The Death of the Avengers

okay so it has been a while since we covered anything other than the X-Men so we're picking back up with Avengers Twilight and the ending of this is going to blow your mind but a little bit of a refresher here this story takes place in the future right where Captain America and all these guys are pretty old Captain America lost the super soldier serum he's recently gotten it back but he's still kind of an old guy that Superheroes Were outlawed because of an event called Heroes day basically hero day was an event where things went sideways where there was like some great big huge conflict battle whatever the case is there was a lot of loss of life and as a result of that Superheroes Were outlawed and so that led to pretty much the Avengers disbanding going into retirement Thor returned to Asgard that was really it the United States is for the most part controlled by corporations at the very top is Stark Industries which is controlled by James Stark the son of Tony Stark and he's been unwittingly manipulated this entire time by The Red Skull who's just now making his move and that's why this opens up with James really referring to Red Skull as Kyle and saying I don't understand because he doesn't know really who the Red Skull is he's not familiar with his character with his villain but even Red Skull says I told you James my name is Johan Now scan quickly son I need to be sure this is one of the really interesting things about the way the red skulls depicted here is it's not like Old Man Logan where he just brings together all the villains and they kill all the superheroes and they take over control of North America and possibly even the world we know that it's not necessarily like that instead it was a very slow low plan that was implemented very methodically and so even though the Red Skull pretended to be somebody he wasn't in order to be a mentor to James and in effect or at least indirectly control the most powerful company in the world which allowed him to control everything in the United States he still does talk to him like a son because there's probably some part of Red's skull that is Fond about James but also he realizes he can't just suddenly start treating him crappy because if he did that it would alienate James so on one part it shows us what you could call The Human Side of The Red Skull but it also shows us how like nefarious this guy is and how willing he is to manipulate anybody to achieve his goal and so even when James says like there's no hidden malware or anything in the system this armor is amazing how did you pull it off that while Red Skull doesn't really go into detail the armor was effectively designed by Ultron now full transparency I thought it was actually Ultron who had implemented everything I thought Ultron was behind all of this like back in the day like when we were covering was it Issue Number Four or whatever it was but of course it turns out to be the Red Skull and he was just using Ultron for his own inss and so of course Ultron has this momentary conversation with the Red Skull when James leaves and ultron's just kind of like you never really intended to honor our deal did you were you just kind of let me out there into the world and I sort of do my own thing and the response of the skull is no I never intended to honor our deal the reality is like machine serve man Ultron I will not allow you to rain when I die people see me as a monster but all I want is a better world and so that's a really interesting idea when it comes to the skull and when it comes to villains in general right it's kind of the old Jedi versus Sith argument they're all trying to achieve the same goal they're just going through different routes to do it right and depending on where you stand and what your philosophical Viewpoint is one is right and the other is wrong which one you side with again is entirely up to you but if the goal is to attain some measure of Peace on a larger level what route do you take right The Avengers would take the route of saying like we need to get out there and fight the good fight and defeat the villains and show people a better way and lead them into a better future villains like the Red Skull would say I can make the world a better place if I control it with an Iron Fist and that's what the Red Skull was doing here the entire time he was feeding people false information out there right slowly brainwashing people over decades he fabricated the entirety of the Avengers they weren't real right I mean there was like a whole other Avenger team that was out there when Captain America and his ilk when his guys showed up to what used to be Avengers Mansion they realized that it's just computer projections it's just CGI that's just being broadcast like to the world in a fake news set and that's when they realized the Avengers were never real now no one else knew that outside of the Red Skull of course and then Captain America and his folks but controlling the world subliminally right controlling the World Behind the Scenes and all that kind of stuff that more or less would lead to the same thing because you can argue people's lives are markedly better than they used to be the only crappy thing here is of course you know having a totalitarian police force which you can more or less cast that off but the fact remains here right depending on where you stand you could make a credible argument they're both more or less trying to achieve the same thing and so you get this really cool instance where you have Captain