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Monday, 27 May 2013

Acts of Vengeance - the crossovers

Another quick guide to a significant crossover event that isn't (yet) fully collected in the Essentials.

Acts of Vengeance appeared in late 1989 (coinciding with a period when Marvel took steps to bring their cover dates closer to actual publication) and was one of the biggest ever Marvel crossovers with the two Marvel Omnibus editions devoted to it reprinting material from no less than sixty-eight different comics.

Although the core focus was on the various Avengers books, the story reached out into almost every single Marvel title. The basic premise is of super-villains working together, under the guidance of six leading villains and their mysterious lackey, and switching heroes in the hope of defeating them. In practice this led to many heroes fighting villains for the first time, such as the Punisher facing off against Doctor Doom.

An exact order for the story is hard to come by, not least because the main collected editions are structured around the "core" and "extended" parts of the crossover. However the (Almost) Complete Marvel Crossover Guide has had a go, noting problems due to long-running storylines in both New Mutants and X-Factor, and offers the following order, including some issues that didn't actually carry the "Acts of Vengeance" banner:
Avengers Annual #19 carries a back-up strip where the Avengers review and summarise the key events of the crossover. Another follow-up appeared in Web of Spider-Man #64-65 and that was also included in the Omnibus edition. And although it's not in any collected edition, Silver Surfer #33 parodied the concept with "Acts of Idiocy", featuring the Surfer's first encounter with the Impossible Man (one of the more enduring relationships to come out of the whole thing).
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1 comment:

  1. Marvel Comics Guide1 June 2013 at 18:23

    Hey, Tim!
    Thanks for the link to the (Almost) Complete Crossover Guide on this post.
    This is one dam n fine site! I need to have a good nose through your blog...!

    ReplyDelete