Previously on the Initiative, a new batch of recruits -- including Diamondback and the Eric O'Grady version of Ant-Man -- rolled into Camp Hammond and Taskmaster replaced Gauntlet as instructor at the same time that an MVP clone was fitted with Armory's Tactigon. The process, which included remembering MVP's death, caused the clone to go insane and calling himself KIA he set out to kill everyone involved. Going on a rampage, which included the incidental death of Dragon Lord and death of Trauma, KIA followed the initial Initiative recruits to MVP's home and battled them and the New Warriors as well the Mighty Avengers who'd arrived on the scene. The combined groups were able to defeat him wiping his mind.In the fallout, Justice and the other New Warriors left the Initiative to act as a sort of watchdog group called Counter Force... except for Ultragirl who decided to remain. To everyone's surprise, Trauma resurrected but had no idea how while Gyrich was officially dismissed by Iron Man. The initial batch of recruits that passed were all given their assignments: Hardball went to Nevada, Komodo to Arizona, Ultragirl and Thor Girl to Georgia, 3-D Man (the former Triathlon) to Hawaii and Cloud 9 to Montana while Trauma stayed on as a counselor. But underlying all of this is that the Skrulls had infiltrated the Initiative and were putting their agents on every team.Today is Avengers: The Initiative #13-16.Previous >>154751212
Running down the new recruits.>AnnexFrom the 1993 Annuals Marvel did where, like Bloodlines from the same year, each was intended to introduce a new character in each one. The most successful of these were Genis-Vell, X-Cutioner and Adam X.>ProdigySlingers member, probably the most notable of these characters which is saying a lot.>SunstreakOne off Iron Man villain from the mid-'90s.>BatwingCharacter from Untold Tales of Spider-Man.>Gorilla GirlOne off character from a 1979 Marvel Team-Up issue.>BoulderNew character.
From this point on, Boulder is dead. There is only Butterball.
Issue 14Time for Secret Invasion.
>>154763449>The most successful of these were Genis-Vell, X-Cutioner and Adam Xthe fact that I have no clue who X-Cutioner is tells me that book was not very good at succesfully introducing new characters
>bottom panelSeems kind of weird to throw a goofy reference like that into an otherwise serious story.
>>154763449>One off Iron Man villain from the mid-'90s.Featuring:>Bootleg Ghost with boobs and dies fighting an old computer science man who was now head of security because ??? >Guy that claims to be Unicorn, but has blatantly the wrong accent for some reason. Not long after another weird Unicorn-like claiming to be the original in a SSS.>Another woman who isn't established what she is supposed to do at all.>His ne'er do well cousin using a remote control armored body. Stockpile was a mistake. Everything from that period was a mistake. Kavanagh was a mistake.
>>154764000X-Cutioner showed up in Lobdell's stuff throughout the '90s eventually renouncing his anti-mutant ways when he grew to respect Gambit. They brought him out of mothballs and backtracked on that a few years ago because he was being used in X-Men '97.
It's a shame that so many new characters are introduced on these teams and we basically see and learn nothing about most of them and then after Fear Itself they almost all disappear.
>>154763584Prodigy was this close to saving everyone a lot of effort and blood during Secret Invasion
This is an issue I had with Secret Invasion. So much marketing was built on asking who was a Skrull yet none of the build up really did anything to seed anything about who and who wasn't a Skrull and then the event starts and all the Skrull agents are just immediately revealed and dealt with quickly every time they are. It never really lived up to its premise.And then Bendis ended the whole thing on a Thriller gag.
>>154763617Batwing makes a good point about age restrictions
>>154764000Raptor is notable in just how lame he was. Completely mismatched for an Ultron story. And a few like Bloodwraith weren't even "new" characters.
>>154764002>>154764052either the skrull is underselling Pym or his version of Pym's powers is nowhere near as good as the real deal's, cause both of these situations are perfectly survivable if he just shrinks into the Microverse
>>154764208>And then Bendis ended the whole thing on a Thriller gagelaborate?
