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Welcome to the Avengers Idea Mechanics.

"No more training, no more academies, no more waiting in the wings, 'knowing their place' — they're full-on Avengers, next-level heroes in a global rescue organization taking on super-threats as big and bad as anything previous teams have ever had to handle."
Al Ewing

New Avengers (collected in trade as New Avengers: A.I.M.) was a 2015 Marvel comic book written by Al Ewing and drawn primarily by Gerardo Sandoval, Marcus To and Paco Medina. Launched as part of All-New, All-Different Marvel in the wake of Secret Wars, it was the fourth volume of New Avengers, but was completely unconnected to any other run of the title.

During Jonathan Hickman's Avengers, Roberto da Costa / Sunspot (formerly of the New Mutants) bought out AIM (Advanced Idea Mechanics) and transformed it into the Avengers Idea Mechanics. Operating out of the new Avengers Island is this new AIM's field team, with team leader Songbird leading Hulkling, Wiccan, Squirrel Girl, White Tiger, Power Man, and Hawkeye (who is the super secret SHIELD traitor on the team... except that it's not a secret, and everyone knows).

The team is dedicated to stopping supervillain attacks across the entire world. Their only problem: the world Doesn't trust them. In fact, if Sunspot were to step on US soil, he would be immediately arrested for being the leader of a (formerly) terrorist organization. But he won't let that stop him and his New Avengers.

New Avengers ran for a total of eighteen issues, ending in November 2016. In January 2017, it was relaunched as U.S.Avengers, with the team being rebranded as the American Intelligence Mechanics.


Tropes used in New Avengers Volume 4:

  • Ancient Order of Protectors: The Knights of the Infinite, an order of Kree/Skrull magicians and warriors guided by the prophecies of M'ryn the Magus to save the Kree and Skrull empires in a time of great unrest.
  • Added Alliterative Appeal: OMNITRONICUS's speech after WHISPER's base is nuked by SHIELD.
  • Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: Billy and Teddy have to deal with the former's mother (sorta, it's complicated) Wanda (aka the Scarlet Witch) in Issue #11, and she has mastered the "embarrassing mom" routine, rambling on about her wedding ceremony back in the 70s, recalling events that sound completely ridiculous but are absolutely canon.
  • Anguished Declaration of Love: Toni to POD, or more accurately Aikku, when she thinks Skar has mortally wounded her.
  • Art Shift: In issue #6 both Wiccan's inner world and the remade future have distinctly different art styles than the rest of the book.
  • Atrocious Alias: Revisited by Power Man, that Wiccan's is kind of religiously insensitive. He decides under the influence of Moridun to change it to Demiurge, but once that's over he goes back to Wiccan. Issue 11 has him discussing the issue with the Scarlet Witch.
  • Badass Boast:
    POD: Planetary Operating Defense System. POD. I see you.
  • Bad Boss: The goons of W.H.I.S.P.E.R. don't dare to call for help as apparently the Maker takes that as volunteering to be a test subject. Likewise, his idea of "promotion" involves strapping hapless schmucks down, ripping out their vital organs and turning them into sycophantic insect-men.
  • Bad Future: The future Avengers already came from one, with most of the Earth flooded and a mention of a "Zero Day" where the previous Captain America died and his shield was atomized, but Moridun manages to make it much worse.
  • Bait-and-Switch:
    • When Hawkeye is introduced as the super secret S.H.I.E.L.D. traitor on the team Sunspot seemed to take issue with it, but what he actually ended up saying was "could we get the other Hawkeye?. Clint looked positively insulted.
    • Issue 17 has John Garrett shot Roberto point blank in the head. The next issue reveals he actually shot Hulking pretending to be Roberto.
  • Barrier Warrior: The Rescue suit is mainly equipped with a powerful defensive forcefield. Doesn't stop Toni from using it to decapitate Skar.
  • Berserk Button: Don't bring up Toni Ho's father. Especially not where Toni's degrees are involved.
  • Beware the Silly Ones: Among The Maker's Revengers team is the extremely minor villain Vermin, who can control rats. He still manages to overwhelm the folks on A.I.M. island with his minions.
  • Big Bad: Ultimate Reed Richards/The Maker, who is running his new organization of W.H.I.S.P.E.R. in an Evil Counterpart version of the newly heroic A.I.M.
  • Big Bad Wannabe: Moridun, who tries taking over Wiccan and accessing his latent Demiurge abilities early, only to be summarily defeated within four issues.
  • Big Damn Heroes: Issue 14 ends with Warlock busting in to battle O.M.N.I.T.R.O.N.I.C.U.S and rescue Robert.
