Ok, Cyclo Media is REALLY on an Avengers tip.
This week, Rob and Clive dip their toesies into the very deep water of Marvel’s Avengers comics. From Doctor Druid to The Secret Wars, we cover it all.
Brace yourself, listeners. It’s about to get cosmic.
Of the spate of superheroing movies that cluttered up the early part of the 21st century, Joss Whedon’s Avengers Assemble was among the best.
With a little urging from Cyclomedia, Rob and Clive look back at this underappreciated gem.
Oh, and while we’re at it…
Superheroes are mythology. They stand above us, their concerns otherworldly, epic. The fate of worlds rests on their shoulders. They have little time for us, the people they pledge to protect. We get in the way. We’re cannon fodder. However much they claim to care, superheroes pledge their fealty to larger concepts than we can embody. They owe allegiance (and often claim ownership) to flags, cities, whole worlds. The people that give life to those ideals are messy little details, and boy does it ever get annoying just when you’re about to deliver the coup de grace to Dr. Villain and all of a sudden there’s a bus full of schoolkids that’s about to drop off a cliff.
And heaven help any mortal that a superhero chooses as a companion. A life of peril and an early, messy death awaits. The flimsy protection of a secret identity is no help once the mask inevitably comes off. I could reel off a loooong list of companions, wives and lovers that have lost their lives while their super-powered paramours have wept a single, perfect tear and moved on to the next battle.
And goddamit, Avengers Assemble does nothing to break that poisonous cycle.
(Are there spoilers after the cut? Are there EVER, True Believer!)
Continue reading Gods And Monsters – X&HT Saw Avengers Assemble
EXCUSES AND HALF TRUTHS 