Avengers #257 pg 18 - Buscema/Palmer

This is my first J. Buscema piece and my first Tom Palmer piece.
Many Buscema/Palmer Avengers pages were available at Heritage this year. This one attracted me with the nice action and a decent price.

The great ones definitely show their value in this one. If I were to describe the page to you - Avengers Quinjet, Black Knight, one close-up of Wasp, and Terminus, but not a full view - you probably wouldn't get too excited. But the craft and storytelling here makes it special. There are maybe hundreds (thousands?) of pages like this, but I'm glad to have this one.

Cool vertical establishing shot with great sound effects, an interior view to let us know the players, the small, but import and eject panel to bridge the start of the page and the end and add a bit of suspense, the jump, the landing, then bottom middle the panel that made me want this page - the sword swipe that could be placed in any classic King Arthur story, and then the reveal that Terminus is a robot or part robot or something.
I like the choice not to show Terminus in full. His size is seen in probably a bunch of other pages in this book, but here we gauge the size not with the zoom out and smallness of all the other characters, but with the zoom-in and Terminus not at all fitting in the panels.

So maybe not the most important or memorable page, but I love the tight storytelling and I love the details and depth that Palmer brings in his inks.
Oh yeah, and this issue was the first appearance of Nebula. She was just the B-story. Can't compete with Termie!


Avengers #257
July 1985
Writer: Roger Stern Pencils: John Buscema Inks: Tom Palmer

Source: Heritage Auctions Weekly