America that kind of fills in us as the reader and he says the red skulls taking control of the military and law enforcement by targeting its members specifically feeding them lies and propaganda computer generated news reports and Avengers making them believe that they're saving the country from a rogue president that's really what's going on it's the first move that Red Skull is making trick people into believing that the president is doing things he's not that he's trying to install himself as a dictator and then once people have bought into it hook line and sinker have them take the president out people's own ignorance to the truth becomes your weapon and in doing so they become Your Weapon It's a ingenious move to be honest with you guys nefarious definitely yes yes nefarious definitely nefarious but maybe maybe it's not the worst thing but the fact is here right The Avengers are just kind of like we'll do what we can when we can in order to end this but that's when the new Hawkeye chimes in right she's part of the military right she was part of actually a special team the Thunderbolts right not really the Thunderbolts as we knew them but effectively a a special ops team and she's says this is years of brainwashing these men and women are sure of their convictions my buddies in the Marines were all headed down that path telling me about conspiracies and things I knew were not real but they believe it and once someone believes it's like trying to erode a mountain and the truth is rain it's the allegory of Plato's Cave right for those of you guys who are unfamiliar with this and to kind of paraphrase the opening monologue to Legion from John Ham is he said says imagine that there was a cave and the people inside this cave had never seen the real world instead they saw projections of the real world on the cave wall now those projections are not real but they're real to them now imagine you removed them from that cave and showed them the world as it truly exists they would reject it as incomprehensible and they would do everything they could to go back into the cave you've heard of that concept throughout a multitude of different plot devices right The Matrix is one of the most notable examples of that but that's what's happening here these guys are in a cave and the world they see is not the real world but it is real to them it's as real as anything could be so when the Avengers show up on the scene and they say hey what's actually happening here isn't really happening here they reject it as incomprehensible depending on how you want to use that philosophy you could Gaslight somebody in the extreme using that philosophy right it's kind of nuts but the point is is like these guys are believers so their convictions are not going to be swayed by a handful of outcast superheroes showing up on the scene in Captain America saying really The Red Skull is the one behind this and you're taking your orders from a guy who's trying to become a dictator and he's having you tear down a legal democracy in order to become a dictator but you're not really aware of it because you've been brainwashed for the last few decades you have to believe me that's not going to work right that's never going to work and that's why these soldiers immediately Wrangle together the Secret Service they bring them out right political officials the Pentagon they bring them out and they're standing there in the ovall office with guns at the ready aimed at the president and so it's crazy because that's when Red Skull shows up on the scene now the president even he himself had bought into the brainwashing because what's the first thing he says you can't do this The Avengers will save us so even he doesn't know that the Avengers are not real right and that's why Red Skull tells him your Avengers are not real I created them fantasies to keep the people feeling safe at night after all isn't that what anyone truly wants safety and so it's this crazy thing because what Red Skull also reveals is he opens his mask and he's got like these tubes that go down into his head which have essentially just like destroyed his eyes it's nuts right it's probably one of the craziest things I've ever seen but that's just kind of how he functions now but even he says you know what I think you're right the Avengers are on their way because Captain America and his forces are flying there alongside Iron Man now Tony Stark in this particular future had just kind of been held in like a tank of water for just years and years and years right a couple decades and his mind was being used by James in order to build what could be considered Iron Man suits they were never nearly as advanced is what Tony Stark could do but James was the next best thing when Tony Stark was freed by like Captain America and those guys it was only Tony Stark from like the shoulders up right because the rest of his body had been physically destroyed so yes he is controlling an Iron Man suit but it's not like his full body in a suit that's something that I want to specify because you're going to see this body get torn apart here in a little while but you have Iron Man Who shows up and immediately attacks The Red Skull now here's the cool thing and this just kind of shows how incredibly capable The Red Skull is right he says poor Tony Stark asleep for years only to awaken to a world that still hates him that still reels from what he did to it and where Tony Stark responds and saying you keep telling yourself that Red Skull the response of the skull himself I