Issue(s): Avengers #98, Avengers #99, Avengers #100
Cover Date: May-Jul 72
Title: "Let slip the dogs of war!" / "--They first make mad!" / "Whatever gods there be!"
Credits:
Roy Thomas - Writer
Barry Windsor-Smith - Penciler
Sal Buscema / Tom Sutton / Syd Shores, Joe Sinnott, & Barry Windsor-Smith - Inker

Review/plot:
While some of the Avengers look for Hawkeye, who never returned from the Kree-Skrull War, others investigate a pro-war demonstration taking place outside a Chinese/American peace talk. The Chinese delegates are depicted with pale yellow skin, pretty amazing and embarrassing for 1972.

The crowd is riled up by Pan flutes, instigated by Ares. Some of the Avengers are possessed by the flutes as well.

The Vision and Thor aren't affected and they free the other Avengers and drive off Ares. Then Hawkeye shows up. After stopping the Skrull bomber, he fell to the earth and wound up in a traveling circus in Yugoslavia. He temporarily joined the circus, gaining a new costume, while they traveled to the nearest place where he could grab a plane. While traveling with the circus, he realizes that the group's strongman is actually an amnesiac Hercules.

    

Iron Man tries to use a device to restore Hercules' memories, but it doesn't work even though it's powered by Thor's hammer.

Hawkeye starts hitting on the Scarlet Witch, even suggesting marriage, despite a complete lack of interest on Wanda's part. The incident gets the Vision all upset though. Quicksilver is more perceptive however, and asks her if she is in love with the Vision. (Quicksilver is reading Fear by L. Ron Hubbard when she walks past him.). She admits that she is, but Captain America sounds an alarm before we get Quicksilver's reaction.

Two Greek demi-gods, Kratos and Bia, attack the Avengers and manage to escape with Hercules, in part due to the fact that the Vision spends time tending a fallen Scarlet Witch even though he knows she isn't badly hurt.

Then the Black Knight summons all the Avengers. Cap takes him very literally and ensures that even the Hulk shows up.

They even let the Swordsman hang out with them for this one. The Wasp is wearing her most bizarre costume, no contest. It has weird strands coming off of it. (You can actually see it best in the group shot above.)

The Avengers invade Asgard, where they find and defeat Ares, who is teamed up with the Enchantress and wielding the Black Knight's ebony sword.

Barry Windsor's art and layout is very nice.

Quality Rating: C+

Historical Significance Rating: 3 - "All Avengers" issue.

Chronological Placement Considerations: Goliath/Hawkeye has not yet returned to the Avengers at the start of this story after leaving to chase a nuclear-armed Skrull saucer during the Kree-Skrull War.

References:

• "Unavoidable aside: This tale occurs before... or perhaps after... the legendary events of Thor #198 - Stan". Marvel ultimately went with 'before' in the Marvel Index.
  
• "Everybody who has already recognized 'Mr. Talon' from past issues of Thor and the Avengers, take one giant step - Stan". Ares has previously appeared in Thor #129, Thor #131, Avengers #38, and Avengers #49-50.
  
• No footnote, but it's likely that the memory inducer that the Avengers attempt to use to restore Hercules' memory is the same as the subliminal recall-inducer seen in Avengers #26.
  
• Kevin O'Brian, the Guardsman, was slain in action in Iron Man #46.
  
• Ares acquired the Black Knight's ebony blade after the Black Knight threw it in Arkon's enchanted well in Avengers #84.
  
• Thor buried the gate between Asgard and Olympus in Journey Into Mystery annual #1 (actually, Zeus buried it; Thor is misremembering here).
  
• The Swordsman was an Avenger "for a couple of panels" in Avengers #20.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: Avengers #48 (Jan 02)

"Embiggen"--I love it!

All Right someone needs to do these issues and Hawkeye justice and fire the Wardrobe consulatant. Hawkeye looks like the Logo for an online dating service whose motto is use Cupid to find your next Stupid. I mean Come on.

In Comics Journal #230, Tom Sutton admitted that he tended to give female characters larger breasts when he inked them, prompting Roy Thomas to say to him about this issue: "Tom, how can the Captain get anywhere near her?"

"Two Greek demi-gods, Kratos and Bia, attack the Avengers and manage to escape with Hercules, in part due to the fact that the Vision spends time tending a fallen Scarlet Witch even though he knows she isn't badly hurt."

And the idea of even questioning Vizh's commitment to the team is dismissed out of hand when he shows bravery in #100. Which is fine on its own, but really made me grind my molars when compared to Cap's hauling Hank Pym before a formal inquiry because he (accidentally) zapped the Elf-Queen when she had "stopped fighting" (how should Hank know? He couldn't see her face? How did CAP know? She wasn't speaking any language he recognized!) 100+ issues from now.

Hell of a lot more reason to suspend Vision here (Clint's written as an absolute a-hole in #99, but he's right about Vizh leaving him and Pietro to fight off freaking demigods because he's too busy being distracted by Wanda to help) than Hank there, IMO. But Shooter wanted his goddamn "heel turn" plot and…grrr.

Of the Avengers who joined the team in the first 100 issues, here is my A team: Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, Scarlet Witch, Vision, Hawkeye, and Black Panther. The rest were either ineffective or just not around enough to contribute much.

Besides the poor color choice for the Chinese characters' skin, their regulation PRC era clothing should be colored green, not brown. At least, that's my understanding from reading John Fraser's 1980 book, The Chinese, Portrait of a People, the whole idea being that all citizens should wear the exact same clothes, even Chairman Mao.

Another coloring oddity is that this must be the first time I've ever seen the Enchantress wear any color other than green.

It occurs to me that this story can be read as the Avengers finally managing to defeat the Enchantress after a long run in which she causes the team a lot of problems, first as part of the Masters of Evil, then by setting a variety of superhuman pawns against them.

Prior to this issue, she always escaped, with the sole exception of Avengers Annual #1, which is also the only story where she's used as a henchvillain and not as the primary threat. She's one of the more successful Silver Age efforts at a genuinely powerful, menacing female villain.

Though Enchantress does escape Zeus almost immediately thereafter in Defenders # 4. I guess you just can't keep a good goddess down.