The long-lost FH2I contributor is back, and all it took was the latest Marvel “company-wide” crossover event to rein me in.  I’m talking about Seige by Brian Michael Bendis and Oliver Coipel, the 4-issue mini-series dealing with the “problem” of Asgard, homeland to Thor and his fellow gods, floating above the rural town of Broxton, OK.  SPOILERS AHEAD…

Now remember, in the few posts I have made, I’ve shared my dislike for these  big events that claim huge ramifications as a result.  I often feel like the best stories are told within a single title, based around a single character or team – not told in nearly every comic a publisher puts out and involving nearly every known (or unknown) character in the brand.  You may also recall that I am not a weekly comic shop goer.  Since January I’ve only been to the shop 3-4 times and have probably only picked up 15-20 comics in that time span.  I’m nowhere near an authority on the matter.  And picking up Seige was a bit intimidating as I was in the dark (no pun intended) about much of what had been happening in the Marvel U leading up to this event.

All that being said – Seige delivered, and may have just delivered Marvel a returning devout customer.  The first I heard about Seige was that it was going to finally unite Marvel’s Big 3 heroes – Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor – who had been at odds for most of the last 4-5 years (more?).  While fun titles such as New Avengers emerged during that time, the fans were not being treated to the classic Avengers team that revolved around the Big 3.  And if you are like me, it got stale after a while.  So, for that main reason Seige had piqued my interest.

Now I know the team-up of the Big 3 was short-lived – Steve Rogers will no longer be Captain America as he hands the shield over full-time to Bucky Barnes.  But, that’s not going to last forever (I hope) and at least they are on the right track.  The Avengers will finally feel like the Avengers again.

What I really loved about Seige was that it was so much more than this simple reunification that originally got me interested.  In many ways it was a reclaiming of the true essence of the Marvel Universe.  Much had change in that past few years, and for obsessive-compulsive traditionalists it became really hard to bear.  But think about it – we found out that many of the heroes we loved in stories we loved were really aliens (see Secret Invasion), we watched as Earth’s Mightiest Heroes split up and we’re replaced by many heroes no one ever pictured as Avengers, we watched Norman Osborn (the once dead Spidey arch-nemesis Green Goblin) gain control of the top defense department in the government (see Dark Reign), flagship marvel hero Captain America was killed off, and, oh yeah, being a super-hero became illegal unless you became government toolie (see Civil War).  And I imagine I’m leaving stuff out.  Bottom line is a lot of stuff went down, and in many ways the landscape changed in the Marvel U (as they promised), many times not for better.  I personally stopped reading comics because I just didn’t care about this all new Marvel world that was crafted.

So Seige brings the world’s greatest superheroes together again in an event I’d never imagined I’d care so much about – the defense of Asgard against Norman Osborn’s rogue Dark Avengers team of mostly villains disguised as heroes.   As Asgard falls, the classic Avengers and heroes emerge, putting their differences aside to aid Thor, and once and for all set things straight in the world – the way it would have always been.  Osborn is defeated, arrested, and his true (green) color is revealed.   Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, and all the favorites show why they are the heroes, making Osborn’s teams look like the rag-tag wannabes they are.  Finally, the Marvel U is beginning to look like, well… the Marvel U.

We also got some huge fights thanks mostly to the Sentry (who was really under the full-control of his evil side, the Void), and some long-overdue closure to the saga of the Golden Guardian of Good.  His first big battle with Ares provided perhaps the most jaw-dropping moment of the series when he quite literally ripped the god of war into two pieces from head to toe – intestines and guts spilling everywhere.  The battle with Thor took nearly everything out of the Son of Odin, and absolutely everything from the Sentry in what was really the only right way to kill him off.  On paper, the only hero who matches up to Sentry is Thor (and I suppose the Hulk too, but he’s been just a bit preoccupied).  Having tried the old loss of memory trick one too many times, in a very brief moment of clarity, Robert Reynolds asks the Thunder God to kill him to protect the world.  Thor reluctantly but definitively obliges, sacrificing the Sentry and finally laying the Void to rest.

I’ve always thought the Sentry was a cool concept, and the original mini-series by Paul Jenkins and Jae Lee ranks as one of my favorites.  But, I always wondered how he fit in as a full-time character.  The idea got more legs than I think anyone could have imagined and deservedly so.  It was finally time to say goodbye though, and I think they did so in a most honorable way.  The Sentry dies a lesser known character in the Marvel pantheon, and yet true fans still know that there are few as powerful as he was.  I’m sure we will eventually see the Sentry again, hopefully outside of regular continuity for the foreseeable future.  But this death felt like a big deal, at least to me, and that is pretty impressive considering the character started out as a hoax.

And so, the point is that much of the Marvel U has been restored to the way things were before all these big cross-over events shook the world to its very core.  The Big 3 (at least to some extent) are working together again, the ridiculous Super Human Registration Act has been overturned, and all the mainstays are alive and kicking.  And  I’m very excited about collecting comics again.  A restarted Avengers and the new Steve Rogers-led Secret Avengers sound like a very promising jumping on point to me.  Marvel is calling it the Heroic Age, and maybe Marvel is starting to realize that change is only good for time.  After a while, we want our heroes back.  Seige, in my opinion, has accomplished that.

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