I recently finished the Avengers Prelude Comic Series, Fury's Big Week. The series was 8 issues long, written by Chris Yost & Eric Pearson, with art duties covered by Luke Ross & Daniel HDR. I'll put the spoilers from the series at the bottom, so you can read the review without finding out the major details.
The series was fun. Basically, it focuses on Nick Fury, Black Widow, Hawkeye and Agent Coulson as they deal with the events that happened in the MCU as they happened - including Hulk's rampage at Culver University, Tony Stark's birthday binge and the discovery of Mjolnir.
It felt very much like the series was just trying to tie up all of the events together into one cohesive storyline. The writers didn't really have free reign over the story - obviously - but it was fun to read how they handled all of the crazy shit that was going on. The pacing was good, with each issue ending on a cliff-hanger, considering I kind of knew what was going to happen from the movies I still got a sense of anticipation.
One of the interesting parts of the series was the characters - you get a much better feel for how SHIELD operates in this comic series than the movies, especially the relationships between the agents. I found Hawkeye particularly interesting, mostly because we've hardly seen him in the movies. Clint Barton is portrayed in the comics as laid back and kind of funny. At one point Fury says, "He's one of my best men, and good for a laugh from time to time." I didn't really get this kind of vibe from Renner in Thor, so it'll be interesting to see how he's portrayed when he's fleshed out in the Avengers. Black Widow is also shown to be pretty badass, and Fury's relations with his team seem to be much friendlier than i expected - he treats them much more like friends than employees.
The art in the comics was great, not really ambitious but the characters are drawn well and there are a few iconic scenes recreated from the movies.
Overall, the comic series wasn't ambitious by any means, but it fulfilled it's goal in putting together all of the movies in the MCU so far with a solid narrative, whilst tying up a few important loose ends that hadn't been addressed. These loose ends are the SPOILERS, which I'll now put below.
SPOILERS
We get to see what happened to THE DESTROYER after Thor. It is taken away by Coulson and SHIELD, and a year later (around the time Cap is found), Coulson checks in with the research team to find that they can actually CONTROL the Destroyer. As in, activate it and make it blow up shit. The level of control they have isnt specified, whether they can just turn it on or actually choose its targets. Coulson tells the scientist he wants them to "Dismantle the thing and make it about a hundred times smaller...And put a trigger on it!"
THE LEADER is also shown in the series. After we see him mutating on the floor in TIH, Black Widow shows up and organises a team to seize all of the property. The Leader begins to give a speech about he will take over the world, at which point Romanoff shoots him in the leg. I'm pretty sure we see him in some kind of suspended animation tank at the end, but I'm not sure, but he is taken into custody by SHIELD.
It wasn't shown in the movie, but apparently SHIELD were monitoring Banner throughout the entire TIH. Black Widow is sent to run interference by Fury at Culver University but ultimately fails and Banner is taken in by General Ross. It is at this point we see Fury looks at Ross as more of an enemy and goes to speak to him about his actions. This makes the extra-credits scene in TIH kind of off, as Fury wouldn't send Stark to see Ross at the bar, and that isnt mentioned in the comics either.
What did you think of the series? Comment Below!!