I didn't buy this in 2001, but I suppose it would've just made me mad then: Maximum Security #3, "Whatever the Cost!" Written by Kurt Busiek, pencils by Jerry Ordway, inks by Will Blyberg, Paul Ryan, and Mark McKenna.
This wasn't as big a crossover as some: after the Dangerous Planet one-shot, it was three issues and sixteen tie-ins. Offhand, I only recall one of the X-Men ones, featuring the return of Cerise from Alan Davis's Excalibur; except it was set in the middle of that stretch where Nightcrawler was going to be a priest and blech. Ooh, wait: the Marvel Knights tie-in was the Punisher vs. an alien, that was a bit of all right. Anyway, the gist was, the various races of the universe decide maybe earth is too dangerous to just leave alone, and they opt to turn the planet into a prison, dumping all sorts of past alien bad guys on earth!
The whole thing is revealed to be a plot by the believed-dead Supreme Intelligence, involving trapping Ego the Living Planet on earth and draining his power to give to Ronan the Accuser. Actually, at least part of that plan seems to work, with the Kree seemingly moving against several worlds to return to power; but that plot is left open as the Avengers in space are recalled home by the current team leader...USAgent?
It's the riot-cop costume, not my favorite. He mentions federal authority there, but that only seems to apply like every other time for the team...USAgent was actually the viewpoint character for most of this series, having found some of the first alien prisoners; and Busiek walks a line between making him sympathetic (it's his case, after all) and as much of a dick as usual. He defends Quasar until he's able to absorb the essence of Ego and de-power Ronan; but instead of shaking Cap's hand in the end, he throws a little hissy fit about the silent majority that pisses any goodwill away.
Quasar had to leave earth to keep Ego in check, and I'm not sure if that was ever explained before he was killed off in Annihilation. Professor X also returned here, he had only been in space with the mutant Skrulls since Uncanny #379, not even a year.
Yeah I remember this. I have the IM tie-in myself.
ReplyDeleteMan, Agent is even more of a dick than usual here. Wonder what bug crawled up his ass.
Of course later on he'd lose his arms, only to have them grown back, or something like that, during Jeff Parker's run on Thunderbolts.
The bigger question for me is why 2000AD never sued Marvel for ripping off Judge Dredd's look.
Man, I don't remember this at all! And from the looks of it, I'm glad.
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