Avengers West Coast in the 1990s
Avengers West Coast had such high hopes and great expectations. With John Byrne at the helm as writer and artist it seemed as though the series was headed toward unexpected heights. The previous decade was marred by overly complicated plots, sub-par artwork, and a team that seemed to be rudderless. Every story ended the way it began. There wasn’t anything big that happened that really shook up the status quo. Until Byrne came along that was. Unfortunately, his run on the Avengers West Coast would proved to be short lived, sending the title back into the swirling mediocrity that sustained it in the previous decade. But, I’m getting ahead of myself. Time to start at the beginning:
Byrne’s run started off the decade wrapping up the Acts of Vengeance. Other than the big finale in Avengers West Coast #55, Byrne’s treatment of this company wide event appeared to be him just doing whatever the hell he wanted. It was filler for the story he was building up in between the pages involving the Scarlet Witch, Magneto, and Immortus. It was an excuse for Byrne to draw big page chewing action scenes with the Avengers fighting giganic monsters. The final chapter of the Acts of Vengeance saga closed with the Avengers going up against the villain who first brought them all together, Loki. I’m sure that Byrne — a character who respects the legacy of Silver Age Marvel — must have insisted on doing if he was to participate in this crossover at all, but that’s speculation on my part.
Unfortunately, Byrne’s run on the title would come to an abrupt end two issues later. Issues #56 and 57 began a new chapter where Magneto turns the Scarlet Witch over to the dark side. This following the collapse of her marriage and the revelation that her children weren’t actually real. It appeared as though Byrne was going to bring back the original Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, or at the very least Magneto and his “children”. At least that’s what it seems to me as I recall that that years collection of Marvel Universe trading cards featured a Brotherhood card that showcased the version that appeared in this story.
The way John Byrne tells it is that he wanted to do a storyline where Immortus uses the Scarlet Witch to alter reality in a way he sees fit. It was supposed to be a major storyline that would cross over with all books. Tom DeFalco, the Editor-in-Chief at Marvel at the time, did not like the idea and went with Acts of Vengeance instead. Byrne — who had near autonomy at Marvel at the time — went ahead to tell his story in the pages of Avengers West Coast exclusively. When DeFalco found out that John was doing the storyline he rejected he was furious. The two butted heads and Byrne ultimately quit in protest.
It was then left to Roy and Dann Thomas to clean up house. Joining them on the take over of the book was artist Paul Ryan, who was inking the book at the time. As far as art goes, Ryan has a similar style to Byrne but unique enough to call his own. This would have been a smooth transition if the abrupt change in creative team didn’t require fill in issues to make sure the book made it out on time. There were three fill-in issues during this period and I want to talk about those before I get into how the Thomas’ dealt with Byrne’s story. As far as filler issues go, they are some rough reads. If you want my opinion, skip issues #58, 59, and especially issue #64. They are rushed stories with terrible art. Especially issue #64 which is written by Terry Kavanagh (one of the worst Marvel writers of all time) and just some hideous artwork by Chris Wozniak.
The Thomas’ would write on Avengers West Coast together until issue #96, with Roy taking over the writing duties entirely. He would continue writing the book until the 2nd last issue. Regular artist on the series was David Ross from issue #71 until the end of the title with the odd issue being done by fill in artists. As an artist, Ross’ work started off pretty rough but his work improved over the course of the series, finding his stride around issue #91. I particularly like his work during the later part of the series run, however I’m sure that my opinion is somewhat tainted by nostalgia as I remember collecting Avengers West Coast at that time when I was only 11 years old (I’m fucking old guys!)
Where the series really needs some critiquing is the work of the writers. Roy Thomas is a legend in the industry and particularly at Marvel Comics. He was the guy who carried on when Stan Lee stepped away from writing many titles in the late 60s. Thomas was responsible for writing one of the most iconic runs of the mainline Avengers books. He is responsible for so many great story lines and characters. Unfortunately, he doesn’t bring any of that magic to Avengers West Coast.
When he and Dann took over after John Byrne they were hired to clean up house for DeFalco. Maybe it was the rushed nature of the sudden creative shift, but a number of plotlines that Byrne was starting to build were almost immediately dropped. Sure, we get a conclusion to the Scarlet Witch/Magneto/Immortus plotline but other things were torpedoed almost immediately. The Avengers getting served an eviction notice is dropped, Tigra’s reversion to a feral creature had to be handled in Avengers Spotlight, Byrne’s attempt to revive the original Brotherhood of Evil Mutants was dead in the water, and the Torch’s search for the remains of his former partner Toro was all but forgotten after issue #65. In fact, the Human Torch — who Byrne made a big deal bringing back — was very quickly shuffled off the title like an afterthought. Although he would in turn start making regular appearances in Namor the Sub-Mariner (another John Byrne book) his story was taken into a different direction.
