Inhumanity - The Awakening #1

Writer - Matt Kindt

Art - Paul Davidson, Jean-Francois Beaulieu

It's a major event in the Marvel universe,so the youth get their own title again.  There are all characters I enjoy.  I was a big fan of the late Avengers Academy and the recent Avengers Arena story.  So, when held up against Infinity's underwhelming "The Hunt" story, where does this fall?

Sadly, not far away.   This is a social media driven story.  When done organically within the story, it can be fun.  See the Beatle in Superior Foes of Spider-Man.  The degree to which it is embedded in this story is off-putting.  There is far too much telling of the story add opposed to showing us the story.  What we are shown is not very dynamic and misses the opportunity to tell a powerful story about change.  The social media aspect cheapens the message.

The core Inhumanity story is starting off fairly slowly, and almost feels like an oversight.  I expected more fanfare regarding such a big change.  It seems it was slipped into Infinity without the intention to really do anything with it quite yet.  What we've gotten seems forced and not as important as I would have assumed.

The art is nothing to write home about.  The character designs are alright, but a majority of the faces look similar.  The word boxes permeate the issue, making the art that much harder to decipher.  Without those, the art team might have been able to spread out their setups a bit, but they had their hands tied from the get-go it seems.

The Verdict...

They're kids, but they've people too.  Heroes in the own right.  Too many writers focus on their youth, really alienating some readers like myself.  The reliance on social media here killed me, really sapping the enjoyment of what should have been a fun story.