The Sinister Substitute

Marvel Avengers Assembly #2

by Preeti Chhibber, James Lancett (Illustrator)

It's a new semester at Avengers Assembly but something seriously weird is going on!
Kamala, Doreen, and Miles are back at Avengers Assembly for a new semester! Captain Marvel has added new staff to the school, and the students don't quite know what to expect from them.

But some of these teachers are really not acting like heroes at all, more like... super-villains? And then someone starts posting incriminating pictures of Doreen and her friends. Can Doreen and her friends get to the bottom of this scandal, who framed them and what is causing the teachers to act so strange? Or will this be the end of the Avengers Assembly?

Genres: Graphic Novels, Superheroes, Marvel, Childrens, Science Fiction, Mystery, Juvenile

176 pages, Hardcover

First published April 6, 2021

About the author

Preeti Chhibber is a huge nerd. She usually spends her time reading a ridiculous amount of Young Adult, but is also ready to jump into most fandoms at a moment’s notice. You can follow her on Twitter @runwithskizzers.

Reviews

[Lata · Rating 4 out of 5]

Squirrel Girl is the focus in this next and terrific entry in the lighthearted Avengers Assembly comic series. Weird things are happening at Avengers Assembly; some teachers don’t remember their lessons or their students, while a couple of kids are accused of cheating and vandalism.
Turns out, someone is impersonating teachers and students at Avengers Institute, and Squirrel Girl, Nancy, Ms Marvel, Spidey Miles work together to investigate, developing different ideas and plans, resulting in a successful capture of the baddie.
Doreen is such an ebullient, kind and positive character. She knows her friends would never do the things they’re accused of, and the young, in-training Avengers work nicely together, leaning on each others’ strengths to figure out what’s going on and deal with the problem.
It’s a cute, upbeat story, thanks to the young superheroes.

[Mehsi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Our trio of Spiderman, Squirrel Girl and Ms. Marvel is back. This time friendship, strange things happening at school, priorities, and more!


A superduper fun book this time we get Doreen aka Squirrel Girl as MC and I loved it. Hope that next time is Miles! Squirrel Girl is really hit/miss for me. I like her character/her powers, but it really depends on how she gets written if I like her or not. The comics that I read. No. She was immature, annoying, and more squirrel than girl. But in the Hale and also Chhibber way we have a mature, fun, punny and sweet girl! And I was just delighted. This is the girl I want to see.

I really liked seeing what happened at the school and all the evil things that got planned and plotted. A lot of things happen at school (both good and bad) and at times I just felt so sad for the characters that got in trouble for things they didn’t do. Or well. Not consciously. I had fun puzzling and figuring out who could be the mastermind of the story. I have to say I am a bit disappointed it is that villain, I do hope next time we get someone else as the big baddie.

I was sad about the friendship between Nancy/Doreen, but I am proud that she knew she was wrong and tried to patch it up. I was also said to see the friendship/teamship between the characters disappear a bit (and how they didn’t believe her), but thankfully things got patched up and I saw my team again!

I cannot wait for the next book, X-Men! Yas! I cannot wait to see my favourite X-Men in this fabulous art style.

Review first posted at https://twirlingbookprincess.com/

[Melliane · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mon avis en Français

My English review

J’avais trouvé le premier volume très mignon et j’étais ravie de découvrir cette suite. Nous changeons cette fois-ci de personnage principal et nous suivons les aventures d’Écureuillette.

Notre jeune super-héroïne va se retrouver avec une sacrée affaire sur les bras ! En effet, d’étranges évènements se déroulent à l’académie et personne ne semble s’en rendre compte. Et quand notre héroïne en fait aussi les frais, elle est bien décidée à découvrir ce qui se passe, même si personne ne la croit !

J’ai passé un bon moment avec ce petit livre à nouveau et c’était un plaisir de découvrir un autre personnage de la petite bande. Je suis curieuse de voir l’histoire que nous aurons dans le tome. Après avoir vu plusieurs grands Marvel ici (Thor, Groot, Antman…), des X-Men nous attendent dans le prochain, de quoi rendre curieux !

[Becky B · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's time for another semester at Avengers Assembly. Doreen, Miles, Nova, and Kamala are excited to get back. It's a very busy semester. Everyone's schedules are packed. They are getting used to some of the new teachers this semester including Ant-Man and Rocket & Groot. But some of the teachers are saying weird things. And then someone starts posting pictures of Doreen and her friends doing bad stuff. But they would never do such things. What is going on? Is Avengers Assembly doomed?

A nice mystery going on here for the younger Avengers to solve. I like the mix of text and graphic novel in here. I find this format is really good to give reluctant readers confidence that they can read text-only books. Not that there is anything wrong with graphic novels, though! I am a huge graphic novel fan. And I love those sections of this book the best. With no more Squirrel Girl graphic novels right now, I'm super happy to get to spend more time with Doreen and Tippy through these stories. Rocket as a teacher is a very funny idea, and I hope he and Groot stick around for another semester. Hand this to middle grade Marvel fans.

Notes on content: No language issues. No sexual content. There's some online meanness going on but it is resolved happily. Oddly enough, there are no superhero fight sequences in this I can remember.

[Iann R Dean · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was SO confused reading through this (Though it could just be a me thing). I somehow managed to keep getting Evan and Amadeus mixed up and it kept feeling like some pages were missing. When they catch Space Phantom (SP), both Miles and Nancy mention being to SP's pocket dimension, which they never were as well as Amadeus insulting it, but he isn't supposed to remember being there. I can't tell if they're jokes or not. It was also confusing at first when SP took Amadeus' place in his lab, because it goes from Amadeus being on page to a text conversation to SP in Amadeus' place in Amadeus' lab and it doesn't really mention that the kids notice that it's SP, but instead they just immediately enact their plan to stop him. Amadeus then also just appears out of nowhere after he's captured. Idk, I'm overall very confused and generally overwhelmed with all that happened. It had funny moments and an interesting plot, but I feel like it was overall poorly executed.

