Agents of Atlas

What If (vol.1)#9

It started, as these things often do, with an innocent enough question, ‘What if the Avengers Had Fought evil in the 1950’s?’ Without Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, Giant Man or even the Wasp around, the comic takes a deep dig into the past of Marvel Comics before there even was a Marvel Comics Group.

Using the varied and sundry super heroes of Atlas comics as a make-shift team, the comic presents Venus, 3-D Man, Marvel Boy, Gorilla Man, Human Robot and the Great Video as the super hero super team of the era. As a kid looking for comics at a flea market I distinctly remember this cover (a direct lift from the Giant Size X-Men #1 in which Gil Kane represented the classic team shocked by these newcomers). Maybe it was the fact that the only characters I recognized were freaking out in typical Kirby over-emotiveness or the sheer madness of the heroes that were chosen, but it certainly made an impression.

Agents of Atlas

Many years later Jeff Parker decided to revive the idea with his Agent of Atlas miniseries. Building upon the concept of a secret super hero team that predated the Avengers, Parker’s series tells the tale of a team assembled by Special Agent Jimmy Woo to battle the villainous Yellow Claw. Formed under the auspices of President Roosevelt, the team is a success but deemed far too outlandish for the time. Years later, Woo finds himself in a tight situation and his former teammates come out swinging to rescue their leader from danger. The series took an odd turn by revealing that Woo is actually the Yellow Claw’s ancestor and heir to a criminal empire. Rather than fight the bad guys, the Agents of Atlas decide to use the tools of evil against itself by acting the part of the Yellow Claw’s Atlas Foundation.

Given the mood of comics when the initial mini-series was published back in 2006, Agents of Atlas was a wild ride of retro-comic fun. A unique mixture of rollicking action and outlandish humor, this is a superb new series and I’m happy that Marvel has decided to publish it as an ongoing comic. One of the most interesting and fresh takes on old unused ideas, the mini-series generated lots of positive word-of-mouth press. The new series looks to be more of the same.

Agents of Atlas #3 hits the shelves today at your local comic shop.

Recommended:
Agents of Atlas (Hardcover collection including What If#9 and several vintage stories)