  • Bodyguarding a Badass: POD serves as Sunspot's bodyguard. We later learn in issue 4 that Terrigen Poisoning has weakened Sunspot to the point where he may have lost his powers, which would better justify POD's presence in this manner.
  • Brainwashed and Crazy: Angela Del Toro, Ava's predecessor as the White Tiger, is still under the Hand's brainwashing. According to The Maker, it can be undone, but obviously he's not about to do that himself. Later on he notes that at least part of Angela is fighting against what's been done to her, just not enough.
    • Ava breaks the brainwashing by destroying Angela's tiger amulet, causing both Angela and herself to be Brought Down to Normal as a result.
  • Buffy Speak: In issue 8, Roberto states the SHIELD battlecarrier is "like a helicarrier, except more battle-y".
  • The Bus Came Back:
    • The preview in the Marvel Now one-shot shows Danielle Cage, the Captain of America of 20xx from Ewing's Ultron Forever mini-event returning. She and what's left of her team travel back to the modern day in issue 5.
    • Angela Del Toro, the White Tiger before Ava, returns in issue 7.
    • Dum Dum Dugan, Cannonball and the Zebra kids return in issue 10.
    • Warlock appears to defend Roberto from OMNITRONICUS in issue 14.
    • Monica Rappaccini and Dr. Forson, the previous head honchos of A.I.M. from Hickman's Avengers, show up for issue 18.
  • The Caligula: General Robert L. Maverick, creator of American Kaiju, who seems to have done so largely because he can:
    Soldier: Isn't there a more conventional way to handle this, sir?
    General Maverick: Maybe. But they're the ones who started this, son. They're the ones who think unauthorized super-science is fun. Well, guess what? They're right.
    American Kaiju: YUUUU! ESSSSS! AAYYY!
  • Call-Back:
    • Issue 13 has The Maker introduce himself as the "Ultimate" Reed Richards, followed by announcing he wants to "solve everything", the Arc Words of Jonathan Hickman's run on Fantastic Four. For an added bonus, those words were associated with Reed Richards, and the various alternate versions of him who pursued less than morally sound practices (as well as abandoning their friends and family) to do so.
    • During issue 16, Angar tries using that time he died against Songbird, his former partner in crime.
    • In the final issue of the series, Warlock asks fellow New Mutant Doug Ramsay when could he take over Roberto's body and ride it around, referencing the time he tried to "revive" Doug by doing exactly that.
  • Canon Immigrant: Toni Ho, who first appeared in Captain Britain and the Mighty Defenders as Toni Yinsen, appears as one of the Avengers support staff. She later becomes the new Rescue.
  • Chekhov's Gun:
    • Issue 2 introduces the Champagne Robot, a little hovering robot designed to serve champagne. Then it turns out it can also knock people out, should the need arise.
    • The preview one-shot has a glimpse of Roberto showing the team the mysterious Avenger 5. In issue 9 the audience gets to see it for themselves: It's a giant robot.
    • POD's ability to adapt to block technological data gathering is established in the first issue where she No Sells Dugan. It's used to feed false / incomplete data through the Maker's nano cameras, which he only realizes in issue #14.
    • The Maker is constantly referenced to come in "slices". While initially it seems like just a reference to his fate in Secret Wars, near the end of the series it is revealed he has been "sliced" into the multiverse, meaning there's a copies of him in every reality who can travel between them now.
  • Cloudcuckoolander: Squirrel Girl's tactics and attitudes come off beyond strange in a straight up superhero book. Like her first instinct facing any enemy is: Let's make friends with it!
  • Combat Tentacles: One of the reasons Moridun gets dubbed space Cthulhu.
  • The Comically Serious: Poor long suffering White Tiger is very very serious (even the writer compared her to Batman occasionally)... and this is a team with Squirrel Girl. Strangely, they develop an Odd Friendship with each other.
  • Continuity Nod:
    • Squirrel Girl tries Talking the Monster to Death, as she does frequently in her solo title. It's less successful here, something that she lampshades.
    • The soul The Maker uses for his giant scorpion-gorilla centaur is that of Evald Skorpion, arch-nemesis of Adam Brashear, as seen back in Ewing's run on Mighty Avengers.
    • In issue 3, Hawkeye mentions that time he got an up-close and personal look at a Kree spaceship engine.
    • The team briefly mention the end of the first volume of Young Avengers, when Teddy's status as the Skrull prince was first revealed.
    • Issue 4 acknowledges the "Terrigen Mists are harmful to mutants" plotpoint that is crucial in most ANADM X-titles and the Uncanny Avengers.
    • And also that Squirrel Girl isn't or isn't entirely a mutant according to her mom and science.
