{"id":7963,"date":"2022-06-12T17:05:20","date_gmt":"2022-06-12T16:05:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=7963"},"modified":"2022-06-12T17:05:20","modified_gmt":"2022-06-12T16:05:20","slug":"free-comic-book-day-avengers-x-men-eternals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=7963","title":{"rendered":"Free Comic Book Day: Avengers \/ X-Men \/ Eternals"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>FREE COMIC BOOK DAY: AVENGERS \/ X-MEN \/ ETERNALS<\/strong>
\n“Of Deviation and Mutation”<\/strong>
\nWriter: Kieron Gillen<\/strong>
\nArtist: Dustin Weaver<\/strong>
\nColourist: Marte Gracia<\/strong>
\nLetterer: Cory Petit<\/strong>
\nEditor: Tom Brevoort<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Bloodline”<\/strong>
\nWriter: Danny Lore<\/strong>
\nArtist: Karen S Darboe<\/strong>
\nColourist: Ian Herring<\/strong>
\nLetterer: Cory Petit<\/strong>
\nEditor: Annalise Bissa<\/p>\n

“Let’s Talk About Krakoa”
\nWriter: Gerry Duggan
\nArtist: Matteo Lolli
\nColourist: Rain Beredo
\nLetterer: Clayton Cowles
\nDesign: Tom Muller
\nEditor: Jordan D White<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is, to be honest, one of those comics where there seems to be a bit of ambiguity about what it’s, you know, actually called, which is always helpful when people might want to find it on Marvel Unlimited at some point. The cover has a\u00a0Judgment Day<\/em> logo. Marvel Unlimited has it listed as just\u00a0Free Comic Book Day: Avengers \/ X-Men<\/em>, with no mention of the Eternals. Let’s split the difference.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

So there are three stories here. If you’re expecting one each for the Avengers, the X-Men and the Eternals, well, no. The lead story is a prologue – really more of a trailer – for the upcoming\u00a0A.X.E.: Judgment Day<\/em> crossover, and while the Avengers put in a brief appearance and the X-Men get a cameo, it’s an Eternals story. It’s by Eternals<\/em>\u00a0writer Kieron Gillen, it’s got Eternals<\/em>‘ signature narration, and it’s setting up very much an Eternals concept.<\/p>\n

If you’ve been reading\u00a0Eternals<\/em> it will not have escaped your notice that this stuff about resurrection machines and such forth is awfully similar to Krakoa. It’s actually been part of the Eternals’ mythos since at least the Neil Gaiman run, but once again the Eternals find themselves a slightly awkward fit in the Marvel Universe. There’s a plausible theory that says they were never really meant to be in the Marvel Universe to begin with – the basic concept of the original series, that the Eternals are the “real” people who were interpreted as gods, and the Deviants are the basis for all our stories about demons, has always sat uncomfortably in a world with superheroes and, especially, one with\u00a0Thor. But viewed from the right angle, these things can also be a source of tension that you can build on.<\/p>\n

The basic set-up, as established in\u00a0Eternals<\/em>, is that the Eternals have a programmed function on Earth, which is to get rid of the Deviants when they mutate too far. This isn’t merely a cultural role for them, but an irresistible compulsion. But the traditional Marvel cosmology says that mutants were also created at the same time as the Eternals and the Deviants, so how do they fit in? The Eternals’ standard line seems to be that they’re not especially bothered about the mutants. But what if the mutants start getting ideas above their station and drifting into Eternal territory? Well, this is basically the Eternals wondering about that question (especially the nastier ones), and a flashback to the Eternals wiping out some nascent mutants a while back when they seemed on the verge of figuring out hive-minds.<\/p>\n

It’s done as well as a nine-page trailer is going to be. I’m still not really sure I understand what any of this has to do with the Avengers, but I have faith in Kieron Gillen to have an answer in mind.<\/p>\n

The second story is a four-page trailer for the upcoming\u00a0Bloodline<\/em> series, about Blade’s daughter. I can’t say it immediately grips me. The angle seems to be “Blade but more contemporary”, which means that she’s into gaming. It feels a bit box-ticking. But it’s only four pages. We’ll see how it goes.<\/p>\n

Finally, Gerry Duggan and Matteo Lolli do a short X-Men story which leads in to the next Hellfire Gala event. This being a FCBD one-shot, much of it is devoted to explaining the concept of the Krakoan era to readers who won’t be aware of it. And quite right too, but it’s material that regular readers will be familiar with. To liven it up, Moira MacTaggart gets to explain the premise, though some of it reads a bit oddly. She tells us here that she never did figure out a working cure for the X-gene. Presumably that’s to explain why she never got as far as including it in drugs but… hold on, she\u00a0did<\/em> figure out a cure to the X-gene. That was the point of Mystique and Destiny killing her in a prior life. And she’s meant to have a photographic memory of those earlier lives, so why can’t just re-create it? Okay, maybe there’s work from some of her colleagues that she doesn’t know by heart. I can go with that.<\/p>\n

Despite the fact that they failed in every one of her previous timelines, Moira remains concerned that mutants could dominate the world unless they’re stopped, and broadly hints that\u00a0A.X.E.\u00a0<\/em>is the next convenient opportunity to get rid of them. Well, naturally.<\/p>\n

From there, we get a curious link to the Spider-Man books, as Mary Jane Watson becomes a brand ambassador for Krakoan drugs, and Moira attacks her to take her place at the Gala. Quite how that’s going to work is not clear – Moira seems to be implying that she’s going to repeat the Banshee stunt from\u00a0X Deaths of Wolverine<\/em>, but they’re obviously not killing off Mary Jane Watson for an X-Men story, so I imagine it’s going to be possession or something. The final page is nicely creepy, either way, and it’s a somewhat unexpected hook for the second Gala.<\/p>\n

Overall, it’s… well, it’s Free Comic Book Day, and the primary point of these things is to bring in a fresh audience, even if that’s “people who go to comic stores anyway and happen not to be reading this particular book”. Previous years have opted to tell fuller stories; these definitely verge closer to promotion, but that’s fair enough in context.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

FREE COMIC BOOK DAY: AVENGERS \/ X-MEN \/ ETERNALS “Of Deviation and Mutation” Writer: Kieron Gillen Artist: Dustin Weaver Colourist: Marte Gracia Letterer: Cory Petit Editor: Tom Brevoort “Bloodline” Writer: Danny Lore Artist: Karen S Darboe Colourist: Ian Herring Letterer: Cory Petit Editor: Annalise Bissa “Let’s Talk About Krakoa” Writer: Gerry Duggan Artist: Matteo Lolli […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-x-axis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7963"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7963\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7965,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7963\/revisions\/7965"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}