Truthfully, I'm wary to even trust my own interpretation of this first issue, because I'm reminded of my miscue on the first issue of She-Hulk, where it took a couple issues before I really "got it." That said, GLA #1 reads kind of like Slott trying to get a little bit away from the reputation he's gotten as one of the few guys at Marvel with any respect for the less-than-A-list characters. There's a blend of serious and funny tones here, but they seem flip-flopped, playing parody when a little more straightforward writing is called for and treating some cliched angst-y elements as if they strike at the heart of the readers. Fans of the GLA (all six of them) will probably be unhappy since it looks like Slott is aiming to take out the team one at a time, and fans of She-Hulk (slightly more of those) may find themselves a little unsure about whether lightning can strike twice for this creative team... as opposed to the characters, for whom it can and does in the tail end of the book.
The idea of the GLA is patently ridiculous on the face of it, a bunch of C-list lamers with D-list powers forming up to defend the midwest from what must surely be a paucity of supervillains in the area. And yet, there's kind of something potentially inspiring there, a chance to show a little "flyover state" pride for the folks who might be tired of seeing that everything seems to happen in New York and L.A., a chance to play up the universal themes of the underdog. Slott doesn't really walk that line in this issue, using the GLA entirely for laughs. Some of them are kind of funny, including the flashbacks to the first "adventures" of the hapless team members or the addition of "Leather Boy" to the team roster, although it's not quite as endearing as Slott's work on She-Hulk yet. This may have to do with the admittedly obscure nature of the characters he's working with.
This is part one of the parody titled "Great Lakes Avengers Misassembled," but it could just as easily be called the secret origin of Mr. Immortal. We learn how he got his unusual powers, and see the background that led to him becoming a bit of a glory hound, and even get some hints as to why he might have such rage when he wakes up out of his death, although that last part isn't directly referenced in the issue. Slott does a nice job of incorporating a weird, fringe element of the Marvel Universe in Immortal's origins, and giving a creepy vibe to the "imaginary friend" who seems to delight in killing everyone around Mr. Immortal even while sparing him. However, while in She-Hulk Slott might have used this element for a humorous aside, here he goes for something more akin to superhero melodrama, and it doesn't quite work. The death of Mr. Immortal's loved ones is kind of disturbing, but not quite disturbing enough to be real drama, and it's not quite funny enough to be called dark humor. The big reveal here at the end is a clever twist, but one easy enough to predict, especially given that the whole theme of this issue is about how much death surrounds a character who can't die himself.
While Slott's work on this issue doesn't click with me immediately, Paul Pelletier has definitely brought his A-game to the party. He absolutely nails the look of the GLA, from Mr. Immortal's William Katt white-guy 'fro to the distinctive skinny Byrne girl look of Ashley, supermodel alter ego of Big Bertha. His designs for the second-rate Ani-Men, based on less threatening animals like giraffes, pigs and bunnies, are funny and yet kind of cool-looking. And the action sequences have all the energy of a big superhero fight, even though they're mostly played for laughs in these pages. Quintana also does an amazing job with the colors, keeping things bright and colorful without ever crossing over to gaudy or overly slick and over-produced.
Slott has sort of become the standard bearer of the fanboy flag to some extent, but I think they'll be taking that flag down after reading GLA #1. He opens with a mean-spirited and cliched attack on comic book fans as overgrown adolescents with poor social skills, and then continues to plague us with obnoxious inserts from "Monkey Joe" the squirrel. Seriously, it's like Quesada's fanboy-baiting persona from the Jemas years has been reincarnated as a talking squirrel. The solicits and next issue blurbs have promised many deaths in the pages of GLA, and I hope that Monkey Joe will be one of those meeting his maker, and soon. Perhaps we can set up some sort of 1-900 number to vote on his gory demise, ala Robin in the '90s?6/10
