U.S. Avengers Cover Art (Marvel Comics)
As American as driving foreign cars and doubling down on diversity, get ready for Marvel’s U.S.Avengers.
As it stands in the Marvel Universe, S.H.I.E.L.D. is a broken entity that no one can trust and with the elite spy agency derailed, the United States’ first line of offensive defense is down. Fortunately, help is on way in the form of the all new A.I.M.
Headed by billionaire Roberto Da Costa, A.I.M. (formerly the evil Advanced Idea Mechanics) has been refashioned into American Intelligence Mechanics to replace S.H.I.E.L.D. and pick up the protecting the U.S. mantle with a fresh batch of Avenger minds and blood on the roster.
The series is being written by Al Ewing (who is British) and features a diverse cast of characters: At the helm is Da Costa, a Brazilian-born mutant (known as Sunspot) who came to America in his teens and trained with Professor Charles Xavier as one to his original New Mutants. In an interview with The Washington Post, Ewing describes Da Costa as, “…both an actual and fictional minority” who has seen some of the worst sides of America. Ewing added, “But he’s seen the best of America, too. He has an absolute love for his adopted country, and he’ll fight to the end to save lives and help people.”
Filling up Da Costa’s roster are Cannonball, Thunderbolt Ross as the Red Hulk, super-scientist Dr. Toni Ho as the All-new Iron Patriot (yes, her father, Ho Yinsen, created that very first Iron Man suit of armor with Tony Stark in that cave), Danielle Cage (a future Captain America and daughter of Luke Cage and Jessica Jones), Pod and the unbeatable Squirrel Girl and her squirrel legion.
Give a little nod to the fact that this series with it’s distinctly American title and theme has assembled a virtual melting pot of diversity for its team: women, men, immigrants (Da Costa and Norwegian-born Pod), Cage is biracial, Iron Patriot is Asian-American, plus a big red guy and a youngster with a fluffy tail…all coming to life via the pen of an Englishman. Genius. Series editor Tom Brevoort said, “U.S.Avengers will be a bold, brawny book that will distill everything that you love about and everything that you fear about this great land of ours into twenty pages of high-octane patriotic action every issue.”
The first villain that the U.S.Avengers will face makes things interesting on a timeline level: it’s none other than the Golden Skull (Marvel does love its Skulls) who made his debut in the Avengers: Ultron Forever storyline as a foe of an adult Danielle Cage/Captain America 30 years down the road, so it looks as if Cage/Captain America may have done some time traveling. Got it? Good.
All of the flag-waving, patriotic, mom’s apple pie action and adventure of U.S.Avengers will hit the ground this December!
Artwork by Paco Medina, courtesy of Marvel Comics