New Avengers #1

"Memento Mori"
written by Jonathan Hickman
pencils by Steve Epting
inks by Rick Magyar with Steve Epting
colors by Frank D'Armata

The best that can be said for the first issue of Hickman's new New Avengers series is that Black Panther is a magnetic personality with a high ceiling as the leader of a new band of superheroes and that Black Swan is a complete badass.  For the most part "Memento Mori" is very standard superhero fare, passable but unimpressive.  The introduction of three young Wakandan novices just to have their maudlin deaths serve as emotional fodder—perhaps the titular "memento"—for Black Panther's rejuvenated willingness to team up with the Illuminati seems particularly contrived.  As does the ever-ballooning stakes of superhero worlds.  EVERY world in INFINITE UNIVERSES is at stake!  The continually elaborate hyperbole does little to enhance the emotional stakes or invest any real meaning into the enterprise.  Instead, it manufactures an empty obligation to care.

Epting's artwork follows in the same tone as Hickman's story.  It is, even at a quick glance, a typical superhero style.  It's lines are crisp, muscles and gear are prominent, and shadow is used liberally to heighten contrast.  Standing, or otherwise still, figures are statuesque, but characters in motion are sometimes awkward and stiff, such as Black Panther's assault on Black Swan.  The notable exception to this—and one of the best visual effects in the issue, though it's one common to Black Panther comics—is his swift, leaping attacks on multiple villains, which are quite kinetic.

[March 2013, digital]