    • The Maker complains that the rules of science in this world are far more fantastical and less grounded than what he is used to.
    • In issue 5, the Maker is introduced with "He comes in slices".
    • During issue 6, Collapsar mentions the Worldmind, the living computer that manages the Nova Corps, and which hasn't been seen in the modern day since the end of The Thanos Imperative.
    • Issue 8 notes that Daisy Johnson was once Director of SHIELD, meaning she knows their code for undercover operatives.
    • In issue 11 Wiccan, Hulkling, and Squirrel Girl regroup and talk about future superheroing plans in a diner and the narration even points out that "yes, it servers breakfast meats" as a nod to Young Avengers where this was the norm. Fittingly enough this is the point where they also entertain the idea of going back to the Young Avengers name.
    • Also in issue 11 Wanda talks about her wedding and the 70s in general which sounds like ridiculous made up stuff, except it's all canon.
    • Wiccan's ringtone for Roberto (which he didn't have before, so AIM apparently tampered with his phone) is the Magnum, P.I. theme. You know, Sunspot's favorite show from the original New Mutants.
    • Issue 17 has the Maker stating that if there is a god of reality, they were in chains, with a picture of the imprisoned Eternity behind him, a plot thread from the concurrently running The Ultimates (2015).
    • Issue 16 has Not!Obama declaring his distaste for all the recent super-hero on super-hero incidents. In issue 17, he turns out to be a disguised Roberto, whose annoyance with pointless super-hero infighting was a plot point of Hickman's Avengers run.
    • During their fight, Hulking tells Paibok he's beaten the real Super-Skrull before.
    • The Maker mentions Nadia Pym is a part of whatever plan he was cooking up.
    • The reality where World War II was fought in space mentioned in #16 is the setting of What If? vol 1 #14, "What If Sgt Fury and his Howling Commandos Fought World War II in Outer Space?"
  • Cool Sword: Excelsior, a magic space sword Teddy acquires in issue 4. He starts using it in issue 12
  • Corporate Sponsored Superheroes: The New Avengers are sponsored and funded by A.I.M., which was bought out by Sunspot during Jonathan Hickman's Avengers run. Ewing has also compared the way Sunspot leads the team to the way one would run a company, such as his strategy for "headhunting" newer, up-and-coming superheroes.
  • Covers Always Lie: The first issue's cover, pictured above, shows Bobby in his Sunspot attire. So far, he has yet to be seen outside of his snazzy business suit in all appearances post-Secret Wars (including his cameos in Starbrand & Nightmask). And then we learn in issue 4 that he's suffering from Terrigen Poisoning like most other Mutants and may not even have his powers at all anymore.
  • Creepy Cute: The in universe reveal of Moridun's true form, which is more traditionally squidlike, makes Squirrel Girl go "eww" then admitting it's cute and back to "eww" again.
  • Cryptic Background Reference: At the beginning of issue 6, Future!Teddy mentions something called "The Eternity Wars", which involved him becoming "king of space". Collapsar asks an intrigued Sunspot to forget he ever heard that.
  • Department of Redundancy Department: As the aftermath of Standoff the team is split and Wiccan names his the All-New New Avengers.
  • Divide and Conquer: The Maker's plan involves splintering the team and being the laughing third party in Civil War II. He is also convinced that Sunspot will find his We Can Rule Together an irresistible offer.
  • Energy Absorption: Moridun can absorb energy in apparently all forms, magic, souls, whatnot. Yeah. Shooting it with a concentrated Photon Blast is a phenomenally bad idea. That's why the lights go out around it.
  • Evil Counterpart:
    • Maker refers to W.H.I.S.P.E.R. as "A.I.M. if they were still fun." Given a Lampshade Hanging in issue 5.
      Caption for W.H.I.S.P.E.R. Henchman: A.I.M. are science goodies now. Someone had to be science baddies.
    • Later on in the same issue he reveals his "New Revengers" who do double-duty as an evil counterpart to the Avengers, and Simon William's Revengers team from Brian Bendis' run.
  • Evil Is Not Well-Lit: Mor-I-Dun of the fifth dark cosmos causes the lighting to malfunction with its mere presence.
  • Exact Words: Agent Garrett forces Songbird to give up AIM's secret base. As the recap page points of issue 15 points out, she only gives them the location of a secret base.
  • Excalibur in the Stone: Teddy has to retrieve a sword from a ray of light to prove that he is The Chosen One. It takes him about two seconds.
  • A Father to His Men: Da Costa has this general attitude to all of the people under his employ.
  • Foreshadowing: During issue 13, Roberto offhandedly mentions another former New Mutant is around in A.I.M's secret base. It turns out to be Warlock.
