I post this picture just because it’s creepy:
Necrodamus was the villain in the first issue of The Defenders.
The creative team of The Defenders is now hitting its groove on The Avengers, by which I mean it’s getting weird. And if you want to get weird with the A team, you focus on Scarlet Witch.
The gnarled nailed hands in the panel above belong to Agatha Harkness.
At this time, she is best known as the Fantastic Four’s nanny and one of the original witches from the Salem Witch Trials. She was teaching Wanda how to control her mutant “magic” powers. See, originally Wanda’s power was described as changing reality/probability. Here, we learn that this ability is at least similar to magic in how it is controlled and manifested by the user. So, finally, she actually was becoming a witch.
Necrodamus attacks.
Agatha tries her best, but Wanda defeats Necrodamus in this issue. With bricks to the face.
By the way, Necrodamus needs souls so he can transform from the shriveled little dude at the top of this post to this:
Meanwhile, Mantis tries to woo Vision, sensing that he has the hots for Scarlet Witch. Vision gives her the “let’s be friends” treatment.
The Fantastic Four appear in this issue, as it takes place right after FF #150.
And, at the very end, Kang shows up as a prologue to next issue.
I enjoyed “Bewitched, Bothered……and Dead!!” Overall, it was very well drawn, and written even better. My quibbles, overall, are minor, however, my concern about the mechanics of the hex-power of the exquisite Scarlet Witch are not limited to this one single issue. My understanding of how her power works is, simply, manipulation of probability, meaning, she has the mutant/quasi-magical ability to force things to happen, as long as there is even the most microscopically minute possibility that it could happen. Even a one-in-a-trillion likelihood can be made to happen by the hex power of the Scarlet Witch. But that possibility MUST EXIST. Wanda CANNOT bring total impossibilities into reality. So, my question is: What, exactly, is the mathematical likelihood of our girl being able to cause her opponent to become attacked by a bedspread, or a barrage of bricks-???! Now, I am certainly no Stephen Hawking, or Reed Richards, but my common-sense tells even THIS dumbass that the mathematical possibility of Wanda’s hex-power being able to cause these things to actually happen are absolutely, one hundred percent NIL. A jammed gun- a stalled engine- a fainted opponent- a deactivated atom-bomb- even a quick rainstorm, on an otherwise totally clear day- sure. But the miracles that she is performing here in these pages are simply in defiance of all the known laws of possibility- that cute little stunt with yanking the meteor down from orbit in ‘Giant-Size Avengers’ #2, shortly following this issue, also falls into the category of total mathematical impossibility, on the same basis!! I may be a little ‘old-school’ when it comes to comic-books and super-ladies, but the level of power which was established for her, by Stan Lee, in 1964, was just fine- and, at least, quasi-plausible!! Three hexes within the range of one hour-roughly one every twenty minutes, which can all trigger a mathematically-plausible minor-miracle- was just fine! If that level of capability isn’t enough to justify her membership in the Avengers, then have the Wasp hook her up with her hand-me-down set of Wasp-stingers!! Or, maybe she could take some martial-arts training from Mantis, or Captain America! Now, THAT’S the Avenger she should be, by all human logic, throwing herself after!!! Which brings me to my second point about “Bewitched, Bothered…….and Dead!!” For the ever-lovin’ LIFE of me……….I just CANNOT understand what all of these hot super-chicks see in an android!! On an intellectual basis, perhaps- my understanding of the Vision is that he was created in 1968 as a robotic, super-powered answer to ‘Star Trek’s Mr. Spock- but, to put it as delicately as I know how- just, exactly, HOW does a human female- even a mutated human female, or one with extraterrestrial, martial-arts training- have her basic, sexual drives met by a construction with no sex-drive itself-???? The programming of Simon Williams’ brain-patterns into the Vision’s computer mind at least imbues him ( it-? ) with some semblance of emotion- but what happens when either of these fertile women start feeling the “itch” to A) Breed, and B) Reproduce-??!! Yes, I read the 1985 ‘Vision & Scarlet Witch” miniseries, with the “magically-induced pregnancy” which produced the twin sons which either may-or may not- actually exist! The Marvel writership is still struggling with that question, to this very day! ( unless the question has been decisively resolved by now, and I just missed the memo! But that’s not likely! ) So-besides these two key story-points- “Bewitched, Bothered………and Dead!” was not bad! “C+”, you say-??? Nay, good sir- I sayeth……”B”! Lastly, anybody who cannot recognize the presence of Agatha Harkness by the presence of Ebony the Panther-Cat in the scene’s immediate foreground, simply isn’t reading enough Marvel Comics! I just wish any of MY pussies were that mean!!