The Avengers Epic Collection: Judgment Day

{AVENGERS EPIC COLLECTION VOLUME 17}

Roger Stern's fan-favorite run comes to a celestial conclusion! For the life of Hercules, the Avengers must storm the very gates of Olympus and take on an entire pantheon of all-powerful Greek gods! Do our heroes stand a snowball's chance in Tartarus? Then: Magneto's on trial, and he needs all the help he can get! The X-Men aren't sure what his scheme is, but they're positive they don't want the Avengers and the Soviet Super-Soldiers to find out before they do!

COLLECTING: Avengers (1963) #278-285 and Avengers Annual #16; PLUS: Marvel Graphic Novel #27: Emperor Doom; X-Men vs. Avengers #1-4; and West Coast Avengers Annual #2

Marvel launches the Epic Collections -- a new way for fans to collect their favorite series! Each super-sized volume in the Epic line presents a heaping helping of Marvel's greatest heroics in one handy, affordable and self-contained package. What's more, each Epic Collection TPB is also a piece of a grand puzzle: When all is said and done, the Epic volumes will fit seamlessly next to one another on readers' bookshelves, presenting a complete and unbroken run of each title! So be sure to get in on the ground floor! Marvel's most storied titles -- including Amazing Spider-Man, Avengers, Captain America, Fantastic Four, Iron Man, and Thor -- are going Epic, and there's no turning back!

"The culmination of Roger Stern's 5 year+ run on Avengers was the line up of Thor, Black Knight, She-Hulk, Sub-Mariner, his wife Marrina, Doctor Druid and their chairperson Captain Marvel. True, a far cry from the founders heavy early days when one would expect Iron Man, Captain America and either the Wasp or Yellowjacket on the team. But this colorful assemblage of heroes were more than able to hold their own, possessing a wide variety of skills, contacts and backgrounds in both scientific and mystical matters.

"Under Roger Stern (not to mention the consistent art team of John Buscema and Tom Palmer), the Avengers had continued to grow and evolve, culminating in the election of its first ever trainee recruit Captain Marvel to the position of chairperson. As one sees too often in group books, only two or three members get the chance to really shine, leaving the others as little more than glorified bitplayers forced to spout interchangeable, expositionary dialogue.

"Not this particular line up, though. Thor was appropriately godlike, She-Hulk sounded like her familiar, sassy self, the Sub-Mariner displayed his trademark pomposity while Black Knight showed he was first and foremost a scientist. Even new recruits like Marrina and Doctor Druid were valued, vital and instantly distinguishable members of the team. In many ways, that makes these "post Mansion Siege" era Avengers like Cap's Kooky Quartet, the first ever line up change that saw Captain America heading up a team that consisted of Hawkeye, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver. One'd hardly consider them Earth's mightiest, but for the briefest of times, they were.

"Sometimes, history repeats itself." -- Jef Willemsen