don't need to I just kept telling the world and they DED on my message safety from the false Heroes safety from your narcissist father and that's when he calls in James James activates all these War Machine robots and they just come flying in but the bigger Point here are the actions of The Red Skull because he's right when he says all people just really want is safety right people want safety and in a lot of ways even as adults they just kind of want to be taken care of they just don't want to have to worry about anything right for example if I came to you and I said okay guys there's a new federal policy and this policy is that everything that you need will be taken care of for you you'll be given a house you will be given a kind of monthly income you don't need to work if you don't want to how many people would just kind of be like yes that's perfect that's exactly what I want because it removes stress from their table it takes them back to a time when they were children and life was so much easier no stress nothing to overwhelm you that there was no anxiety no fear of how you were going to make it right and if you're in that situation you're probably not going to ask a whole bunch of questions and even if questions are asked of course you're probably going to be fed lies if you have someone like Red Skull who's doing it for you and that's how societies come under control in that way now imagine that example that I give you except it doesn't happen overnight it happens over the course of 15 years 20 years and that's how societies fall so easily to these kind of totalitarian dictatorships right seize control of the country make people's lives better and they're never going to question your rule and so what you do is you switch over to basically Thor arriving on the steps in Washington DC and you get this really interesting moment right where like the soldiers are like get on the ground think about what you're doing the response of Thor this is no Battleground and you are no Warriors amend thine actions and just starts taking these guys out now of course Captain America is just like no casualties right and Thor gives this amazing line where he says I captain Thor Odin son will use a gentle touch I love Thor's lines in the comics I just I love the way he says things especially in Avengers Twilight it's just I don't know what it is but it's just hilarious right like I absolutely love it but the bigger point is this right Captain America does not want to kill anybody if he doesn't have to because they've all been brainwashed and manipulated by the red skull it's not like they're aware of how terrible The Red Skull is and they go along with it anyway because they're Soldiers of Fortune just turning themselves over to whoever happens to be the highest bidder and the highest bidder right now is the Red Skull no no no no right like they are as innocent and they've been tricked as much as any average citizen who is out there and so what you get here kind of switching over is a huge fight between Iron Man and his son James and what you get here is the perspective of these two because James was in a lot of ways raised without a father right that like Tony Stark was essentially kind of out of the picture more or less quote unquote dead by the time James came around or at least was born and was able to understand the world around him hence the reason why the Red Skull has been able to manipulate him for so long but even when Tony Stark was there as a superhero he wasn't really there in any meaningful way because the reality here is that Tony Stark really is a narcissist right he really believes the world revolves around himself and he tries to assade that right he tries to kind of aade that and say no no no that's not really the case right you have to understand like you know our job as superheroes was to protect the world and to save the world and all that kind of stuff he's hiding behind his actions in the past and the hopes that it will keep people from seeing who he really was on an individual level because we know that from like Jonathan Hickman's Avengers and New Avengers Tony Stark is a narcissist and Tony Stark is a futurist all he cares about is himself and what comes later on down the line nothing more than that right it's just the world according to him and I wouldn't go so far as to say that like everybody just kind of Pawns and play things but in a lot of ways he kind of treats them that way but in the end The Plea that Tony Stark makes to James is you do not understand what the Red Skull is about you don't know what you're getting into here the Red Skull will kill Millions right he'll eradicate millions of people in one Fell Swoop in order to seize control James doesn't believe it because even though he's being prived to The Red Skull as he actually appears as he is now what he's known of The Red Skull has been a mentor a person who's guided him right who's helped him to grow and become better now he doesn't really see the bigger picture he only sees the picture in relation to himself and his relationship with the Red Skull as a kind of father and son but Tony Stark's right here I mean you guys know this right The Red Skull will kill as many people as he needs to in order to achieve his goal in order to seize control of the United States and what James doesn't know is that if it comes down to it the Red Skull will kill him too right and where James is sitting there looking at him like I thought I was like your son the response of red skull would have something to do