Beating Up a god is All in A Day's Work

 

cover art by John Buscema

Last week, we left the X-Men in a cliffhanger. Now we are going to jump back to the Avengers. Since the World's Mightiest Heroes are going to have three single-issue adventures before reconnecting with the Wanda/Pietro story arc, I've decided that we'll cover the first of these three issues this week. Next week, we'll take a break from the story arc and visit with Sgt. Rock. The two weeks after that will be the remaining two single-issue adventures. THEN we can get back to the X-Men as they are joined by the Avengers to sort-of wrap up the Wanda/Pietro story. Gee whiz, planning a blog is as complex as planning D-Day sometimes!

Anyway, Avengers #50 (cover-dated March 1968; written by Roy Thomas and drawn by John Buscema) begins with the three remaining Avengers (Hawkeye, Goliath and Wasp) bickering with each other and wondering if its time to close up shop--especially since Goliath can't be Goliath anymore. He can still shrink, but he can't grow larger any more.

But they pull themselves together enough to begin to trace Hercules, who hasn't contracted them since he left a few issue before. We know, of course, that he's been zapped into a shadowy dimension by the mad Titan Typhon. So we switch scenes to the big guy, who beats up a monster before finding the other Olympian gods.

There's a bit of bickering among the gods--primarily and unsurprisingly it's Ares who does the most complaining. But Zeus decides that only Hercules is powerful enough and noble enough to defeat Typhon. Zeus had enough power left to zap Herc back to Earth.

Meanwhile, back on Earth, the Avengers have run into Typhon and gotten into a fight. But they're in over their heads--none of them are powerful enough to face off against a Titan. Fortunately, Hercules returns in time to go toe to toe with the bad guy. They trade super-powerful blows, but in the end it is Typhon who falls.

Herc is able to summon the rest of the Olympians back home. Typhon is tossed back into his eternal prison and Hercules opts to stay in Olympus for the time being.

So the Avengers are still down to just three members. But they opt to stay together. By golly, the Avengers are THE AVENGERS and nothing will ever bring their ongoing legacy to an end.

This is a fun issue and a satisfying end to Hercules' story arc. Buscema's art, especially in his depiction of the shadow dimension and Hercules' too-short but still epic fight with Typhon, is fantastic. The story doesn't give the actual Avengers enough to do, but an issue emphasizing that they currenly lack the raw power they once had via members like Herc, Thor or Iron Man is important. The team has decided to stay together, but they need to power-up or expand the team somehow. We'll see how in future issues.