Leonardo da Vinci, Agent of SHIELD

Well Jonathan Hickman does it again.  He managed to make the Fantastic Four into one of the better books at Marvel, which has been much needed relief given how bad many of Marvel’s books are at the moment.  Within the first issue of his new SHIELD series he manages to do the same with this property.  It is a fresh new take on SHIELD where we find out SHIELD is far more then just the organization that Nick Fury founded.  Its secret history goes all the way back to the days of Imhotep in ancient Egypt.  The issue goes on to show that many historical figures were part of SHIELD, including Leonardo da Vinci.  Before I read this issue the idea of da Vinci being a comic book hero sounded lame, but it works perfectly here and has me looking forward to more with him.

Dustin Weaver’s artwork really shines here in the same way Dale Eaglesham’s work does on Fantastic Four.  And perhaps the most amazing thing is that it is a $3.99 Marvel book with more then 30 pages of content.  This is the first book from Marvel, since they introduced the $3.99 price tag, where I can say without a doubt that readers will get more then their money’s worth here.  It also more then makes up for the mind numbing misery that is Siege.  Marvel is not looking quite so hopeless creatively to me now.