with you know Fathers and Sons and then he would just kill him and that would be it right so again it's one of these things where his character is incredibly dark incredibly manipulative but it shows how inexperienced James is right and it really kind of brings in that turn of phrase to be so confident about being so wrong and it's just one of those interesting things because James believes without a shadow of a doubt that Red Skull is doing the right thing with every bone in his body he believes it to be true and so what you do here is you switch back over to the forces of Captain America catching up to the Red Skull Thor and Hawkeye and you know Miss Marvel and so on and so forth and where they all kind of converge on the skull himself this guy crushes them all right because what happens is Red Skull ask Thor he says tell me God have you ever fought a country and Captain America is just like no this is not going to happen right like this is the day when you get defeated and the response to the skull is you have fought a country before haven't you Captain my beloved Germany you were a leader of men then but now you lead children huddled away in their ramshackle buildings Across America of course he's referring to the resistance teenagers basically rising up and trying to work against the Red Skull where they can when they can with a few adults as part of the group and the Red Skull says buildings I'm currently tearing apart children I'm currently wiping out the the problem here is that you have all the teams of the Red Skull Who start reporting in and every single one of these safe houses are all empty because Captain America knew as soon as the battle starts that Red Skull is going to go after every single one of these groups hoping to use them as bargaining chips right Stand Down captain and your resistance Will Survive but if the resistance is basically freed by his wife Rosa who gets them all out of there then there is no bargaining chip there are no distractions here it's Captain America and his guys against the red skull now what you also get and what's really cool is the resistance bands together in a kind of V for Vendetta type thing where you essentially have I wouldn't say a huge portion of society but individuals fighting against the cops trying to liberate Society itself right from the Yoke of Oppression that comes from these totalitarian cops and Red Skull and his forces and so on and so forth but switching back to the Red Skull this guy in no uncertain terms dismantles The Avengers in their entirety and that's something that I want to specify here he crushes these guys right like it's not even a contest right I mean they're told that like the vice president has been moved to safety but the fact is like these guys get crushed Thor gets taken out in one hit Captain America it's the exact same way but then the Red Skull ends up pulling the trigger and sends in a nuke right he's just like whatever man like we're just going to Nuke the whole place so of course this information gets from Tony Stark to like Captain America and those guys and then you have like Luke Cage who was basic basically the leader of the resistance before Captain America arrived back onto the scene and while he's really really old and his body doesn't really move the way that it used to he ends up putting on a kind of power armor that allows him to move around that combined with his Bulletproof Skin and his super strength makes him pretty much indestructible out here but that's when things go south and this is the ending that I was telling you about right like because it looks like the superheroes could potentially win now it looks like it's game over because what you get here is you have Red Skull talking to Captain America and he says this is not like before har Rogers this is not some impetuous plan this is decades in the making and where Captain America gives a general retort right like I don't care how long you've been planning this for right I'm going to defeat you you know you can manipulate people into believing that hero day was necessary and y y y but the Red Skull just kind of laughs at him right and he's like you and your H day since that glorious battle America has been safer than ever and did you ever wonder why was it because you superheroes actually stood in the way of peace or was it because America finally had the Ultimate Weapon and where Thor was sent by Captain America to intercept this nuke as soon as Thor sees what it is his statement no right and the Red Skull says this Ultimate Weapon that the United States could drop into upstart countries at well typical American narcissists it was never called H day because of you Heroes it was called H day because of the Hulk with that being being said guys we're going to bring this video to an end yes the Hulk is back he looks modified and he looks like he's mind controlled but I will see you guys when the next video comes out peace

Channel: Comics Explained

Views: 96,613

Keywords: avengers twilight, avengers twilight review, avengers twilight comic, captain america, marvel comics, comic book, comics, marvel, twilight, Chip Zdarsky, Avengers twilight chip zdarsky, hulk, superhero, comic books, iron man, avengers, comics explained, marvel comics explained, comic book review, comicsexplained, steve rogers, avengers twilight #5, avengers twilight 5, avengers twilight chip zdarsky, avengers twilight explained, old man captain america, new comics

Id: Xijplkt5e6Y

Length: 19min 39sec (1179 seconds)

Published: Thu May 02 2024