Just to clarify, I've not been picking up the Fear Itself book, but many of the books I do collect are now Fear Itself tie Ins, see unless you're willing to just drop a title for a couple of months there's no escaping the huge event.
The plot, from what I can ascertain, Sin, Daughter of the red Skull has found an old Asgaurdian fear god who was so bad he was banished and removed from all of history. This god has given her a hammer like Thor's and sent 7 others to earth where they have been picked up by several Heroes and Villains, turning them into evil gods. Sin has also led an attack on Washington using Giant Nazi robots. Odin is in fact so scared he has withdrawn Asgard from earth taking all his norse gods with him. Confused, well for someone not reading the main book it can be. This is wat I would classify as a "Bad" crossover. Namely you do feel you've missed something if you just stick to your main titles. So much so that it took several books for me to realise I hadn't missed an issue in between.
This criticism aside, the event itself is great. Obviously, some heavy hitters get their own big bad to fight, such as Iron Man fighting the Grey Gargoyle or the Avengers fighting a hammer possessed Thing. Others are involved in general fighting, such as the Secret Avengers being on the vanguard defending Washington DC from Sin's forces, The Thunderbolts trying to secure the raft after a hammer landed and was picked up by Juggernaut or the Avengers Academy pupils involved protecting civilians. Either way, there is a real apocalyptic feel to this event. Society is breaking down and the problems are as much rioting, looting and people being scared as they are nazi battlemechs or godlike super-villains.
Fear itself has even got me picking up some extra Limited series. First, Youth in Revolt.
Youth in Revolt Features Prodigy, plus many of the heroes that appeared in the Initiative, who are re-activated as a volunteer force to try to help. Sadly a situation in Atlanta develops when Thor Girl accidentally deflects some shots from a policeman with disastrous results. I liked this on two fronts. First, its more about stopping looters than fighting big bads, although there is a good moment with Crossbones nearly wiping out Gravity's team. It's also great if you were, like me, keen on teh whole Initiative idea. As well as featuring Prodigy, Thor Girl, Cloud 9 and Firestar, it is jam packed with guest appearances from Butterball, to some of The Order, and ist a good read.
Second is a bit odd but worth a look, Fearsome Four. because of the high levels of fear, man thing has been drawn to New York. Howard the Duck recruits She-Hulk, Nighthawk and Frankensteins monster to try to prevent his friend from killing too many people. Its quirky, Nighthawk appears to have gone a bit ga-ga since I last saw him, think more along the lines of the "God Damned Batman" but its worth it if nothing else for some serious Quack-Fu from Howard.
So, I'm still not picking up the main book, but the story is worth the disruption its caused to my regular reads. In fact, at this rate I'll probably pick up the trade.