Issue 15
>>154764031At least his name ended up being used for the underrated and absolutely operatic event X-cutioner's Song (the X-cutioner does not appear in this event)
>>154764441Secret Invasion ends on a closeup of Jessica Jones and Luke Cage's infant daughter where she has green eyes. Everyone thought this was meant to set up a plot about how she'd been replaced by a Skrull but Bendis later said it was just a joke referencing the ending of the Thriller music video.
>>154764470X-Cutioner's Song came first. X-Cutioner debuted a few months after it ended so I would assume Lobdell's reuse of the name was intentional.
>>154764268This mf is is dissing humans for supposedly being dumn, but he's the one to talk when he only has offensive powers and absolutely nothing for defense. Who came up with that powerset
>>154764509The Skrulls seemed to think just throwing a bunch of powers on Super-Skrulls without thinking of the build was all they needed. I honestly hate the Combo Man Skrulls because it's an example of how Secret Invasion's priorities were completely wrong.
Meant that for >>154764511
>>154764509Ah my mistake, still any excuse to read peak X-men
>>154764525Yeah, a lot of skrulls were just "make a skrull out of everyone who was on a given super-team", only for them to end up hilariously shitty compared to the originalslike I recall there being a duo of Surfer+Namor+Valkyrie and Thor+Iron Man+Wasp Super-Skrulls and they got both slaughtered by Spitfire of all people at the same time
>>154764570Blitzschlag is lowkey one of my favourites from the Initiative. What a smug bastard. Sucks that he barely appeared anywhere outside of Initiative.
>>154764705He shows up in a few flashbacks early in Academy as he was working with Norman when HAMMER was running things and is why some of the characters like Veil are how they are. But yeah hasn't been used since. He's great though, not in the "I totally think he's cool" way but he's supposed to be a frustrating asshole and he plays that role perfectly.
Re-reading this just makes me sad about what happens to Crusader later on. And that he never comes back afterwards
Issue 16The return of the Skrull Kill Krew.
>>154763463I hope Prodigy dies horribly
>>154764960>>154764976Come the fuck on, real Sharon has brawled with She-Hulk and Joe Fixit, she is not fragile enough to get killed by this shit. Did these super-skrulls get their powers off temu or something?
>>154764975Still around, last showed up in PAD's Scarlet Spider. He's one of the main characters of the Fear Itself tie-in miniseries that serves as something of a send off to the Initiative.
>>154765003>Did these super-skrulls get their powers off temu or something?I wouldn't at all be surprised if the Skrull versions of the powers aren't as good as the real ones. "Good enough" and an overwhelming amount of firepower is what they seemed to be going for.
>>154765004I know but I'm gonna hold a grudge and hope that his time will be up eventually cause I'm petty.
That's it for today. Next time will finish up Secret Invasion and a dangling plot thread from the first year with Avengers: The Initiative #17-19 + Special #1.
>>154765039>I wouldn't at all be surprised if the Skrull versions of the powers aren't as good as the real onesIt's weird because how impressive the super-skrulls were ranged wildly from book to book, and sometimes even in span of the same book too. Like in War Machine some of the Super-Skrulls, like the Drax/Moondragon/Nova one that nearly killed Rhodes, or the U-Foes one that did beat him up, felt like they could have been comparable to the originals, but then the exact same book had a West Coast Avengers Skrull that had features of Wonder Man, Quasar and Iron Man and Rhodey just blasted a hole through it with no effort. Guess if they actually had the full powers of who they were copying the Earth heroes would have never stood a chance, especially with how many of them seemed to have powersets of heavy hitters like Hulk, Thing and Thor and so on.
>>154763527Heh he has a point
>>154765212>>154765226see that's what I'm talking about, if this skrull was even half as strong as real Beta Ray Bill all these guys'd be deader than doornails
>>154765250thanks for the storytime, OPalways a pleasure to re-read Initiative
>>154764898I hate that so much
>>154765463Initiative is a book which probably should have been shit but it's one of my favorites from the entire decade. It's not genre changing or anything but is just a good, solid book.
>>154766397you are uncool.>>154766436you are psychohothead in delusion.>>154766522Make me, sperg.
