A
Spin Off of Marvel's moderately successful
Avengers series, set just after
Avengers: Disassembled, this was aimed at young adult readers, but still contained enough
Darker And Edgier material to please Marvel execs.
The comic has so far had a 12-issue run, an Annual issue, a
Civil War tie-in where they teamed up with the
Runaways (and another for the Secret Invasion), and a series of special "Young Avengers Presents..." books which focused on each character individually. The second half of the book's run is currently being plagued by delays.
Generally, reception has been positive, especially from GLBT readersfor the honest presentation of a relatively realistic gay couple who (so far) haven't had it any worse than any other superhero in the biz. Only time will tell whether
Executive Meddling screws this up or not...
..And as of 2009, it appears that writer/creator Allan Heinberg
is "too busy" to continue the series. At least Stature and Vison are part of the Mighty Avengers.
Contains examples of:
- Abusive Parents: Stature's stepfather is known to berate her, insult her late father, and attempt to physically abuse her. Her mother usually ignores this, and has been seen to slap her on more than one occasion.
- Ascended Fanboy: Everybody (except possibly Speed).
- Most of all Patriot. He was able to meet and team up with both Steve Rogers and James Barnes.
- Badass Normal: Kate Bishop and Patriot both started out this way, but Patriot got hold of first some drugs, then a blood transfusion full of Super Serum, leaving Hawkeye the sole BN on the team.
- Bald Black Leader Guy: Patriot.
- Beware The Nice Ones: Wiccan and Hulkling are the sweetest, most unassuming Yaoi Guys you could ever hope to meet...until you threaten one of them, in which case the other will be very put out.
- Blessed With Suck: Poor Melter (Dark Young Avengers).
- Butt Monkey: Stature, between Civil War and Secret Invasion.
- Coming Out Story (amusing subversion, detailed on the page)
- Cool Big Sis: Kate Bishop
- Crimefighting With Cash: again, Kate Bishop
- Deadpan Snarker: Pretty much everyone. One troper thinks Wiccan, Speed, and Kate Bishop are the best at it, though.
- Different As Night And Day: Wiccan and Speed. Wiccan is a gay spellcaster who's a pretty nice guy if you don't hurt his boyfriend. Speed is a hyperactive juvenile delinquent with a penchant for using hyperkinetic shockwaves to blow stuff up.
- Doomed By Canon: Once we learn that Iron Lad is a teenage Kang the Conqueror, his fate is a given.
- Dysfunction Junction: Pretty much everyone on the team has an issue, be it drugs, rape, homosexuality, parental abandonment...
- Five Man Band:
- Gentle Giant: Hulking. But again with the whole don't hurt his boyfriend thing.
- Half Human Hybrids: Hulkling again.
- Half Kree and half Skrull anyway.
- Identical Grandson: The Vision... kinda.
- I Knew It: Wiccan and Hulkling's reveal as being a gay couple was done sooner than planned, because all the fans could tell they were in a relationship anyway.
- Interspecies Romance: Hulkling (Kree/Skrull hybrid) and Wiccan (human/possible mutant), Stature (human) and Vision (synthezoid)
- Jumped At The Call: Pretty much every one of 'em.
- Killer Rabbit: Molly Hayes, during the Runaways crossover.
- Little Big Man: Stature and Big Zero
- Legacy Character: By Issue 12, the whole team become Legacy Characters, including Kate Bishop as the new Hawkeye.
- Love Triangle: The team basically consists of the stable gay couple and two sets of love triangles: a Betty And Veronica situation with Kate, nice guy Eli, and bad boy Tommy; and the angstier/quirkier triangle between Cassie, a guy she knew for a few hours, and a robot with the memories of the guy she knew for a few hours.
- Paper Thin Disguise (several):
- Kate's 'mask' is a pair of sunglasses (hopefully she never wears those when not in costume).
- Cassie and Eli wear actual masks, but their secret identities are already closely associated with the legacies they take on: Cassie, publicly known as the daughter of the second Ant-Man, wears a variant of his costume and doesn't hide her hair or most of her face (Domino Mask); Eli's grandfather is likewise publicly known to have been Captain America, and Eli, likewise with a Domino Mask, is the Patriot. Both have been easily found out (though, thankfully, not by villains).
- Eli's first costume did avert the trope by covering almost anything.
- Wiccan has no mask at all and yet somehow avoids detection.
- The Psycho Rangers: Dark Young Avengers, also called Young Masters of Evil.
- Rape As Backstory: Kate Bishop, again
- Relationship Text Upgrade: Wiccan and Hulkling
- Shadow Archetype: Most of the Young Avengers have a Shadow Archetype in the Dark Young Avengers.
- Suddenly Sexuality: Completely averted. Signs that Wiccan and Hulkling are a couple are there from Day One.
- Super Serum: Patriot, using the stuff that started the trope.
- Superpowerful Genetics: Wiccan and Speed somehow inherit their "mother" and "uncle's" mutant powers, despite being reincarnated, and therefore not genetically related to the Maximoffs at all [or each other, but they're still fraternal twins].
- Trying to apply logic and/or science to chaos magic will only bring you sorrow and grief, especially considering that the boys are technically older than their past lives.
- You Killed My Father: Cassie tries to do this with Scarlet Witch when they end up on the Mighty Avengers; ironically, Cassie is right that Wanda shouldn't be trusted, but not for the reason she thinks (Wanda is actually Loki, God of Mischief, in disguise).
- Good Parents — The Kaplans are pretty amazing.
