'S.H.I.E.L.D. is gone, the Avengers have fallen. All that stands in defence of the world are its greatest villains, the Dark Avengers, in this high-octane adventure from the Marvel Untold line
'Under Norman Osborn’s jurisdiction, the Avengers have been secretly re-formed with a cabal of deadly super villains. This is Osborn’s chance to finally put the Green Goblin behind him and become the Iron Patriot the world needs him to be. But villains aren’t easy to wrangle into the place of heroes – doing damage control for his new line-up constantly puts his empire at risk. When S.H.I.E.L.D. loyalists break into Avengers Tower and steal the secret list of replacements for his team of maniacs, the threat to his reign becomes intolerable. Osborn unleashes the worst of the worst to crush those responsible… It’s hard to be a hero!'
When I first started getting into comic books properly, having always been something of a fan of the genre since being a little kid, I remember walking into my local comic shop (an absolute amazing thing for my tiny, backwards town) and seeing posters for The Dark Avengers. Secret Invasion had just happened and now Norman Osborne, the man behind the mask of the Green Goblin, was put in charge of protecting the world with his own team of Avengers. I remember the excitement and intrigue around the event, especially as people were trying to put together who was going to be on his team thanks to the small clues Marvel were giving out.
Whilst I only dipped my toes in and out of this series thanks to spending a lot of time in that shop, and eventually coming to work there, I got to see most of the bog moments such as the murder of Frank Castle, and the eventual Siege finale. Over the years I've gone back and read up on bits of this era that I missed at the time, and have really enjoyed it. It was a wonderfully different time, to see the bad guys in control, yet having to pretend to be heroes, and the real heroes on the run. It felt different and unique to other eras in Marvel, and I wish it could have had more stories.
Luckily for me, and everyone else, Aconyte Books have just released their first novel set within this time period, Dark Avengers, The Patriot List. The book takes place well within the Dark Reign, with Norman having been in charge of HAMMER for some time now and his Dark Avengers having gotten used to their roles; with some early members of the team having left by this point.
The story begins with Norman having been contacted by an investigative journalist who claims to have something that could be damaging to him; having chosen to approach Norman for a quote on the incident before running the story. This moment of journalistic integrity gives Norman the heads-up he needs, and he sends several of his Avengers to steal the sensitive information from the newspaper offices in the dead of night. Unfortunately, they're not the only people there, and an armed group starts a fight with the 'heroes' that leads to destruction across the city.
Dealing with the fallout of the previous operation, Norman leaves Avengers Tower open to infiltration, and the same mystery group breaks in and steals some highly classified documents; including a list of potential candidates to replace his Avengers if the need arises. Knowing that most of his dirty secrets are close to being laid out in the open, Norman has to use his team to try and stop their opponents and retake the information. All without the Dark Avengers finding out what's on the list.
One of the best things about Dark Avengers, The Patriot List is just how well David Guymer manages to capture the characters from the comics in such vivid ways. The people who make up the Dark Avengers aren't your average group of heroes; they're not heroes at all. They all deeply flawed, awful people who snipe at each other, mock each other, put their own agendas and interests first, yet somehow manage to form a competent team; and Guymer brings that wonderful energy from the comics into the book.
A lot of the times with comics people will say that they love the action, that they're there to see the costumed heroes and villains fight in over the top and explosive ways; and whilst there's nothing wrong with liking that, and this book does deliver that, the real highlight of this novel is the smaller character moments. Instead of looking forward to seeing Ares throw someone through a wall I was eager to see what sly moves Daken was going to pull, instead of wanting to see the Sentry unleash his amazing powers I wanted to see how petty and weird Bullseye was going to be. Some of the best moments of this book are the scenes where several of the Dark Avengers are forced to be in the same room together just interacting. It was pure chaos and bitchy drama and I loved every moment of it.
The book also dove into some of the characters in ways that I can't really remember seeing in the comics, and led to some wonderful new insight into their motivations that changed the way I thought about them. The two biggest examples of this are Moonstone and Venom. Moonstone is a very complex character right from the start; we see her working with the Sentry as a psychologist, using the things from her past to try and help him, and we learn more about what drove her to become a villain. As the book progresses we see that despite being a villain, and a murderer, this is very much not what she wants to be, and there are several moments where her desire to do good, to be better, shine through and push her to do genuinely decent things that put her life on the line.
Equally, Venom has similar moments across the course of the book, though these are a bit more complex. Venom is already a harder character to understand due to him essentially being two different entities in the same body, and the influence that the symbiote has over the host changing the way the host thinks. At the start of the book Mac Gargan is fighting against eh symbiote's influence, trying not to eat people and the such. Over the course of the book Venom goes through some trauma and some changes, and the lines between the two personalities blur a little; but towards the end we see Gargan fighting back and fighting to be better, to do better, and this gives us a glimpse into the man he was before he even became Scorpion, let alone Venom, and how he wants to try and be better once again.
Possibly the stand out star, however, is Norman Osborne. How could it be anyone else? As fans of the comics will know, Norman isn't the most stable of people, and his shift into crazy towards the end of Dark Reign is some great stuff, and Guymer brings some moments of this to the book. The small glimpses we see at the deeply unwell man under his professional veneer are actually quite frightening at times, an the moments when he begins to slip into a mania that's close to the Green Goblin make for some wonderfully tense, stand out moments in the book. I could have spent so much longer following Norman like this, and I really hope that this won't be the last time Guymer gets to write the character.
Dark Avengers, The Patriot List is an action packed, dark, and wonderfully fun book that takes readers back to a unique time in the Marvel universe. It has reignited my desire to read more of this period, and to delve into some of these characters again. Whether you have read anything from the Dark Reign or not, I'm sure that a lot of readers are going to love this latest addition to the Marvel Untold line.
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