standard Luke Cage and Jess Jones fanfiction from Brian Bendis
So, this is now the fifth or sixth Avengers vs. X-Men "tie-in" and the funny thing is, it's still not Avengers vs. X-Men. Labelling this as a tie-in is ridiculous, the X-Men do not appear and the issue is pretty much more standard Luke Cage and Jess Jones fanfiction from Brian Bendis.
The writing is the expected from Bendis: annoying, monotone and just not very good. We have such self-aggrandizing throwaway comments suggesting Spider-Island "wasn't important" as well as the blatant insistence that there are only 2 or 3 important characters in this TEAM book. I'm going to focus on one particular moment this issue and that's Storm. Before I start, I don't particularly like Storm and I didn't think she was necessary on the Avengers. It seems Bendis agrees because for the sum total of the 3 panels this issue she appears in and "leaves" the Avengers she literally says one word. This big character and motivation-defining moment for her in the Avengers vs X-Men event is entirely weighted on the one word she says. "Goddess". That's it. She says that and then storms out Avengers Mansion. No context is needed because in any context that's just as worthless a character piece as it is without. That's not a character arc, that's not even getting a character's motivations across, that's just hilariously bad writing of a character Bendis put in his book to tease and try and get up his slowly dwindling sales.
The art by Mike Deodato is again some of his weaker work, he seems burnt out or just uninspired on New Avengers. With this predictable and repetitive writing I'm not surprised, I wouldn't waste my A-game talent pencilling these consistently lacklustre Avengers issues. With that said, the highlight of the entire issue is probably one page featuring most of the Avengers gathered in the mansion. I say most the Avengers because Bendis can't even remember his own line-ups forgetting to include Daredevil in the issue at all.
As a whole, don't be fooled by the promise of an AvX tie-in. This is in no way whatsoever related to the "biggest event ever to happen to comics". Other than the last few pages of expositionary Bendis-talk that repeats the same expositionary Bendis-talk from Avengers vs. X-Men #1, this is not really related to Avengers vs X-Men. Oh, and as per norm, nothing remotely similar to the cover happens in the issue and Wolverine doesn't even make much of an appearance. Save your money and buy something good instead.
