These are incredibly handsome books - I commented about that on the last one of these, but they are just incredibly beautiful. Hickman has such a talent for the creation of spectacular designs, and nowhere is this clearer than here, where he can cut loose with stuff and Marvel seem content to build their branding around him. Even his creator owned work like Manhattan Projects, East of West and God is Dead don't have the same cohesive structure of Avengers.
The actual story is somewhat less stellar. It's a quick read, that boils down to a lot of punching. Hickman is more concerned with giant actions affecting the Universe at large than giant consequences for the characters. To quote Andrew Wheeler's review of Infinity over at comicsalliance:
"Hickman doesn’t seem to enjoy writing character moments. It’s not where he takes the action. He’s an odd contrast to Brian Michael Bendis, whose character moments are typically so strong that he sometimes spends issue after issue building on them before he remembers to tell a story."Considering that outside of the last 18 months or so BMB has written nearly every Avengers story for the past decade, that is a HUGE transition.
I still find myself terribly enjoying the book though, for all its lack of focus and love of action set pieces over anything like development. And I enjoy the large scale of cast, something which seemingly everyone else hates. I just wish we could get more Smasher, so luckily for me the next volume sets up Infinity, a space based event where the Shi'ar, and thus Smasher, are prominent.
Also Try:
Jonathan Hickman, The Manhattan Projects
Brian Michael Bendis, New Avengers vol. 1
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