The unofficial title of this review is “Why does Hickman’s New Avengers work so much better than his Avengers?” Here are my theories. The slightly slower pace gives Hickman an opportunity to indulge in character moments that are missing from Avengers. Namor steals this book month after month. Hickman is excellent at writing ambiguously villainous assholish royals like Namor and Doom. New Avengers is also much more traditionally structured. There’s a small group of characters (The Illuminati) with a defined goal (stop universes from crashing together) and high stakes if they fail (the destruction of earth). In Avengers, there are so many characters flitting in and out and bouncing around that it’s hard to get any of those things established or make a reader care. Hickman’s slower pace and abundant dialogue and diagrams in the second issue of this series were a gambit that’s paid off.