BHOC: AVENGERS #180

This next issue of AVENGERS was the second half of a two-parter that editor in chief Jim Shooter commissioned from Tom DeFalco in order to help him get ahead on the title, which was suffering as Jim’s day job was eating up all of his time. I believe that this was the first story DeFalco had published at Marvel, though he wrote some shorter pieces earlier as a bit of a try-out. And while this story wasn’t life-altering, it was a solid base-hit effort that showed that DeFalco knew how to put together a workable super hero story. He’d eventually succeed Shooter in the editor in chief position some years later.

The artist on the story was Jim Mooney, who had a career that stretched back to the Golden Age of Comics and who was a close friend of Stan Lee’s. Jim had been doing work for Marvel for more than a decade at this point, mostly on the horror/monster titles as well as providing finishes over John Romita on AMAZING SPIDER-MAN for a while. He wasn’t a hot commodity, but he was a reliable storyteller and draftsman, and Shooter always liked that sort of an underappreciated artist and worked to keep them around. I don’t know that AVENGERS was the sort of assignment you’d typically think of for Mooney, but he did a really great job with these issue regardless, with Mike Esposito contributing his by-the-numbers inking to the finished pages.

Last issue, a team of Avengers accompanied the mutant Bloodhawk and his Teacher back to the South Sea island of Maura with the intent of replacing a purloined mystic totem. But arriving there, they discovered that the guardian of the island has come to life and is rampaging across the place. Meanwhile, back in Manhattan, a costumed super villain calling himself the Stinger has been taking out the Avengers one by one, and he waylays the members of the group who stayed in New York. So the team is unknowingly facing peril on two fronts. And before the Avengers can replace the totem and halt the monster’s rampage, Bloodhawk loses control of himself and flies off with the thing.

While Thor and the Vision attempt to bring the great monolith to a halt, and find their efforts insufficient to the task, the Beast takes off into the jungle in pursuit of Bloodhawk. This leads to an aerial battle between the two, one in which the Beast is forced to rely on his agility to counter his foe’s ability to fly and avoid his deadly talons. Eventually, the Beast is able to take the talisman away from Bloodhawk, and he races back to where his comrades are battling the monolithic creature. Thor is able to provide the Beast with a boost to the colossus’ forehead where the totem is meant to be inserted, and Hank McCoy is able to get it in place, thus causing the creature to return to being immobile, lifeless stone.

In the aftermath of the battle, the snarky and ill-socialized Bloodhawk tells the Avengers to get lost. He’s suffering from a bout of self-loathing due to his mutant body. But the Beast steps up and tells Bloodhawk that his situation was no better when he was younger, and that there is a man who helped him who may be able to help Bloodhawk as well. Moved by Hank’s entreaty, Bloodhawk hesitantly agrees to accompany the Avengers back to the United States where the Beast can introduce him to Professor X.

Meanwhile, back at Avengers Mansion, the Stinger has set up a private auction where he intends to sell the captive Avengers to the highest bidder. He reveals that he had been just a regular businessman who bought a few specialized gizmos from the Tinkerer in order to see his fortune more criminally. It’s a bit tough to believe that a guy with a few Tinkerer gadgets could take out all of these Avengers, but that’s what the story says, so let’s go with it. When the remaining Avengers and Bloodhawk return home, rather than running for the hills like any sane person, Stinger attempts to fight them. And to be fair, he does unbelievably well against the Vision, the Beast and Thor for a guy of his power level. Maybe they were tired from the flight or something.

At a key moment when the Stinger is about to back-shoot Thor, Bloodhawk comes racing in and takes the shot for the Thunder God. I can’t say whether this zap would have proven fatal to the Thunder God, but it certainly does for the guest-star. By this point, the Beast has freed the other Avengers, and they dogpile on top of the Stinger until he’s not moving any longer. And in the final frames, DeFalco implies that the father who had abandoned Bloodhawk when he was born a mutant was actually the Teacher himself, and that he’s proud of his son. It’s a nice little emotional end beat.