Comic Book Review: New Avengers Vol. 2: The Other Woman written by Sam Humphries, art by Ton Lima
Longtime readers of this blog may have noticed that I don’t often review more recent comics from DC or Marvel. Back in the day, I was a big fan of both with a large collection, but when I got laid off in 2012, I had to cut expenses somewhere, and weekly trips to buy a large handful of individual issues was one place to do that. Making it easier was that I’d been unimpressed with DC Comics’ New 52 line that had started the previous year, making it a good jumping off point. And Marvel was in the doldrums itself for me.
When I did start having a steady paycheck again, I’d moved further away from the comic book store, so the trip is cumbersome. I go every few months, and mostly pick up collections, especially from the bargain bin or independent publishers’ area.
Which brings us to this volume, which turns out to collect a series that was published in 2025. As I had not been paying attention to recent series, I didn’t realize it was so new. And perhaps the fact that a collection of so recent vintage was in the bargain bin would have been a red flag for me.
This latest iteration of Marvel’s Avengers team was put together by the Black Widow (superspy, former Soviet agent) from people she knows are not reluctant to use lethal force against opponents. Clea (extradimensional wizard), Namor the Sub-Mariner, Winter Soldier (cyborg assassin), Wolverine (the female clone version) and Carnage (alien symbiote, currently fused with Eddie Brock, the first Venom.) Their mission: take down the Killuminati and prevent their master plan from coming to fruition.
And what, pray tell, is the Killuminati? They turn out to be a collection of “neurogenic clones” (evil parody versions) of the Illuminati, which was a collection of “genius”/influential superheroes who met in secret to handle various crises, but is best known to Marvel fans for making really stupid decisions. Including, apparently, letting someone gather their genetic material.
Their membership includes Iron Apex (Iron Man), Mr. Ouroboros (Mr. Fantastic), Luke Charles (Black Panther), Guru Strange (Doctor Strange), King Britain (Captain Britain) and Rapunzel (Medusa). The clones were created by the Jackal, a biogeneticist who is themselves a series of neurogenic clones. All of this in service to a master plan created by someone called the “Shadow Boss.”
The villains don’t trust Shadow Boss, for good reason, but will die if they don’t do what they’re told, so are on board for now.
As if trying to ride herd on a group of surly antiheroes who don’t much like each other wasn’t bad enough, the New Avengers also learn their team has been infiltrated by The Other Woman.
The story is told in a nonlinear order, flashing back and forth in the timeline to keep certain information concealed so the big reveals theoretically have a bigger impact.
Good: There are some genuinely funny moments with the villains despite all the murdering, and a couple of their concepts are interesting. Especially Guru Strange, who is “what if Dr. Strange’s fatal flaw was hedonism instead of pride?”
The Other Woman is a credible threat and an interesting idea, even if the exact mechanics of how she works are unclear.
The art is decent; I can tell who all the characters are even when out of costume.
Less good: For a series with “new” in the title, there’s little new here. The newest protagonist character is Laura “Wolverine” McKinney, who was first published in 2004, and the villainous characters while more or less created just for this story, are all remixes of characters who were introduced in the 1970s at latest. A lot of this story feels stale, remixing previous storylines with perhaps more modern cynicism.
Also, death feels cheap in this story. Even though, yes, the protagonists use lethal force, the moral weight of that loses something when their opponents are treated by the narrative as less than real humans. And then there’s a moment when the villains kill several thousand people in a major city as a byproduct of their plan, and it’s just a thing that happens, not treated as the horrific tragedy it would normally be, and not really the concern of our main characters other than adding it to the list of things needing avenging.
Content note: Mass murder, regular murder (sometimes a bit gory), general comic book violence. Some characters are having extramarital sex off camera, all apparently consensual. Two characters strip to underwear and have kinky foreplay.
Overall: The story ends with a blatant indication of “if the sales are good, we’ll do more of the same.” I strongly suspect we will not, in fact, be seeing more of this iteration of the Avengers. Recommended primarily to people who need to complete their collections of a favorite character or creator.