  • For Science!:
    • The Maker is a dark, and decidedly mad version of this. Taking the soul of a crazed, nihilistic Mad Scientist and putting it in the body of a gorilla-scorpion-centaur hybrid? Summoning things from the previous universe? Turning people into insect-men? They're all in there.
    • A.I.M. is a more benevolent version, building spaceships and time machines for no readily apparent purpose.
  • Friendly Enemy: Power Man's nice enough to let Deathlok know that Simmons has something wrong with her chi before engaging in the obligatory Let's You and Him Fight.
  • The "Fun" in "Funeral": The final issue opens with Sunspot's funeral. Songbird gives a melodramatic eulogy, Cypher gets some looks when he declares that Sunspot is the first of the New Mutants to die, and Koi Boi can't stop cracking fish puns. And then it's revealed Sunspot was faking his death as a means of drawing out A.I.M.'s former leadership.
  • Fun with Acronyms:
    • World Headquarters for International Scientific/Philosophical Experimentation and Research, or W.H.I.S.P.E.R.
    • The future Black Widow is apparently a director of the A.V.E.N.G.E.R.S. Initiative.
    • The Maker's new A.I. calls itself Organo-Mechanic Nexus-Integrated Techno-Radical Organizational Networked Intelligent Computer Unity System. Or OMNITRONICUS for short. The Maker suspects that something about the way physics works in this universe causes this kind of flamboyant behavior.
    • Issue 7 has fun with W.H.I.S.P.E.R., giving it different definitions three times.
    • Issue 18 has all the various mutations of A.I.M. from over the years, and a few new ones (including T.I.M., whose members haven't decided what their name actually means).
  • Fusion Dance: What happens if you take the Tiger God, and have it face off against the Tiger God of a different universe? They merge. After all, they're one and the same.
  • Future Badass: Future!Teddy is a large, muscled Walking Shirtless Scene who calls himself King Hulk, having finally become ruler of the Skrulls. Possibly averted after Mor-I-Dun's foiling, where he and Billy appear to be living an ordinary life by themselves.
  • General Ripper: The general behind the American Kaiju project, one Robert L. Maverick. It might be the fact his first words are an immediate rejection of the idea of talking things out with A.I.M, or the fact that General Ross thinks he goes too far.
  • Genre Throwback: This is a very very very VERY old school comic. It wouldn't be too out of place if it were coming out twenty years earlier.
  • Good Thing You Can Heal: Daisy Johnson decides the best way to deal with POD is to remotely crush the operator's internal organs. By the time POD has healed from that the fight is over.
  • Good Versus Good: Issue 8 is a case of this. in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. #3, we find out that Coulson & co. are against Kobik and so they take Rick Jones into custody so they can protect him from the rest of S.H.I.E.L.D. and find out more from him. But in New Avengers #8, Sunspot & co. who are also against Kobik end up trying to "rescue" Rick, which results in the two groups fighting each other despite being on the same side.
  • Groin Attack: One poor A.I.M. goon gets zapped in the junk by another A.I.M. goon during Roberto's fake funeral.
  • Heroic Sacrifice: Having sustained a mortal and not being able to heal both herself and Aikku, POD ejects her killing herself in the process.
  • A House Divided: The fallout of Standoff broke up the team into the New New Avengers (Wiccan, Hulkling, Squirrel Girl, Hawkeye (who is also an Agent of SHIELD)) and A.I.M. (Sunspot, White Tiger, Power Man, POD, Songbird (who is the team's mole at SHIELD), with the addition of Cannonball).
  • Hurricane of Puns: Roberto plus a fake funeral. He naturally takes the opportunity to crack as many terrible puns as he can.
  • "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight: Hulkling attempts this with the possessed Wiccan. It works.
  • Incurable Cough of Death: We learn early in issue 4 that Roberto is suffering from this due to Terrigen Poisoning. He puts on a brave and confidant face as much as possible, but when Hawkeye questions why Sunspot, as powerful a guy as he should be, didn't go into space to rescue Teddy and Billy with them, Songbird has to explain to him the truth. The extent of the damage isn't quite known, but Roberto may or may not have lost his powers.
  • Insanity Immunity: Downplayed. But Wiccan could use his struggles with PTSD and depression to kick Moridun out of his head after he realized its shtick.
  • Insistent Terminology: SHIELD don't torture people. They'd never sink to that level. But they're not above subjecting people to "enhanced interrogation".
  • Interface Spoiler: Maker's speech uses the same font and capitalization style that was standard in the Ultimate universe comics. Careful eyes would probably notice this when he disguises himself.
