Marvel NOW!: Zingzillas

Captain America #1: Steve Trevor should have known it wasn't a SHIELD train when it has Mogwai songs as the password to get on it. Surely the good guys aren't still listening to them? Although maybe Steve still is, since it's his 90th birthday. Maybe he's just confused because his bllod sugar is low? He and Sharon clearly thought they were going to a bar for a drink or some food rather than him being transported to Dimension 5 by Arnim Zola, where he's now stuck. This is at times charming, funny and thrilling and is a great, great read. It makes explicit though that Marvel NOW isn't anything other than a marketing gimmick, as it refers to something which happened in previous issues of Captain America? The Avengers? Who knows, and it isn't explained.
Deadpool #2: A zing-rated wazzer if ever I saw one, Deadpool is joke after joke after violence after joke. Zingy dialogue about sound effects? CHECK! An elephant burned to death? CHECK! JFK can't keep his hands off theladies? CHECK! Bugs Bunny and TV advertising references? CHECK! If this sounds like snark it isn't, because I really enjoy reading this, but then I was buying Deadpool Max before the jump so go figure.
Indestructible Hulk #1: Mark Waid's take on the Hulk is simple. Bruce is upset that Tony Stark and Reed Richards get all the credit for being the brains in the Marvel Universe and feels intellectually cuckolded so decides to be the Bruce Banner/Hulk from the recent Avengers film because people liked him. Eventually it turns out the Hulk might be stronger than anyone ever thought he was and might defy mathematics. Yes, again. Enjoyable enough, but feels like it's been done before.
Iron Man #2: More Greg Land! At one point, the entire frame is full of a woman pouring a martini at chest height. Why? Because BEWBZ! (Apart from that, this is wordy and Tony fights some other people in Extremis suits, this time inspired by King Arthur and the Round Table. OK if you like some near-identical people blasting repulsor rays at each other. I think we're supposed to recognise the woman in the final panel and draw some conclusions but, you know, Greg Land.)
Journey Into Mystery #646: Sif leaves a domestic dispute to scratch a dragon's neck and then cut someone's head off. Seriously, are there any books in the Marvel Universe that aren't supposed to be funny? This is jam full of jokes, about half of which vaguely come off, and if I knew it was like this I would have been buying it already. Like Deadpool Prince Valiant, if not nearly as good as that sounds.
Wolverine and the X-Men #21: Rehashing the plot of Mojo Mayhem, reset in a circus, might just work. Although even I, who has read very little Marvel, spot it so maybe not.
A+X #2: Hey, these are fun and all but like last month they're too short to take seriously. An entertaining diversion though.
All New X-Men #2: Okaaaaay... present day Hank goes back in time to get the original X-Men and bring them back to the present day, because if he does then Scott will realise what he's going to do and... something will happen. Instead they come back and love what they've done with the place. Jean gets her mental powers because Hank tells her she'll get them at some point in the future. Anyway, they decide to stay and fight against present day Scott because present day Hank might not be that well. I can see what this is doing, but it feels like awful fanwank if I'm honest.
FF #1: So, now we know what's going to happen while the Fantastic Four are away for FOUR MINUTES. This is so heavily foreshadowed that something going to go wrong it's not true, but I'm guessing we'll end up with this being the Kirkman FF book and the Fantastic Four being Challengers of the Unknown In Space. This issue pretty much does what's required to set up this premise, but since most of this is told in single pages it feels like it jumps about a bit too much. As somebody who was with the FF books at the end, I kind of just want them to get on with it.
Thor God of Thunder #2: After having set up the three time zone premise, this is set entirely in the past. Thor and Lord Voldemort punch each other in the sky for 10 pages until Thor remembers he can call down lightning, which ends the fight pretty quickly. Yes, I'm being harsh (because I did actually like this) but given this is only a five part story - because the one thing I'm getting from all of this is that Marvel only want to tell stories they can print in a single-volume trade these days - it doesn't feel like that much happens.
Uncanny Avengers #2: PO. FACED. Possibly Wanda is going to do what she did in A vs X which got undone by the end of A vs X again, because the Red Skull tells her to. After all, why just use a plot once when you've paid for it, right? Some heroes look guilty because they smashed up New York, but it's OK because an old guy tells them he wanted it smashed up really. The Red Skull stands very heroically, but not as much on the cover of #3 where Cap looks like he's going to kick him in the balls.
X-Men Legacy #2: Wow. Even worse than the first one. Some people who may be an alternative X-Men turn up to get Dragonball Z guy out of his Tibetan monastery while he simultaneously fights Davey Jones from Pirates of the Caribbean in his head and Chinese Parademons in Tibet, guided by the Fluoronic Man. A pair of floating eyeballs turn up and he starts wearing an 80s bodywarmer. This version makes more sense than the published one.
All New x-Men #3: We get, in the following order, the following scenes: Scott and Magneto set up their bad mutant base in the Weapon X facility because "nobody would ever suspect that bad guys would be there"; we see Scott and Magneto bust out Emma (where she admits her powers are screwed and turns into a diamond a couple of times to show she can still do SOMETHING) and she joins them out of desperation because the police turn up; Scott has a bit of a cry and Magneto talks through his daddy issues with him; and finally the 60s X-Men turn up to tell them they're naughty mutants. This is so mired in X-history and continuity I can't be arsed, and I can't see how this is much fun for anyone else who isn't bought into the whole X-thing.
Avengers #1: Tony decides the Avengers need to go to Mars to take over the planet as a base, because the Avengers aren't big enough, but it turns out somebody else had already had the same idea. They have a fight and Cap gets away and back to earth, where he plans a rescue mission because of guilt over Civil War or the Illuminati or some other crossover I didn't read and couldn't care less about. To do this, he expands the Avengers membership to 13 which might stretch the defention of "Earth's Mightiest Heroes" slightly.
Deadpool #3: Even by the standards of the first two, this is like watching a hyperactive kid running round zinging bits of furniture. It works, but by God it's tiring to watch. Two issues in one sitting might just be too much, although Deadpool acting as the editor's explanatory boxout is a moment of greatness.
Iron Man #3: Blah blah extremis blah blah sick girl blah blah guys in super suits fight with rays. Only one real Landism to report, which is the first panel Firebrand's in. No woman's ever sat like that though, surely? And what's up with her left thigh? Poor quality lightboxing there. I'm sure there's something to like here but I'm not seeing it.
Red She-Hulk #60: The Red Hulk Avengers fail to capture her, but notice she doesn't seem to be as bad as they think she is. Except Cap. He hates her. Machine Man discovers that the Earth actually is the supercomputer from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and the Eye in the Pyramid tells him that SHIELD has it built. Because of this he chooses to help her beat up a super-soldier training camp run by DUN DUN DUN...! General Fortean! Presumably mates with Brigadier Blavatsky? It's really not very good, this.
Thunderbolts #1: General Ross' Rulk is recruiting bad guys, so obviously picks the Punisher, Deadpool and Elektra. This aims for Ennis (Punisher, and bits of Preacher seem the most obvious comparators) and mainly succeeds, but the retouching of Steve Dillon's artwork to give Elektra bigger boobs sticks in the throat a bit too much to take it seriously. We'll see where it goes from here.