed. It’s also six months after the mistake that is “Disassembled”. However, Electro has been hired to release some of the villains from the prison, leading to Captain America coming in and Spider-Man tagging along. All of this leads to a new reason to visit his client, Robbie Reynolds, the Sentry, who is in the Raft for killing his wife.
What they got right: I like the artwork. The plot itself isn’t bad.
What they got wrong: With Bendis it’s usually the details that he gets wrong. Why bring Foggy here if he’s this scared to be here with all these supervillains? Spider-Man is a bit too jokey with Captain America, but we’ll see his take on 616 Spidey is always way too jokey. Still, it feels weird for me to see Cap called Spidey a smartass. And not even to mess with Peter would MJ go “tee-hee” I don’t care if he calls her out on it.
Recommendation: I’m reserving judgement until I review the full arc. I’m hoping this is before Bendis went off the proverbial tracks (though this was after the assassination of Scarlet Witch that was “Disassembled”). We’ll see, but the issue overall wasn’t bad.