  • Island Base: Avengers Island, appropriated from A.I.M.. When da Costa breaks out the spaceship hidden in an artificial mountain, Songbird has to comment that he is kind of leaning into the supervillain thing.
  • Jerkass: Maria Hill opens issue 12 ranting about how she always knew Da Costa would become a supervillain. She manages to be outdone by John Garrett, who hijacks all of Dum-Dum Duggan's LMD bodies and overrides his mind with a worm.
  • Kaiju: American Kaiju from the Issue #9, basically Godzilla with with an American flag painted on its head and chest.
  • Ki Manipulation: Power Man's power lets him draw in local chi to enhance his attacks, with the ability to draw more the more he knows about a place's history, though he also gains a lot of use from his Required Secondary Powers of chi-sensing, which let him tap into the history of a place and see people's souls and emotions. In issue 5, he starts getting downloads courtesy of A.I.M. to boost his powers.
    • In issue 7, it backfires, since he tries using it against Angela Del Toro, who is under the Hand's control, and they're an Ancient Conspiracy.
    • During issue 8, his attempt to use it on the SHIELD Battlecarrier doesn't work, what with it being pretty new.
  • Large Ham:
    • The Plunderer.
    • In case its introduction wasn't a clue enough, O.M.N.I.T.R.O.N.I.C.U.S proves itself one in issue 14, declaring itself the master of the "Mechano-force," and "Overlord of the Robo-Sapiens." Issue 15's introduction subtitles lampshade this by describing Warlock as "Talks funny" and O.M.N.I.T.R.O.N.I.C.U.S as "Talks funnier".
  • Late-Arrival Spoiler: Woe betide anyone still reading Secret Wars (2015) who goes in to this one blind, since it doesn't bother hiding the Maker's survival at all. All the more egregious since Secret Wars hadn't even finished when this series started. This is a problem for most ANADM titles by the waynote .
  • Latex Perfection: Roberto manages to disguise himself as Barack Obama in issues 16 and 17.
  • Leaning on the Fourth Wall: In issue 16, the President of the US states how sick he's getting of the whole "hero-versus-hero" business.
  • Lemony Narrator: This series is written by Al Ewing and that alone should tell you how snarky and/or strange the narration can get.
  • Let's You and Him Fight: The fact that all two hundred members of AIM (aside from Billy, Teddy, and Squirrel Girl) voted to go to war with SHIELD over Rick Jones really gives the impression that they were just waiting for an excuse.
    • As does the fact that the immediate response from the US government was to deploy American Kaiju.
  • Life Will Kill You: Moridun subscribes to this view, or as he puts it "life ends life".
  • Lighter and Softer: Significantly more so than the Darker and Edgier vol. 3. This one has a much bigger focus on super-science and heroics.
  • Living Bodysuit: Poor M'ryn for Moridun for a while... at least it's blatantly obvious that he isn't himself.
  • Love Cannot Overcome: POD's pilot's girlfriend, Darja, fell out of love with her and broke up, not being able to handle the inhuman nature of POD.
  • Luke, You Are My Father: The Ms. Marvel / Marvel Woman of the future Avengers reveals she's Songbird's daughter. And the issue before revealed her second name is Brashear. Whether she's related to Max Brashear or not goes unconfirmed.
  • Madness Mantra: After getting mind-hacked by Garrett, Dum-Dum Duggan keeps repeating "part of the team".
  • The Magazine Rule: Squirrel Girl reads "CHTTT!!! weekly". No. We have no clue what it's about. Outside of squirrels.
  • Magitek: The Knights of the Infinite make use of it in their spaceships.
  • Meaningful Echo: Moridun babbles a seemingly incomprehensible phrase mid-issue 4 that he repeats later at end. It makes a lot more sense when he does, as we learn that his random attack on Billy earlier on wasn't so random; it was a means to leave a piece of his essence within Billy's mind so that he could slowly gain control and later spread in influence ever wider. Teddy realizes that Moridun essentially leading them to the weapon that would be his undoing didn't make much sense, but isn't able to put together the "why" of it all.
    Moridun: Life eats and claws. Lays eggs. Infects. If it provides us distraction... ...we'll play pretend.
  • Meaningful Name: The soldier who signs up for the American Kaiju project is called Todd Ziller.
  • Meaningful Rename: At the end of issue 4, Billy decides to take Victor's advice, and so changes his name from something he isn't to something he will one day be. He chooses "Demiurge", which happens to be the same name he had in an alternate reality where he was a reality warping, worshiped deity. This is because of Mor-I-Dun nesting in his mind. After booting him out, Billy doesn't stick with the name, but he doesn't go back to "Wiccan" either.
  • Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Tippy Toe manages to turn Vermin's rat minions against him, since Vermin keeps making them fight superheroes, something the average rat isn't really designed for. And he doesn't even give them hazard cheese, the villain.
  • The Mole:
    • Hawkeye. It's not spoilered, because he blatantly admits it from the moment he appears. It's just for show.
    • In issue 3, Songbird finds a listening bug on her costume. When Hawkeye claims to know nothing about this, she notes that either he's a good liar or there's a mole they don't know about.
    • In issue 8, it turns out the mole is in fact Songbird herself.
    • And then in issue 11, it transpires that she's actually been a triple agent for Sunspot all along.
  • Mook Carryover: Sunspot hired most of A.I.M., many of those who didn't stick around joined W.H.I.S.P.E.R., and it's suggested that other evil organizations have hired the others, since minions with PhDs don't grow on trees.
  • Nebulous Evil Organisation: W.H.I.S.P.E.R., led by The Maker.
  • The Needless: White Tiger no longer needs to eat, sleep, or do anything that isn't related to being a god of primal terror. This played a large part in Power Man's decision to break up with her, as he was alienated by her increasing distance from humanity.
  • No Celebrities Were Harmed: The US President in issue 16 goes unidentified, but he's blatantly Barack Obama.
  • No-Sell:
    • Duggan, as a highly advanced LMD, is capable of scanning whatever he looks at. When he looks at POD, he gets nothing.
    • Songbird's sonic powers have no effect on Marvel Woman thanks to genetic immunity. Apparently she is her mother, and judging by her family name her father was someone from the Brashear family.
    • Cannonball is apparently immune to the terrigen sickness afflicting most other mutants, because of the nigh-invulnerability he gets when using his powers.
  • Odd Friendship: Thanks to the events of the second issue, what with kicking all kinds of butt together and being turned into crystal-headed zombies before being cured, White Tiger and Squirrel Girl develop a somewhat Odd Friendship with each other, as seen in the beginning of the third issue.
  • Oddly Small Organization:
    • The Knights of the Infinite has seven members when they're first introduced. It turns out being genetic pariahs hunted by two galactic empires doesn't lend itself well to survivability. They get reduced further thanks to Moridun.
    • Issue 8 reveals that Avengers Idea Mechanics only has about two hundred people on staff at Avengers Island. Which explains how Roberto can afford to pay them so well.
  • Off Screen Moment Of Awesome: And not Squirrel Girl. In issue 3 Teddy is tasked with retrieving whatever it is in a pylon of light. The knight giving him the "task" didn't even finish explaining it before he's back with a sword.
  • Off with His Head!:
    • Issue 5 opens with Future!Mor-I-Dun tearing off Thor's head.
    • In issue 15, Toni uses her Rescue armor to take off Skar's head.
    • Issue 18: Duggan punches off Garrett's head.
  • Once More, with Clarity: Issue 15 revisits a conversation from issue 3, showing Melissa and Roberto's conversation once more, revealing what they actually were talking about... and that Hawkeye's appearance forced them to bluff.
  • Open Secret: Everyone, meet super secret SHIELD traitor Hawkeye.
  • Painting the Medium: The Maker still talks in the Ultimate Universe font for some reason. A bit character mentions it sounds like an untraceable accent.
  • Parting-Words Regret: After Billy and Teddy are abducted by aliens, Power Man regrets picking that particular day to call him on the "Wiccan" codename.
  • Persona Non Grata: The New Avengers are barred from setting foot on U.S. soil thanks to their association with the A.I.M. corporation.
  • Playing Both Sides: In issue 15, Melissa manages to use Garrett to take out WHISPER's base by making him think he's nuking AIM.
  • Playing Possum: Moridun is gloriously defeated and dies dramatically in issue #4. Too bad that was just a distraction and it possessed/corrupted Wiccan in the process.
  • Put on a Bus: Hawkeye, due to the events of Civil War II.
  • "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Billy Kaplan to Moridun.
    Billy:You don’t know people, do you? A voice in my head that doesn’t like me? That’s your big horror? Oh, shut up. You don’t know. I know what poisoned thoughts are like, Moridun. I always have. I get anxiety. I don’t think I’m good enough. I don’t like myself, even though I know - rationally, I know - doesn’t matter. I have bad days. Bad thoughts. And sometimes … sometimes, yeah, they’re hard to fight. But I don’t let them win every day. And I’m damn sure not going to let you win today. You're just a cheap little bully who likes breaking toys, Moridun—and you shouldn't have let me see you.
  • Refuge in Audacity: American Kaiju's creation. What happens when you inject one Corporal Ziller with a Frankenstein's Monster of super serum cocktails, featuring the greatest hits of Erskine, Connors, and Pym? Well, you paint the resulting Kaiju Red, White, and Blue and sic' him on A.I.M.
