by Rick Remender, Matteo Scalera and Matthew Wilson

Ant-Man and Venom take centre stage in Rick Remender’s Secret Avengers #31. With Hawkeye and Valkyrie under the control of the “Abyss”, Black Window back at Lighthouse Station, and the rest of the team in Malaysia, Ant-Man and Venom are forced to go it alone for much of this book. The result is a very fun, extremely action-packed, and intensely plotted issue.

Remender continues to hit a high note when it comes to this series. He plays off of his intimate understanding of Venom to focus the story around him. Flash Thompson also narrates much of the story as well. It is a voice that Remender is familiar with, and it translates extremely well, and yet, we aren’t allowed to forget that this is a team book.

To prevent the “Abyss” from spreading, the duo head to the airport. The resulting scene is fast-paced and wonderfully rendered by artist Matteo Scalera and Matthew Wilson. Personally it is my favourite part of the book. Remender mixes in the appropriate amounts of big moments and spectacle to make this a stand out part of the comic. Colourist Matthew Wilson does his best work of the book during this sequence as well. Racing down the runway is exactly as it should be- a high-speed adrenaline rush that is exciting until the very end.

As good as they are- Ant-Man and Venom can’t stop every plane. Hawkeye and Valkyrie, along with a contingent of possessed villains, manage to take off. Enter: Black Widow. The next sequence was a little weird for me. Not because it was written poorly, in fact, it was written quiet well. But because Widow seems to be…out of proportion, and as would be expected, it is extremely distracting. So much so, that it makes the scene more difficult to follow than it should be. It is a good example of how you shouldn’t portray female characters in comics…ever.

The Widow misstep aside, I enjoyed the rest of Scalera’s art for this book. The runway scene is outstanding and certainly one of the most exciting panels of the week. This issue will just have to settle for hitting a very high point, and a very low point, just pages apart.

Fans of Remender’s run should continue to eat up this series like it is Grandma’s apple pie. The dialogue, the plot, the character, everything is done extremely well, and represents a strong case for why Remender was given the reigns to one of Marvel’s most important NOW! books, Uncanny Avengers. There is more airplane action between Widow and Hawkeye promised next issue, here’s to hoping that Matteo Scalero sees a female, any female, in between now and then.

Story – 8/10
Art – 7/10
Overall – 8/10

Follow Cody on Twitter, he’ll probably be Tweeting pictures of Black Widow all week: @codymudge.

Save 10-50% on Iron Man Comics, Apparel, and More!
Cody Mudge

Cody Mudge

Reviewer at ReadComicBooks
Cody lives just outside Kitchener, Ontario, Canada. His first love is writing, and his second is reading. Comics have been an interest of Cody’s for the last four years however he didn’t start collecting and heavily following his favourite characters until the start of 2012. When not reading comics or writing, he can be found playing guitar or Xbox 360 or hanging out with the Arwen to his Aragorn. In 2011 he wrote his first novel, Darker than Shadow, which will be published by iUniverse. His favourite DC character is Batman, and his favourite Marvel character is Wolverine. If he were a superhero he would be Spider-Man because of his dashing wit and charm, the dripping sarcasm he applies at times and his ability to learn lessons the hard way.
Cody Mudge

@codymudge

Cody Mudge

Latest posts by Cody Mudge (see all)