Reviewer: Tim Stevens
Story Title: Great Lakes Avengers Misassembled
Written by: Dan Slott
Pencilled by: Paul Pelletier
Inked by: Rick Magyar
Colored by: Wil Quintana
Lettered by: Dave Lanphear
Editor: Tom Brevoort
Publisher: Marvel Comics
GLA #1 is really the story of Craig Hollis, aka Mr. Immortal. Craig holds what is simultaneously one of the most powerful and most useless powers in the Marvel Universe: he can’t die. Not in a “Phoenix, We Just Can’t Seem to Keep That Jean Grey Down” sort of way, but rather he literally cannot be killed. Fires, floods, guns, poison, and all the rest, they just can’t do the job. However, beyond that he has no real other abilities. He gets shot, he gets struck by lightning and survives, certainly, but none of it really translates into crime stopping. To make matters worse, the powers come with a special friend named Deathurge that only Immortal can see. Deathurge, it seems, is nature’s way of balancing the scale; he shows up from time to time to take away the lives of Craig’s nearest and dearest. Mr. Immortal may never die, but the price is that all those around him will.
Pretty dark stuff that I’m describing there if you couldn’t guess. On the other hand, this is also a book that revels in poking fun at the recent Avengers tragedy (Avengers Disassembled), that features a fourth wall breaking talking squirrel, and that boldly allows a character named Grasshopper to take center stage and basically verbally reinforce every negative stereotype about comic book fans that there is. So what kind of book is it?
It’s not so easy to pigeonhole as the “humor” book it initially appeared to be. There is humor to it, particularly in the form of talking squirrel Money Joe who offers up PSA style denouements of the action unfolding on the panels. But that is balanced by the very jarring reality of Mr. Immortal’s life: a mother dead in childbirth, a father killed in a favor that Craig caused, a first love committing suicide, a recent lover slain by a supervillain and Craig’s own desire to prove that he belongs in the hero game. Even moments when the team is killing time waiting for something, anything of interest to come along are deeply tinged with the feeling of bittersweet. The juxtaposition is enough to make your head spin.
I, personally, wouldn’t trade either element. I liked Grasshopper’s opening speech (he sounds a lot like the dearly departed Jemas did when he discussed an Elektra book) and Monkey Joe is quite a find. On the other hand, the tragedy that is Mr. Immortal lends the book so unexpected gravitas and meat on its bones. The problem isn’t that Slott has humor and tragedy running side by side, that’s been going on since Shakespeare. The problem is that Slott has not yet worked out the perfect recipe for making the two elements work and compliment one another. If he can nail the balancing act, this could end up being quite a book (the art looks great). If he can’t and the fragmented tone continues, the book just won’t fly.