  • Remember When You Blew Up a Sun?:
    • A caption in issue 2 takes the time to note that Squirrel Girl once beat up Thanos.
    • And in issue 3, she brings up her in-depth knowledge of Doctor Doom's tech.
  • Replacement Goldfish: The Maker tries to recreate City, his self-aware A.I. from the Ultimate Universe, but because of the Marvel U's different nature, it acts different than he was hoping for.
  • ReTool: In much the same way New Avengers vol. 3 had absolutely nothing to do with the previous two volumes, vol. 4 is mostly unrelated to vol. 3 (although the premise of A.I.M. being bought and retooled by Sunspot did originate in the concurrent volume of Avengers at the time), and features a brand new cast of heroes taking the lead.
  • The Reveal:
    • It's not until issue 16 that The Maker reveals just what he means when he says he "comes in slices". It means he's scattered across multiple universes, and capable of interacting with each version of himself.
    • Roberto hasn't lost his powers at all. However, they do come with the cost of being Cast from Lifespan.
    • Dum Dum Dugan hasn't been dead all along. He's been alive all along, Nick having hidden his body away in a secret bunker somewhere.
  • Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: The US government has promised it will retaliate if A.I.M. operates on American soil. Regardless, the team still makes the decision to attack the SHIELD Battlecarrier and rescue Rick Jones, including Hawkeye, who's finally had too much of SHIELD's moral compromises.
  • Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: Most of the typical A.I.M. members quit after the organisation was bought, and were recruited by W.H.I.S.P.E.R.
  • Seen It All: General Maverick is utterly unimpressed with A.I.M's activities over the series.
    You call that a mad scientist? I've seen madder science in my daughter's school fair, son, and I ain't impressed by 'you, either.
  • Set Right What Once Went Wrong: What the Avengers 20XX attempt. Stop Moridun before it takes over Wiccan completely and destroys the world. They succeed, creating a new, much happier reality.
  • Sequel Hook: A ludicrous amount in the final issue:
    • The comic ends with Roberto having his henchmamn do "Formation 1776" forming a human american flag and announcing the rebranding of the organization as American Idea Mechanics.
    • Power Man decides to go back home and hero there again with Max tagging along under the name "Iron Fist"
    • Doug mentions the New Mutants should reunite again.
    • Wiccan and Hulking decide on possibly doing "That Young Avengers reunion we've been talking about."
    • Mel leaves, setting up her appearance in Thunderbolts.
  • Ship Tease: POD and Dr. Toni Ho have several moments which hint at their growing closeness, and while linked together in Avenger Five Toni tells POD that she's concerned for her and cares deeply for her. They hook up in the final issue after Toni's previous Anguished Declaration of Love after POD's Disney Death.
  • Shout-Out:
  • Sixth Ranger: Cannonball, whose been hanging out at another A.I.M. base in the Savage Land, joins the team when A.I.M. evacuates Avengers Island.
  • Skewed Priorities: Hulkling decides, in the middle of a pitched battle with the Revengers, to try and answer a text-message, leaving him wide-open to attack.
  • Slasher Smile: The Maker frequently sports one. He even begins issue 2 with one, while covered in someone's blood (and probably other things).
  • Smooch of Victory: Billy and Teddy in Issue 6 after Moridun is expelled from Billy.
  • Space "X": Space knights, space wizards, space castle, space Cthulhu...
    • The Maker also found a reality where WW2 was fought in space. He borrows a space gun from it.
  • Spiritual Successor: The book uses characters and plot elements from Ewing's previous Mighty Avengers series. It also happens to have mostly tonal influences by the author's other previous series Loki: Agent of Asgard especially when it comes to the ridiculously over the top plots (albeit that was magic, this super science) and being deceptively light-hearted.
    • The series also carries over several plot elements and characters from Young Avengers. And, with the addition of Cannonball and Warlock, it's also a spiritual successor to the New Mutants.
  • Stepford Smiler: Due to his Terrigen illness severally weakening him on the inside, the usually upbeat and positive on the outside Sunspot may or may not be suffering from a case of this Trope.
  • Story Arc: So far seems to be working its forefront plots with a two-issue Story Arc fashion, with various other subplot threads inter-spliced throughout, like the reveal of another, non-Clint mole in their midst, POD's humanity crisis, Sunspot actually being deceptively ill, like all other Mutants, due to the Terrigen Mists, and Moridun taking root within Billy's mind.
  • Surveillance as the Plot Demands: The Maker has nanocams (cameras that breed), keeping an eye on A.I.M. all the time. Except when they're on the can (he has minions to do that for him).