Edit: It seems I did miss some information. I just found that this is the second book in a series, but I don't believe that's advertised anywhere in or on the book.

[MacK · Rating 2 out of 5]

Building off the first volume in the series, Chhiber seems to revel in connecting more with her protagonist. In particular, she provides one of the best justifications for superhero-ing that I've read in any source. The heartfelt and honest letter that Doreen Green (aka the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl) writes to her family about identity and purpose and growing up connects beautifully.

However, the book itself doesn't have the same pace or energy that the first one had. Rather than building on the world we already met, we're thrown head long into a new character's home life, a new best friend to meet, a new ally to encounter, new teachers to understand, and a new enemy to defeat. But with a more focused and intentional character story to tell, the joy of super-hero classes and adventures end up lost. Again there's so much happening that the strongest moments (like the aforementioned letter) stand out, and you barely have time to regret the parts you missed.

[Natalie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Doreen, aka Squirrel Girl and her gang of superhero friends start off a new school year at the Avenger Institute. Things are a little peculiar though as a couple of the teachers, Rocket Raccon and Antman, are teaching some strange, superhero-contradictory things. To top it off, there's some anonymous person posting embarrassing and insulting pictures of Brawn (Amadeus) and Squirrel Girl. Though totally false, the pictures are undeniably them. Perplexed, Squirrel Girl needs to touch base with her team, but everyone is so busy with their own thing that it's hard for them to even have a decent conversation about it, let alone to solve whis mystery on their hands.

This was a fun read and knowing the avengers characters and Marvel universe is a big plus to fully understand the context and story.

[Noel Sierra · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm about to attend a convention as Squirrel Girl alongside a Kamala and Miles, so naturally, I had to read this book! The first in the series was checked out, but I was able to snag this one in time--and was actually happy to discover this one is in SG's pov!

The story is told through a series of SG journal entries, texts, and doodles, and is honestly absolutely hilarious. A ton of Marvel heroes make an appearance, including Rocket and Groot, Ant Man, Captain Marvel, etc., and it's so fun to see the younger "student heroes" working together and observing the weirdness that would ensue in an Avengers school. I mean, who doesn't want to attend a class taught by Thor?! The emails exchanged between the teachers had me laughing, too.

Overall, it's a super cute Marvel AU that I definitely want to read more of!

[Kristine Tague · Rating 5 out of 5]

So totally bought this for my kid but landed up reading it on my own because it made me laugh. It’s a fun and easy read and squirrel girl is pretty neat, love how she figures out what’s going on with her team of friends. Really loved the illustration style too!

[V. Arrow · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this title! Squirrel Girl's voice was spot on, the mystery was fun and allowed SG room for a character arc, and the balance between superhero problems and middle school problems was great.

[Lisa D · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it!

[Yuiko · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this

[Flyingzebras · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun light reading.

[Jack Jack · Rating 5 out of 5]

BEST BOOK EVER!

[Nicola · Rating 2 out of 5]

Miss 9 thought it was okay but got bored and didn't finish it.

[Isaac · Rating 4 out of 5]

good

[LuCioLe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Je tiens tout d’abord à remercier Lumen pour l’envoi de ce roman. Nous avions beaucoup aimé le premier tome de l’Académie Avengers avec mon fils qui mettait en scène Kamala Khan alias Miss Marvel que l’on ne connait pas encore très bien mise à part avec un jeu vidéo sorti récemment (et forcément ceux qui lisent le comics la connaissent mieux). Cette fois, on suit Doreen alias Ecureuillette une héroïne particulière mais très sympathique. Nos héros commencent leur deuxième année à l’académie et ils ont de nouveaux professeurs comme Thor ou encore Rocket et Groot. Mais le plus bizarre ce sont que certains professeurs n’agissent pas normalement et même certains élèves. Doreen constate avec son amie que les choses ne sont pas normales et que quelqu’un trame quelque chose. Elle va alors tout faire pour démasquer le coupable. Ce que je regrette c’est que Miss Marvel ou encore Spider-Man ne sont pas trop présents dans ce tome surtout que dans le premier leur bande était géniale, ils étaient soudés et ils faisaient tout ensemble. Là ils sont un peu trop éloignés pour diverses raisons mais finiront par se souder de nouveau pour y arriver et déjouer ce qui se trame dans l’Académie. Le roman montre l’importance de l’amitié et surtout la nécessité de l’écoute, de prendre le temps de comprendre les choses.

En résumé, L’Académie Avengers Tome 2 l’imposteur est une très bonne suite dans la trempe du premier. Il faut dire que suivre Ecureuillette c’est assez sympa, cette héroïne est rigolote. Ce roman graphique est plutôt construit de façon sympathique entre les séquences téléphone, BD, les pages de journal intime, le roman se lit très vite et donne une très bonne expérience de lecture aux jeunes lecteurs. Ce qui est le plus dommage c’est que cette série se termine en deux tomes et du coup c’est le dernier, mon fils aurait aimé continuer de suivre les aventures de ces personnages ! Une saga super pour les plus jeunes.

[Justin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Delightfully cute once again, but not quite as much as the first book in the series. It still has adorable illustrations and humorous prose, though, that are sure to delight any Marvel kid.