Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver are visiting their homeland when they see it is under attack.
By aliens. The duo are at the base of Wundagore Mountain because their powers have been fading.
As a result of her weakened state, Scarlet Witch isn’t much help and Pietro is captured.
So Wanda goes to the A-team for help.
On a weird historical note: Scarlet Witch and her brother Quicksilver tell Captain America that their powers were fading but when they returned to their homeland, they returned to full strength. This makes them think they are not mutants and get their powers somehow from the soil of their native land. But nobody else from their native land has powers.
Of course, this ties to Thor and the High Evolutionary, and Thor #134.
Then Wanda tells Captain America that aliens have taken over the village they grew up in, so The Avengers–joined by Black Widow–go to help.
Widow’s assistance is not without (justified) concern about her criminal/spy past.
Once at the village they find some caves…
…With a UFO. And a big alien:
The first and thankfully last appearance of the villain Ixar. He, like so many others, likes to put heroes in tubes.
So the woman who came to get the Avengers wasn’t Wanda…
The team have been tricked into coming on board the spaceship and have to fight their way off.
During the big battles in this issue, we get a close-up of Widow’s “bite” or “sting.”
She’s kind of a badass.
Everybody piles on the alien.
Who holds his own against most of them, but the most powerful Avenger…
And f-cks up.
This is the issue with the famous mistake–where Hawkeye calls Captain America “Web-head” instead of “Wing-head.”
They save the day, despite Hawkeye’s misstep.
And I’m not the only one who thinks this run sucks. In an unusually honest move, Marvel printed in issue #40 a very critical letter of this story…
