Working out those daddy issues
Publisher:
JUST in time for what could well be the year’s biggest movie (sorry, Star Wars VII), this graphic novel by some of Marvel’s hottest talents of the day is both a gripping, ripping yarn – and also an overwrought, heavy-on-the-emo story.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe has simplified things so that the iconic Avengers baddie Ultron is an accidental creation of Tony Stark. A:ROU remains firmly anchored in the mythology of the comics.
In print, Ultron was created by Henry Pym (aka, variously, Ant-Man, Giant-Man and Yellowjacket) and had, over the years, a complicated love-hate relationship with him. It was the Oedipus Complex brought to mainstream comics; Ultron wanted to kill his father and developed an attraction to Pym’s lover, Janet Van Dyne (aka the Wasp).
He even created a robotic mate for himself using Janet’s brain patterns as a basis for her personali- ty, and named his creation Jocasta (in Greek mythology, the name of Oedipus’ mother).
Both Pym and Ultron find many occasions in the course of this 112-page hardcover to let out all that angst – spurned creation, misunderstood creator, and all things in between.
The fortunate thing about this tale is that it also gives the Vision – a synthetic person “created” by Ultron and who eventually betrayed his own Pops, too – a fair bit of room to do his thing and work out his own daddy issues.
It’s all very carefully calculated to tap into the near-unbearable anticipation being whipped up among fans by all the teasing as Avengers: Age Of Ultron’s ( A:AOU) release draws near.
As with almost every encounter between the Avengers and the extermination-of-humanity-bent Ultron, this tale involves a pitched battle filled with enough destruction to make Zack Snyder’s Man