Posted in: Comics | Tagged: luke cage, marvel, mighty avengers, Monica Rambeau, she-hulk

A New, Blacker, Mightier Avengers

Published Fri, 07 Jun 2013 12:23:08 -0500

Last updated Fri, 07 Jun 2013 13:32:09 -0500

We mentioned that something big was coming from Al Ewing at Marvel, the other day. didnt know it was this big.

Marvel Comics have announced a new Mighty Avengers comic starting in September by Al Ewing and Greg Land, tying in with the Infinity crossover event. DC may be all about the villains that month, but Marvel are about the heroes. And these Avengers are reminiscent of the original proposal for The Crew from years ago by Priest, which he dubbed "Black Avengers". Even though that, like this, would be inaccurate. We have Luke Cage, Monica Rambeau as Spectrum, Falcon, White Tiger, a new Ronin, She-Hulk, Blue Marvel and Spider-Man.

A couple of years ago, Tom Brevoort was quoted as saying;

and at least two different people pitched this at two different times — was an idea that never got as far as an official title, but it was essentially "Black Avengers." It was "Let's put all the African or African-American heroes together on a team for an adventure," and in those cases too, there was nothing about the idea beyond "It's a bunch of super heroes together" that said "Avengers" beyond the fact that "Avengers" is a term that's salable. I think there's something very specific about what "Avengers" means to the Marvel Universe. They're the varsity. They're the A-list. They're the Man. They're not about being super heroes because of demographics or ethnicity. They stand for something specific and occupy a certain role. If you don't have some degree of that, then it doesn't feel like Avengers.

Today, he's quoted;

Brevoort said it was "no accident" that this team is very diverse in its makeup saying that he's used to fielding questions about Marvel doing a team of "Black Avengers" or any other group with a minority focus. He said that he'd always felt the concept was fake and forced, but "The reality is that he people who are interested in these characters and want to see heroes that reflect them have a genuine point. We first started conceptualizing this book in February around Black History Month, so there was a lot of talk around that." He said particularly a huge inspiration for the book was the late writer Dwayne McDuffie. Brevoort said he wanted to make a book that McDuffie would have made in terms of there being at least 50% non-white, non-male characters. And as it turns out, the final balance is more than 50%. Brevoort promised the series didn't mean that more diverse characters won't show up in other titles, but this series needed that as an anchor thanks to the guiding presence of Luke Cage.