Dark Avengers #5

A majority of this issue is dedicated to Osborn finally defending himself against Clint Barton's rant from a few months ago to us fans. I've been looking forward to this for a few months, but the result is disappointing. The same can be said for the rest of the issue as well.

While reading this you get the feeling Bendis only addresses Barton's rant because he feels he has to, even though he's the one who wrote Barton's rant. The whole thing sounds like a politician's response to a character attack. There's no substance to anything Osborn says. We don't get to see him go crazy, which is the best kind of Osborn. The way he compared himself to Barton, seeing as how they both started off as villains and then became Avengers, was kind of cool. Despite that though, the interview was boring.

Even though I was bored with the interview, I was still a little upset when it was cut short. Maybe I was upset because I was hoping for something cool to finally happen. More than likely, however, the reason for my unease was that he had to leave because aliens were attacking. Come on, Bendis. Aliens? Didn't we get something eerily similar to this in the first four issues? This next arc is going to be extraordinarily lame if the Dark Avengers have to deal with this threat.

One of the main appeals of this series is seeing how these villains interact with each other under the national spotlight. We got to see this in Thunderbolts, but Dark Avengers is a much bigger stage and there are some different characters thrown in. In this issue we finally get to see some of this new interaction. Ares, mistakenly tries to instill some honor in Bullseye and it looks likes Bullseye might be up to some pretty cool retaliation. Moonstone hooks up with Marvel Boy and confuses him about the true nature of the team. And we have Bullseye and Venom. I like Bullseye threatening to kill him. I don't like Venom tattling on him. Bendis writes Venom as quippy as he writes all his other characters. He tries to justify this by having Venom heavily medicated but I still don't like the excuse. Venom is an evil villain, not a hip and clever comedian.

Mike Deodato's art is mostly its usual greatness. His use of shadows is second to none and I particularly enjoyed the facial expresses of every character in the Avengers Tower. He's always been a master of panel layouts and most of this issue reflects that. The interview sequences, however, were a little confusing. My first time reading it, I actually read them out of order. The layout was confusing as to whether or not to read across the double page or just read a page at a time.

Overall, this issue was disappointing. Nothing important happens and a lame new threat shows up. We do get a little character interaction between these lunatics that has potential, however. Hopefully the next few issues will pick up on those and deliver us some good content instead Osborn just reminding us of things we already know.