It's a great time to be a jerk in the Marvel Universe. I mean, they've been making some great comics over at the House of Ideas, but events have conspired to really allow the jerks to flourish. The Illuminati are all CLEARLY a bunch of self-righteous jerks, except for Namor, who's just unpleasant on his own. Tony Stark has become the big-shot king of the jerks, and I'm sure his upcoming movie won't settle him down any. With Stark in charge, S.H.I.E.L.D. has pretty much become a bunch of fascist little jerks in uniform. All the nice-guy heroes, like Spidey, are on the run or conscripted into the Initiative. (I'm thinking Slapstick here! That guy deserves his own book again. He could team-up with Squirrel Girl!)
All this jerkitude leads us to the point where a guy as evil and calculating as that Gwen Stacy-killing jerk Norman Osborn gets put in charge of the super-human dogcatchers known as the Thunderbolts. Not only is Osborn in charge, but he's got guys like Bullseye and Venom working for him! Sure, they're all supposedly kept under control by nanites in their blood, but does anyone really think it's a good idea to put these dudes together and give them deputy badges? When Moonstone is the most trustworthy person on your team, you've got problems.
In the one-shot Thunderbolts: Desperate Measures, by Paul Jenkins and Steve Lieber, Osborn truly allows his jerky side to show. He picks the team's next target mostly based on how amusing he thinks their attempts to capture said target will be. You know from his smirk that Osborn is up to no good when he sends Bullseye and Penance (the formerly upbeat Speedball) to take out a vigilante known as "Americop." Why does he pick this dynamic duo to take on Americop? I won't give it away here, but the results don't make Penance any cheerier than usual, that's for sure.
This new take on the Thunderbolts is definitely an unusual concept for a team book, and Jenkins seems to enjoy running with that oddness here. Nothing here is what readers would typically expect from a super-hero team. Giving readers the unexpected is what Thunderbolts is really all about these days, and this one-shot is no exception.
If you like your comics with a dose of dark humor, Thunderbolts: Desperate Measures should be just your cup of tea. The one thing that could have made this book better though, would be a return appearance of P-Cat, the Penitent Puss, but I suppose you can't have everything. Don't be a jerk! Pick this book up now, while it is Four Color Fantasies' guaranteed Book of the Week! (And before Squirrel Girl shows up to clean out this group of evil, evil people!)
All this jerkitude leads us to the point where a guy as evil and calculating as that Gwen Stacy-killing jerk Norman Osborn gets put in charge of the super-human dogcatchers known as the Thunderbolts. Not only is Osborn in charge, but he's got guys like Bullseye and Venom working for him! Sure, they're all supposedly kept under control by nanites in their blood, but does anyone really think it's a good idea to put these dudes together and give them deputy badges? When Moonstone is the most trustworthy person on your team, you've got problems.
In the one-shot Thunderbolts: Desperate Measures, by Paul Jenkins and Steve Lieber, Osborn truly allows his jerky side to show. He picks the team's next target mostly based on how amusing he thinks their attempts to capture said target will be. You know from his smirk that Osborn is up to no good when he sends Bullseye and Penance (the formerly upbeat Speedball) to take out a vigilante known as "Americop." Why does he pick this dynamic duo to take on Americop? I won't give it away here, but the results don't make Penance any cheerier than usual, that's for sure.
This new take on the Thunderbolts is definitely an unusual concept for a team book, and Jenkins seems to enjoy running with that oddness here. Nothing here is what readers would typically expect from a super-hero team. Giving readers the unexpected is what Thunderbolts is really all about these days, and this one-shot is no exception.
If you like your comics with a dose of dark humor, Thunderbolts: Desperate Measures should be just your cup of tea. The one thing that could have made this book better though, would be a return appearance of P-Cat, the Penitent Puss, but I suppose you can't have everything. Don't be a jerk! Pick this book up now, while it is Four Color Fantasies' guaranteed Book of the Week! (And before Squirrel Girl shows up to clean out this group of evil, evil people!)
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