  • Talking the Monster to Death: Squirrel Girl's favorite tactic in her solo book, when she tries it here it doesn't work. She even lampshades that it tended to work before.
  • Technobabble:
    • The first issues has some delivered by Tippy-Toe the squirrel. And not translated, so only Squirrel Girl can understand it.
    • Generally this is a super science focused team going up against a Mad Scientist big bad so technobabble is very frequent on both sides.
  • Tempting Fate: After the disappearance of the visitor a goon asks The Maker if it went back where it came from, he assures him but ends with this unadvised sentence "Besides... where else would it go?" Cue its five eyes watching from the shadows.
  • Terror Hero: White Tiger, who stole the power of the first thing humanity ever feared. Remains that way even after the Tiger God makes a break for it.
  • Unequal Rites: The space wizard Mur-G'nn deduces that from her point of view Wiccan's power is not magic, but something similar that she dubs being a warper.
  • Unexplained Recovery: The series is mum on how exactly The Maker survived being reduced to slices at the end of Secret Wars, or how he got to the regular Marvel universe, beyond "he comes in slices". Issue #17 reveals that the Molecule Man placed a "slice" of the Maker in every reality in the multiverse as he and the Future Foundation recreated it, meaning each universe has an identical Maker all working towards a common goal of reuniting the universes into one to prepare them for a coming war. Exactly what all this is about is extremely unclear.
  • Ungrateful Bastard: Rick Jones doesn't say even a word of thanks to the Avengers for rescuing him from SHIELD, not even when they recover his stuff for him.
  • Vague Age: Toni's exact age isn't entirely clear. She mentions doctorates, which usually take some time to acquire, but is drawn as being no older than her mid-to-late twenties at the most.
  • Visionary Villain: The Maker's plan is to create the "perfect world". Mainly by committing horrific and bizarre acts of mad science.
  • Vitriolic Best Buds: Collapsar and Iron Mariner of the Avengers of 20XX. Mariner openly admits he doesn't like Collapsar when Collapsar cheerfully claims that they make the perfect duo.
  • We Come in Peace — Shoot to Kill: In issue 3, The Knights of the Infinite tried to claim they came in peace and were greeted with "weapons", not surprisingly as the Marvel universe had it's share of both Skrull and Kree attacks. Thankfully, everything is sorted out by the end of issue 4, with everyone parting amicably and with Teddy given the blessing of being able to return to lead them as their new King when he is ready to do so.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: After his defeat in issue 6, what becomes of Moridun is unknown.
  • What Measure Is a Non-Human?: John Garrett tries justifying what he does to Duggan on the grounds he thought he was "just" a robot. Duggan doesn't bother listening.
  • Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: The Plunderer's henchman, Terry (as in his only henchman), is forced to confront his greatest fear - squirrels. Followed shortly after by his second greatest fear - betrayal, in the form of his boss running away.
  • With This Herring: Squirrel Girl notes on seeing the Kree spaceship that if it were, say, Doctor Doom tech, she could just bring it down with a well-aimed acorn (apparently it's a common design flaw in his ships).
  • Wire Dilemma: Well, sort of. If you're in a hurry tasking Tippy-Toe (as squirrels are colorblind) with wiring your time machine can lead to disastrous consequences.
  • Wolverine Publicity: Not to the degree as other examples, but Hawkeye who will be in this book in addition to his own on-going series. Much more notably, Hawkeye is also the only member of the cast to currently be appearing in anything outside of comics.
  • Working with the Ex: Power Man and White Tiger were a couple during the later half of Mighty Avengers for a while but broke up (mostly off panel in the time skips). It's awkward occasionally.
  • Wrong Genre Savvy: The Maker comes from the grittier, more realistic Ultimate Universe. This causes him to fail to account for some of the more bizarre fantastical elements of the mainstream universe. He's also somehow convinced that he's the hero of the story, when he quite blatantly isn't.
  • You Are in Command Now: In issue 8, Wiccan, Hulking, Squirrel Girl and Tippy Toe are the only ones who refuse to invade S.H.I.E.L.D. to resuce Rick Jones. As such, Sunspot teleports them into the desert... then tells them that, because of what the rest of the team is doing, they're now the New Avengers.
  • You Can't Fight Fate: M'ryn the Magus has been deliberately delaying declaring Teddy as The Chosen One because his prophecy dictates that he will die when this finally happens. Moridun of the Fifth Cosmos helpfully fulfills the latter condition in order to bring about the former.
  • You Know I'm Black, Right?: Parodied when Sunspot observed that future Iron Man has a tail and Tippy Toe as fellow tail haver apparently took issue.

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