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What many perceive as the biggest fault of the Secret Invasion mini-series is actually it's biggest strength. While Brian Michael Bendis reserves a lot of the backstory and revelations for his monthly Avengers books, New Avengers and Mighty Avengers, Secret Invasion is mostly the big budget summer blockbuster popcorn movie event that require almost no foreknowledge, familiarity, or fluency with the Marvel Universe. Certain events may mean more to long time readers of the Avengers titles or the myriad of Bendis’ scribed series from the past few years, but the casual reader can find just as much enjoyment from this series, which is why it's so difficult to dismiss.
Issue 4 takes a step back from the intimate following of the battles in the Savage Land that have dominated the last 2 issues, and instead gives us a tour of the Marvel Universe, catching up on many of the events we saw unfold in the first issue and second issue. While this may feel like a let down to some who hoped that the story would progress faster and falling back to these threads feels like we are still stuck in relatively short period of time, it helps to remember that this is the mid point of an 8 issue series. Many mini-series would be concluding with this issue, while Bendis still has half of the story to go.
With that in mind, it's interesting to see how some of the other corners of the Marvel Universe have fared. Jarvis has demanded that S.H.I.E.L.D. surrender publicly on worldwide television. Obviously, this isn't something S.H.I.E.L.D. considers to be a viable option, yet Jarvis shows how far the Skrull Empire has gone to make this happen. Bendis also uses this issue to declare a very important story point. After all, if Tony Stark or Reed Richards are among the few on Earth who are capable of stopping the invasion, why weren't they killed outright before the invasion began? And how does that rationale tie into the motive of the invasion in the first place? It's an interesting point that adds to the layers of story that even a casual fan can understand.
One of the sour points of the issue is not a criticism of Bendis' story itself, but of the tone of the series and how it relates to the Marvel Universe. While it's often clear from the onset of a major series like this that the good guys will win and Earth will prevail, Secret Invasion begins to infuse the idea that while the invasion will be a failure and the human race will survive, things might not be quite the same afterwards. The status quo of the Marvel Universe changed drastically after the events of Civil War in a way that made that story seem important for a change. Secret Invasion may change things in the Marvel Universe enough that in the end, the most significant change may be a return to the pre Civil War regularity.
Leinil Yu's artwork continues to flourish under the spotlight of such a high profile undertaking. Any doubts about his ability to keep schedule and keep quality seem unfounded. Even though some characters may not quite appear as they do in other Marvel titles (how did Jarvis get so fat?) they are consistent within this series, and that's more important.