The one troubling aspect of Avengers Academy since the latest roster changes has been the overabundance of characters and the lack of space to focus on them all. But just as Christos Gage eventually settled in with the original cast, he proves himself able to better the juggle the many characters and conflicts in issue #24. That means not just focusing on essential matters, like an origin story for the new White Tiger and a closer look at Reptil's scheming, but also on ancillary characters like Juston and Butterball.
Issue #24 does suffer from an uneven sense of tone. There's both character drama and humor on tap, and both veer between light and dark with some regularity. Not that the unexpected doses of black humor are necessarily unwelcome. After all, every Avengers: The Initiative reader must have wondered in the back of their minds whether Butterball could survive being eaten alive. Or not. As long as you can stomach a book that is alternating innocent and charming and dark and tragic, there's a lot to love this month.
Tom Grummett steps on board as the new penciller with this issue. His art has a distinctly old-school feel, with its clean lines and simple figure work. That doesn't exactly help solidify the tone either, but it generally suits the book and its mishmash of old and new characters. Hopefully Grummet can offer the book the visual consistency it hasn't enjoyed much in the past year.
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