1. Nothing Matters
The biggest complaint I heard while this series was coming out was that nothing mattered big name heroes were dropping dead left and right and it was obvious that they would be back. Marvel putting Thor down for good? Never going to happen especially not in the same year as a Thor movie is coming out either! In one of the AR pieces, Bendis talked about wanting to emulate Jim Starlins epic Infinity Gauntlet storyline where you had all these heroes dying but were miraculously brought back at the end. Thats fine if Bendis wants to do something similar. I mean, the heroes dying didnt bother me much so long as we got a good story out of it and The Infinity Gauntlet is such an awesome book - but thats not what we got. Then the whole nothing matters complaint changed when it became clear that Bendis not only didnt care about killing off major characters (which would immediately be retconned) but that he really didnt care about telling a good story either. Age of Ultron to me is essentially issues 1-5 and then jumps to issue 10 the rest is a separate storyline tacked on to this one to make more money by extending the run. Bendis discards one storyline for another before discarding that and replacing it with another, all the while each new storyine that appeared resembled the Age of Ultron Event we all wanted to read, less and less. It was clear that an Ultron-invades and kills a bunch of popular Marvel heroes storyline was never going to become canon as those heroes cant stay dead and Ultron himself will be back one day too (probably). But at least Bendis couldve committed to telling the main story instead of just the first act, especially when that is what Age of Ultron shouldve been about. But really nothing that happened in this series mattered. The first arc and all those deaths, everything that happened? Didnt matter. The failed futuristic Ultron assassination attempt by Cap, Fury, etc? Didnt matter. The alternate present with all those killed by Morgana le Fey? Didnt matter. Even Wolverines first assassination of Hank Pym didnt matter. Nothing that happens in this book matters at all because its all preamble to the universe-shifting that closes out issue #10. Even though you could argue that nothing mattered in The Infinity Gauntlet because everyone who died came back at the end, at least that book told a good story. Age of Ultron tells a decent first act and then botches the rest of it. The rest of the series fails to entertain and becomes one big confusing mess of time travel anachronisms. The Event which this series centres around the Age of Ultron doesnt matter! Not one bit! Because! it! never! happened! Instead the only thing about the series that has any impact on anything is Wolverine jumping around tearing time, leading into Marvels next Event Infinity. That and introducing Neil Gaimans character Angela into the Marvel Universe and kicking off Galactus new series, Hunger both of which couldve been done separately through other means rather than needing this poorly plotted Event to launch them. Age of Ultron shouldve been a great Event in itself instead of being an extended prologue for Infinity, which is what it ended up being. Yes, you could argue that because of Ultron, Wolverine was forced to time travel he and the others couldnt fight the Ultron drones because Bendis made them way too powerful but that was more a means to an end. Get Wolverine to play around with time leading to time rifts leading to Infinity. Thats a storyline that couldve been done separately rather than shoe-horned into Age of Ultron. Rather than that long-winded setup, it wouldve been a far better Event if it had been about the heroes fight back against Ultrons reign. But thats not what we got we got a jumbled mess of storylines and characters that doesnt hang together well. In other words, a modern Marvel Event. * Did you find Age of Ultron similarly disappointing or did you love it? Let me know in the comments below!