"Day Of The Godslayer!"

 

The Avengers are in crisis mode! As was the case with Graviton, the Avengers again face a single individual who possesses enough power to swing a virtual scythe through their ranks and easily thwart their best efforts to take him down. Today, that individual turns out to be Count Nefaria, who in the past has employed the use of super-powered underlings to further his criminal agenda, but has now used technology to siphon the powers of the Living Laser, Whirlwind, and Power Man for himself while also increasing the strength of those powers a hundredfold. That translates, respectively, to being able to deploy massively powerful laser beams, speed which would make Quicksilver seem to be moving like molasses, and strength which allows him to topple skyscrapers with little more than a shrug. In short, the Avengers face the fight of their lives against Nefaria.

Already, in several engagements, Nefaria has defeated the Avengers decisively while emerging none the worse for wear; yet during a skirmish with the Whizzer, Nefaria was made aware of his own mortality, which has motivated him to seek out and face the thunder god, Thor, in order to force him to surrender his mystic hammer which Nefaria believes is the source of Thor's immortality. And as far as Nefaria is concerned, whether that surrender comes willingly or as a result of Thor's death is of little consequence.

For their part, the Avengers made it clear that they would not cooperate with their foe in summoning Thor to the scene, and battled on to yet another defeat. But in the midst of the carnage suddenly comes a sweeping, deadly barrage of lightning bolts which blanket Nefaria and visibly unnerve him--heralding the arrival, and the cry of vengeance, of the one Avenger who yet stands in defiance of him.

If you were a reader of this story when it was originally published in late 1977, by now you would have been made aware of efforts to stoke your interest in its outcome by implying that Nefaria would prove triumphant against the Avengers, and mortally so against Thor. The climactic story's title, "Day Of The Godslayer," teased in the prior issue, appears to go beyond mere marketing; and now we have a cover which is hard to misread in terms of the apprehension being fanned in readers even before flipping the issue open. Over forty years later, with the Avengers and Thor still selling books, it's safe to say that the title might have instead been styled as overly dramatic in Nefaria's favor (put another way, if slightly reworked, "The Man Who Would Be Godslayer" or words to that effect), while the cover caption is simply flat-out wrong given that the outcome it declares never materializes.

At any rate, Nefaria has bigger worries than semantics at the moment--though he's going to do his best to live up to his billing.

Quite a wake-up call for Thor, who arrives guns blazing believing he's dealing with yet another powerful, strutting mortal super-villain but ends up on the defensive and buried beneath an entire skyscraper in roughly the span of a minute and a half.

Give Nefaria credit--with all he's accomplished today, it's not surprising to see him to treat Thor's dispatch with almost casual disregard. And while Thor isn't down for the count just yet, he's in for quite an education as far as Nefaria's ability to withstand the wrath of a god, as well as the man's well-justified arrogance in the face of his opposition.

It's too bad the scene stops short here, rather than displaying the usual attempt by an aggressor to take possession of Thor's hammer but stymied by its enchantment which prevents just such a move. From a reader's standpoint, there yet remains doubt that Nefaria's attempt wouldn't be successful; in any event, we're only six pages into this story, and for Nefaria to find that the hammer has been rendered useless to him would make continuing the fight against Thor and the Avengers almost pointless (aside from the satisfaction gained from their deaths).

So what does stop Nefaria from completing his grab for the hammer? In the prior issue, Yellowjacket unexpectedly abandoned the fight and headed back into Avengers Mansion, which we later learn was done in order to make a risky attempt to revive the Vision so as to increase the odds against Nefaria--an attempt which we already know will be successful, thanks to the cover. And so Nefaria is startled by the Avenger's wraith-like form appearing before him, followed by the Vision's hand knifing toward his chest--for all the good it does against him.

With the Vision dealt with, at least temporarily, Nefaria turns his attention back to Thor, when an unexpected variable enters the scene: Professor Sturdy, who worked on Nefaria's Project "N" which empowered Nefaria, only to then pay the ultimate price at Nefaria's hands for his expertise. But Sturdy still hangs onto life by a thread--and he has come to make certain that Nefaria realizes the mistake he's made, and that in two days he will share Sturdy's fate. Nefaria, now facing a no-win situation and with no other recourse, vows to take New York City down with him.

And what of the Avengers, or the remnants thereof? They do what they do best in a crisis--assemble, no matter what the threat or how great the odds against them. And despite Nefaria's power, and that he fights as relentlessly as ever, the team has the numbers this time to keep him reeling, and everyone (with the exception of the injured Captain America) gets a turn at bat.* But will it be enough?

*Do they, though? More on that train of thought in a moment.

With such spirit and courage on display against an intractable and ruthless foe, it's almost regrettable that we're all being suddenly tugged into taking a detour toward

The final blow against Nefaria comes in the form of the Vision, who has risen a mile above the battle site and prepares his android form for a single, powerful strike which might well put an end to Nefaria's threat.

(Good thing no Avenger was grappling with Nefaria at Ground Zero at the crucial moment.)

As for our puzzle, let's assume, as we must, that the Vision has somehow marked Nefaria's position even while floating over five thousand feet above the fray. Question: How does the Vision manage to make a direct hit on Nefaria, a moving target who is also being batted around by Avenger after Avenger? Since the Vision's plummeting form is no guided missile, Nefaria's constant movement would force him to adjust his trajectory any number of times during his descent in order to stay on target--and that adjustment wouldn't have been possible in mid-fall unless the Vision decreased his mass and density sufficiently to the point where he could shift his position in relation to Nefaria's and initiate the plunge to Earth once more. As a result, each adjustment at various stages of decreasing distance would sap the speed of his descent and, consequently, the striking force of his body against his target, assuming he was able to hit the target at all by that point.

(Funny that it happens to be Wanda who at first mistakes the Vision for a meteor--why didn't she try her little meteor hex from 1974 against Nefaria? A meteor would have the advantage of picking up its speed from as far as outer space and thus achieve a much greater force of impact, while guaranteed via Wanda's focus to hit its target.)

With Nefaria dealt with, at least for the time being, we learn from Yellowjacket the extent of Sturdy's gamble in confronting Nefaria, as well as the irony involved in Nefaria's desperate course of action vis-à-vis Thor and his ignorance of his true condition.

From here, the Avengers will have their encounter with the Guardians of the Galaxy, though eventually they'll have to deal with the repercussions of the battle with Nefaria when a federal nuisance rears its head in the form of their new government liaison, Henry Peter Gyrich. As for Nefaria himself, he apparently perishes after an accident at Stark International destroys the containment cylinder keeping his aged form alive, but survives to scheme another day.

 

BUT HOLD ON A MOMENT...

As alluded to earlier, you may or may not have noticed that there was one Avenger present in the group's initial battle with Nefaria during the first part of this story--only to have been inexplicably jettisoned for this issue when the team joined ranks to finally defeat their foe. Can you guess which Avenger suddenly went M.I.A.?

Well, if you're wondering where the Beast was, he at least made an appearance--not in the battle, unfortunately, but in the Avengers' lab, as Yellowjacket made his attempt to revive the Vision:

Which leaves us with the Black Panther--last seen with the Beast in a joint attack against Nefaria, with both being struck down for their trouble.

After which T'Challa is absent for the duration of this conflict. When the rest of the team regains consciousness, the Panther is simply gone from the lineup, nor does he seem to be missed by either his teammates or the story's writer and artist (respectively, Jim Shooter and John Byrne). Jeez--is that any way to treat a king?