The other issue with the Thomas run was that the romantic drama between Wonder Man, the Vision, and the Scarlet Witch was just as quickly dropped. The will they-or-won’t they drama between Simon and Wanda was quickly nixed and the two quickly shifted into a mutually accepted plutonic friendship. The possibility of a romance between the two characters wouldn’t be explored again until a few years later in Kurt Busiek’s run on Avengers.
The other issue was that, at first, it didn’t seem like the Thomas’ were entirely sure who they wanted on the West Coast roster. They would bizarrely choose Machine Man as a potential member in issue #69 and then do nothing with that idea. Machine Man would appear as a reservist during the Operation: Galactic Storm storyline but ultimately his involvement on the west coast team was practically non-existant.
They would shuffle Tigra back into the roster in issue #66 only to rotate her out again by issue #74. We gained Living Lighting and Spider-Woman, but LL would eventually leave to pursue university in issue #94, never really giving the character much room to breath. Spider-Woman would get a lttle more characterization. Finally given somewhat of an origin story in issues #84-86, something she had been lacking for 8 years. Unfortunately, it’s not a very good origin story.
They also couldn’t make up their mind if they wanted Clint Barton to be Hawkeye or return him to being Goliath. Flip-flopping between the two between issues with no real rhyme or reason.
The addition of War Machine to the roster in issue #94, likely done to boost sales given the character’s popularity didn’t quite pan out and the 100th issue featured the death of Mockingbird. However, the story was cancelled two issues later before anything meaningful could be done with that story.
The problem with the Avengers West cast was that there was almost no chemistry between the characters. Even between long standing characters like Iron Man, Hawkeye, and the Scarlet Witch. Everyone is bland. Their interactions are either benign disagreement or arguing with one another. An attempt to create a rivalry between Hawkeye and US Agent (a near reversal of roles between Hawkeye and Captain America from back in the day) doesn’t progress beyond petty bickering.
Any potential for character growth or examination, particularly in light of Mockingbird’s death in issue #100 was squandered.
Another problem with the series was that the AWC didn’t have a very good rogues gallery. During the Thomas run they basically cycle through three different villains: Ultron, the Night Shift, and the Pacific Overlords. Ultron was over exposed at this time and the Pacific Overlords weren’t given much room to breath. Getting the book caught up in Operation: Galactic Storm and the Bloodties (a huge X-Men/Avengers crossover of the time) didn’t help Avengers West Coast find its own voice.
The statement in the letter pages in issue #102 puts it pretty clear: Writers were stuck finding a point to the west coast team. By the end of the run they were so far removed from the base team. There was zero interaction between the two books, not even referential associations. When you take a look at other books in the Marvel line, the Spider-Man and X-Men titles, they cross referenced and cross overed with each other frequently.
After 102 issues, the title was cancelled. Having read the entire run of the book, my conclusion is that the book suffered from not having a very good focus. It’s early run in the 1980s was marred with dense overly long story arcs under Englehart, while the 90s suffered from a lack of direction, zero chemistry and not a very good rogues gallery. I would argue that the only one who had a decent vision for the book was John Byrne and editorial interference prevented him from doing his magic.
Byrne was trying to do the very thing that they assessed was missing some 50 issues later: A connection to the core Avengers book. When he was writing both east and west coast teams he tried to have stories and plotlines cross pollinate between the books. The rosters were interchangeable, meaning you could transplant Captain America or Thor over to the west coast for a few issues without much trouble. That all went away when he left both books. Rather than pick up on this working method, they tried to make AWC stand on its own when it couldn’t do that very well.
Which isn’t to say Thomas’ run was bad. It just was too little too late and I don’t think that was entirely his fault. It’s not a very good run, but it’s far from the worst from the era.
After Avengers West Coast getting cancelled, Marvel tried to go edgier by having the team reinvented as Force Works. I’ll talk about that at greater length when I get into that series, but what I will say here is that it was a product and victim of the mid-90s collectors bubble and contributed to the company’s financial troubles. Force Works would be canceled after 20 odd issues. And that’s the last we’ll hear from the Avengers West Coast until the title was revived for a 3rd volume that only ran for 10 issues in 2018. Even in a day and age where there are at least two or three Avengers titles being published one based on a team stationed in California still doesn’t seem to resonate with readers for some reason.
