Full of Sound And Fury...

Some thoughts upon the "ending" of Skrullapalooza:

• Fair is fair, so I should acknowledge that, whatever else its flaws, Skrullapalooza was largely on time. There's certainly some utility, some virtue in actually bringing out a "spine" event for your entire universe in a timely manner. For comparison, we got 8 issues of Secret Invasion in the same time that we've seen 4 issues of Final Crisis. That's not to compare the artistic quality of the two--but in terms of keeping reader interest and maintaining momentum to establish a "shiny new continuity" (not to mention not keeping gosh knows how many other pending projects on hold), Skrullapalooza whooped Final Crisis.
• Perhaps as a consequence of prior delays, have you noticed that these spine events are trickling over less and less into the mainstream continuity? Ever since Civil War and Countdown, Marvel and DC have been less and less willing to have their ongoing series hijacked by inevitably late events. World War Hulk was pretty much ignored in every other Marvel mag--not a mention of NYC being devastated, Avengers Tower and the Baxter Building being flattened, etc--while instead we were given assorted mini-series so we could pretend this really was a universe-wide event. Skrullapalooza did cross over a little more...but the Fantastic Four, Thor, X-Men, Spider-Man, etc, couldn't be bothered to interrupt their own story lines to tie into the "new age" (Quesada's words) of the Marvel Universe--instead we got mini-series by different creative teams. If the patterns of WWH are followed (and if the solicits that have been released so far are an indication) we will never get even a mention in those mags of the universe changing events we've witnessed. Is this a preferable approach? Is it a sign that Marvel editorial has broken down into exclusive fiefdoms, where "I ain't tying into your crossover" is the rule rather than the exception? Discuss.
• One final bit of praise: however oddly and illogically it's been set up, it does sound as if there could be an awful lot of interesting story lines coming out of Dark Reign. Of course, I reserve judgment until some of those things actually happen, but there is some potential here.

There, that wasn't so hard, was it?

Ah, but there's' the flip side, isn't there? Why, on the whole, was Skrullapalooza such a disappointment?

• How, precisely, do the heroes win? In theory, the Skrulls have millions of soldiers at their disposal, now with Magic Super-Skrull Combo Powers. Not to mention an obvious advantage in space-age weaponry. I mean, when all of the heroes gather in one spot for the final confrontation, why not just freaking overwhelm them, outnumbering them 1,000-1, and with more powers? Or better, why not just launch a nuke or 12 from orbit?!? While the heroes are making their "last stand," why not just ignore them, leave NYC alone and take over the rest of the damn world? Bendis never seemed to grasp that we were facing a full-out planetary invasion by an entire star-spanning empire, as the heroes seem to win with less effort than they expended against the Red Hood's gang. The outcome is illogical, and rushed--a total anti-climax.
  
• Speaking of rushed outcomes, what happens to all the Skrulls? I know we'll surely get some details in the future, but wouldn't an invasion on this scale by shapeshifters cause a massive upswing in global paranoia, an inability to have the trust to create a new world order with a new S.H.I.E.L.D. and whatever else Norman Osborn is setting up? And we know there are more Skrulls out there--at the very least, Skrull Jarvis escaped with the baby. Shouldn't we have a planet where nobody trusts anybody anymore, were the merest interaction requires biological proof that you're not Skrull, where any and every problem is blamed on those damned shapeshifters? Apparently not--everyone is "phew, that was close" and is going back to trusting one man with unchecked power...this time just Osborn instead of Stark.
• Speaking of Stark--"World's Most Wanted?" "Will Stark be indicted?!?" For what, precisely? I shouldn't have to point this out, but according to Bendis' own timeline, S.H.I.E.L.D. was infiltrated before the Civil War (before Stark took over), The Avengers were infiltrated before the Civil War. It's not as if he forced the world to buy Stark technology. Sure, he's a colossal doofus and a f#$%-up, but it seems obvious that the invasion would have happened even had we not had a Super Human Registration Act, even if Stark had never become director of S.H.I.E.L.D., even if everyone were one big happy Marvel family. Despite his crimes during the Civil War, Stark is mostly blameless here...and the populace of the Marvel Universe looks fickle and stupid (they now no longer care about Stamford??).
• Speaking of blame--Nick Fury trusted Spider-Woman, who was the freaking Skrull Queen, and dismissed Ms. Marvel as a Skrull. So much for all that time he spent in hiding sussing things out with bulletin boards and red circles. Where the heck is the public outrage at Fury for abandoning his post in time of invasion and running a triple agent who was actually behind said invasion?!?
• Who was a Skrull? As most people predicted, nobody important. Just as with DC's Millennium maxi-series 20 years ago, where we were promised earth-shattering revelations about what long-time characters we actually Manhunters and got bupkis, Skrullapalooza had no courage to do anything truly shocking. Jarvis? Please. She-Thing?? Stop the presses!! And making the cop-out even worse than it was, apparently everyone who had been replaced turned up alive and well. Cowardly, Marvel, cowardly.
• Speaking of cop-out city, not only do the good guys win ridiculously easily, with no casualties (even if you believe the Wasp is dead--she's not--than somehow miraculously returning Mockingbird from the grace counterbalances that), but we can't even remain true to the premises established. Stark tech is all compromised--oh, except for Maria Hill's LMD and ray gun and jetpack, conveniently. And except for Stark just happening to have "another suit of armor, not tied to the Starktech mainframe"--yet it still seems to have all of the capabilities of his old armor. And except for Nick Fury's big ass guns and magic teleporter. And the Scarlet Spider suits. And...well, you get the idea: total Plot-Convenience Theater. Pretend that you've completely disabled things, but actually not when you find you've plotted yourself into a corner.

Overall, though, the biggest flaw of Secret Invasion was the pathetic loss of so much potential. Bendis and Yu seemed content to shower us with splash pages and epic crowd scenes, rather than actually telling the story. The entire planet was under attack by an alien species bent on conquest, and we beat it with a Sharks vs. Jets rumble in the park? DC's Invasion! and Our Worlds At War we far better, more convincing depictions of that premise. They're Skrulls--anybody could be one of them!! No, we got Kirby the Pup. We're going to show what happens when we deprive our heroes of their most important technology...no, we're not, really. Look, all the Skrulls are Super-Skrulls now, they can do crazy things with their powers!! Not so much--aside from growing big, did we actually see a Skrull using anything more than a generic power beam within the series? Nope...just lots of static crowd shots of crazy quilt Skrulls not actually doing much.

The actual series itself was padded beyond belief, giving us, at most, 3 issues of content over 8 issues. Yet despite that, almost all of the big revelations took place elsewhere, in New Avengers, Mighty Avengers, and Avengers: Initiative. It's almost funny--Bendis was apparently dead set on showing off how clever he'd been by showing us every clue he'd planted over the last 4+ years, every single moment of a couple of people being taken over and clandestine meetings and filling in background, all over the last who-knows-how-many issues of the Avengers mags. But if he had spent 1/10th of that effort on the actual invasion itself, and actually had something happen during it, it probably could have been a decent story. But instead we got huge build-up; deeeeeeeeeeeppppp background presented elsewhere; little of interest during the invasion aside from stilted, poorly drawn crowd fight scenes; and a rushed transition to the new status quo. For $3.99 per issue.

That was an awful lot of time and effort just to get to "Norman Osborn runs the planet now."