Say bye-bye to the Avengers, and hello to the New Avengers. After Earth’s Mightiest Heroes defeated Thanos in Avengers: Endgame, the Marvel Cinematic Universe lacked a proper team of defenders. However, all of that changed with Thunderbolts*, with the film revealing that the ragtag team of antiheroes would ultimately be called the New Avengers. With that name now in the pop culture zeitgeist, it only makes sense for Marvel Comics to release a title called New Avengers as well. That’s how we end up with the New Thunderbolts* comic being retitled The New Avengers. Now, readers can see how two MCU heroes go about bringing the team together.
Marvel released a preview of New Avengers #1 by Sam Humphries, Ton Lima, and Rain Beredo. It begins with Bucky Barnes, aka the Winter Soldier, paying a visit to a gas station owner in the New Mexico desert. The owner has been selling out his neighbors to Doctor Doom, who currently runs the world in the One World Under Doom event. Winter Soldier lets him know what a bad idea that is by blowing up his gas station. While Bucky does his slow walk away from the explosion, someone sneaks up on him and sticks a pistol to the side of his head.
This person turns out to be Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow. Winter Soldier and Black Widow worked together in Thunderbolts: Doomstrike, a tie-in to One World Under Doom, but that experience has left Bucky done with team-ups. However, Black Widow can be pretty convincing. One romantic hookup later, and Black Widow finally fills Winter Soldier in on the mission she has for him. A lumber camp in Russia has been receiving shipments of genetic technology, and over two hundred people have disappeared from the surrounding villages. When Bucky tells Natasha to go call Captain America or Captain Marvel, she tells him they’re busy.
[RELATED: Doctor Doom Leads the Avengers, Fantastic Four and X-Men Against a World-Ending Threat (Exclusive)]
It’s a dirty world post-Doctor Doom’s worldwide takeover, and the old tricks don’t work anymore. So Winter Soldier and Black Widow will have to fight dirty in response. We know that this mysterious threat is most likely tied to the Killuminati, evil duplicates of the Illuminati. Members of the Killuminati include Bolt (Black Bolt), Mr. Ourobouros (Mister Fantastic), Guru Strange (Doctor Strange), Professor X-Tinction (Charles Xavier), Luke Charles (Luke Cage as Black Panther?), and Iron Apex (Iron Man).
“My basic concept was — the Illuminati were seven kings and heroes from seven different corners of the Marvel Universe, so what if we did the same with some of the biggest badasses representing mutants, the mystical world, the Spider family, the gamma family, and so on?” Humphries told IGN. “I have immense gratitude for our amazing editor Alanna Smith who supported this idea from the jump, even though she had to liaise with pretty much every Marvel editorial office to make it happen.”
“Carnage. The Hulk. Namor. Clea. Wolverine. Five of the most dangerous loners and antiheroes in the Marvel Universe,” the description of New Avengers #1 reads. “Nothing could make them work together… but Bucky Barnes and the Black Widow are going to give it a shot. Demented duplicates of the Illuminati are threatening the world, and if they figure out how to work together, they’ll be as unstoppable as the originals.”
New Avengers #1 goes on sale Wednesday, June 11th. Let us know your thoughts on the preview in the comments below!
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