A V A L I

All right, so I’m way behind on reporting this comic in as great, but my love of Howard Stark tends to send me strolling down memory lane. (And, to be fair, I’m really glad it did.) 

The whole S.H.I.E.L.D. arc has this neat little Assassin’s Creed feel to it (which is admittedly another of my favorite things) where the greatest minds in the universe clash in a massive battle over the fate of man and his place in it all. They turn Galileo and Davinci into superheroes in their own right, and it’s just one of those stories where you check your brain at the door and shovel in some popcorn and enjoy it, because it’s just plain awesome. 

Now, the part that sits at odds with the rest of me is Howard Stark. On one hand, the idea that he’s still somehow alive and not murdered appeases my inner carebear, who wants everyone to get a happy ending and somehow, someday, Mr. Stark will pop back in to say, ‘Hey kid, you’re swell. Also I’m not dead! Let’s hug to make up for all the abandonment issues I left you with!’ On the other…well, this makes everything worse for his character because he didn’t just turn into a callous butt that didn’t know how to say ‘I love you’ to his greatest creation without a bottle of scotch and a video camera, but instead a serious asshole who left because he couldn’t take being crowded. Yes, there are moments when he’s not putting up as much of a front, but they’re not really pressed enough to show that he does care, which sadly puts a dent in his depth. 

Even so, I really love this story. It has beautiful art and some ideas that are bursting with absurd fantasy in the most amusing ways. Definitely worth checking out via the Marvel Store or in a local comic shop’s archives.