Iron Man vs Captain America vs Spiderman (Part 1/3) (Mai 2024)
The Avengers, echipa americană de supereroi de benzi desenate, a cărei listă care se schimbă frecvent includea adesea unele dintre cele mai populare personaje din universul Marvel Comics. Biruită ca „cei mai puternici super-eroi ai Pământului”, echipa a fost creată de scriitorul Stan Lee și artistul Jack Kirby, și a debutat în The Avengers nr. 1 (septembrie 1963).
Inspirată de succesul din Liga de Justiție din America a DC Comics, care a prezentat personaje precum Superman, Batman și Wonder Woman, Marvel a căutat să-și unească cele mai mari nume într-o singură carte. The Avengers, însă, nu era altceva decât o copie carbonică a Justice League. Echipa lui Marvel s-a caracterizat printr-un conflict intern și și-a dat datoria în mare parte mecanizărilor unui ticălos. Loki, zeul norvegian al răutății, îi manevrează pe fratele său jumătate, zeul Thor, într-o luptă împotriva lui Hulk. Această fracas atrage, de asemenea, atenția lui Iron Man și a duo-ului de luptă împotriva criminalității Ant-Man și viespii. Deși la început acest cvartet consideră că Hulk este răufăcătorul responsabil pentru un act de sabotaj feroviar, Loki apare rapid ca vinovat și suferă o înfrângere decisivă. Înainte ca eroii să se împrăștie,Ant-Man sugerează că fac din asocierea lor una permanentă, iar Răzbunătorii (nume sugerat de viespe) se nasc.
Formația echipei s-a schimbat aproape imediat, odată cu plecarea lui Hulk și inducerea căpitanului America, care fusese înghețat într-un bloc de gheață de la sfârșitul celui de-al Doilea Război Mondial.
În următoarea sa naștere, The Avengers s-a distins în continuare de Justice League of America, punând la îndoială ideea eroismului în sine. În timp ce membrii JLA erau cu toții uniciun, eroi, mai mult de câțiva Răzbunători și-au început cariera ca răufăcători. Când Thor, Giant-Man (fostul Ant-Man, care mai târziu și-ar schimba din nou numele în Goliat), și Wasp să părăsească simultan echipa, căpitanul America se află în fruntea unei noi echipe de Răzbunători, fiecare dintre ei având un trecut pe jos.. Hawkeye, care arunca cu arcul, a luptat anterior împotriva lui Iron Man, în timp ce Quicksilver, un speedster mutant care amintește de Flash's DC, și Scarlet Witch, o tânără cu puterea de a modifica probabilitățile, fuseseră membri ai Frăției Mutanților Răi împreună cu tatăl lor, Magneto. Tema răscumpărării este consolidată atunci când Wonder Man,introdus ca răufăcător în The Avengers nr. 9 (octombrie 1964), se întoarce din morți ca erou și își ocupă locul în rândurile Răzbunătorilor.
From its inception, The Avengers was a hit, and the series’ initial success doubtless owes much to the power-packed renderings of Kirby, who had not only cocreated Captain America with writer Joe Simon in 1941 but had also collaborated with Lee on such Marvel mainstay titles as The Fantastic Four, The Incredible Hulk, and Journey into Mystery. Artist Don Heck ably took over the penciling reins after Kirby’s departure, and Lee continued writing the book until he handed the series off to Roy Thomas in 1966. Over the next several years Thomas worked with such notable Marvel artists as Heck, John Buscema, Gene Colan, Barry Windsor-Smith, Sal Buscema, and Neal Adams, whose brief run on the title in 1971 is widely regarded as among the finest Avengers work ever done.
Under Thomas’s direction, story arcs in The Avengers became increasingly complex and character-oriented, flowering into a superpowered melodrama of operatic proportions. The “Kree-Skrull War,” an intergalactic saga that placed the Avengers at the centre of a battle between two alien races, was perhaps the finest expression of this trend. Among the many notable characters introduced during Thomas’s tenure were such team members as the Vision (an emotionally tortured android with the ability to make himself intangible) and such villains as the Grim Reaper (the vengeance-crazed brother of Wonder Man) and Ultron (a world-conquering robot who sought to destroy his creator, Hank Pym, the former Ant-Man). Thomas left the series after issue no. 104 (October 1972), to be succeeded by Steve Englehart, who authored a seminal time-travel arc involving the villain Kang the Conqueror and his time-displaced doppelgangers Rama-Tut and Immortus. Other writers in this period included Jim Shooter—who crafted “the Korvac Saga,” a massive tale involving cosmic forces that span the entire Marvel Universe—Roger Stern, and John Byrne.
During the 1970s and’80s, the Avengers’ membership would turn over several times while growing dramatically. By the mid-1980s the New York-based team had reached such unwieldy proportions that a second squad—the West Coast Avengers—was formed in Los Angeles, under the initial leadership of Hawkeye. In 1989 a team of misfits styling itself as the Great Lakes Avengers debuted, but it never achieved official standing with either of the bicoastal teams. The 1990s was replete with Avengers miniseries and other ancillary titles executed by various creative teams, including Kurt Busiek’s hugely popular, time-spanning Avengers Forever (1998–99). Busiek chronicled most of the team’s adventures in The Avengers from 1997 to 2002, collaborating with artists such as George Pérez, Stuart Immonen, and John Romita, Jr., before leaving the series in the hands of writer Geoff Johns. In 2002 writer Mark Millar and artist Bryan Hitch collaborated on a reinvention of the Avengers for Marvel’s “Ultimate” line. Titled The Ultimates, the book boasted strong sales throughout its run, but initial critical enthusiasm waned as the series progressed.
A young team of superheroes bands together in Young Avengers, a series that debuted in 2005. The book was praised for its light tone and its realistic depiction of relationships, particularly that of same-sex couple Hulkling and Wiccan. During Marvel’s “Civil War” event (2006–07), two rival teams of Avengers emerged. Iron Man organized the official team, the Mighty Avengers, who supported and enforced the Superhuman Registration Act, a law that mandated that superheroes divulge their identities to the government. In contrast, the New Avengers were an underground team of heroes who opposed the act and included Luke Cage, Spider-Man, and Wolverine as members. Later, Norman Osborn, the original Green Goblin, became a high ranking government official and organized his own Dark Avengers, including disguised supervillains. After Osborn fell from power, there was again one Avengers team, although it was not long before secondary Avengers squads emerged once more. Debuting in 2010 were Avengers Academy, which detailed the Avengers’ training program for young superhumans; Secret Avengers, about a superhuman team of covert operatives; and a relaunched New Avengers. Following the events of the Avengers vs. X-Men crossover in 2012, Uncanny Avengers launched with a lineup that included members of both of Marvel’s premier super teams.
The Avengers were depicted in numerous animated films and television series, and the team made its live-action film debut in The Avengers (2012). Directed and cowritten by Joss Whedon, the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the film united the various properties in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in a blockbuster production that was a hit with both fans and critics. The Avengers earned more than $1.5 billion worldwide, making it one of the top-grossing films of all time. Whedon and cast reunited for the sequel, The Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), which was the screen debut of one of the group’s most-implacable foes. Joe and Anthony Russo, who had helmed the Marvel films Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) and Captain America: Civil War (2016), took over in the director’s chair for Avengers: Infinity War (2018). Eighteen films over the span of 10 years had built up to Avengers: Infinity War, whose story pitted virtually every major character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe against the Mad Titan, Thanos. That massive narrative arc was concluded with Avengers: Endgame (2019).
