The Avengers #166
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeAvengers #166 closes out the 'Nefaria Supreme' trilogy (issues #164–166), the three-part arc widely credited — alongside the Korvac Saga that followed — with establishing Jim Shooter's Avengers run as a creative high-water mark of the Bronze Age. The issue delivers a then-unprecedented power-scaling moment: a fully assembled Avengers roster, including a freshly revived Vision and the arrival of Thor himself, still barely able to stop a single villain, forcing the Vision to drop on Nefaria from a mile above in diamond-hard density to end the fight. Beyond the action, the issue plants the seed of one of Marvel's most consequential retcons: its epilogue introduces a mysterious old man in Vladivostok who carries a locket with photos of Wanda and Pietro, the first appearance of Django Maximoff — a character who would anchor the 'Yesterday Quest' origin of Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch and whose shadow stretched forward to storylines as recent as WandaVision.
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The issue was written by Jim Shooter — with co-writing credit on this concluding chapter shared with penciller John Byrne, who contributed scripting and visual invention throughout the arc — and inked by Pablo Marcos, with a cover by George Pérez and Ernie Chan, under editor-in-chief Archie Goodwin. Byrne was not the regular series artist at the time; he was concurrently drawing his celebrated X-Men run, making his guest turn on the Nefaria trilogy a noteworthy crossover of two of Marvel's hottest creative efforts of 1977. A letters page in Avengers #168 later formally credited Byrne with specific dialogue and visual contributions to the arc, a rare public acknowledgment of shared authorship in that era. The issue was released with a cover date of December 1977 and also appeared in a Whitman variant and a UK edition with a 12-pence cover price.
Trivia · 8 facts
- First appearance of Django Maximoff, the Romani foster father of Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver, who appears only in a brief Vladivostok epilogue but seeds the 'Yesterday Quest' origin storyline running through Avengers #181–187.
- Concludes the three-part 'Nefaria Supreme' arc (Avengers #164–166), in which Shooter re-invented Count Nefaria — a previously low-tier villain — as a Superman-level physical threat by having him absorb the combined ionic powers of Living Laser, Whirlwind, and Power Man (Erik Josten).
- The Vision delivers the finishing blow to Nefaria by increasing his density to maximum hardness and dropping on the villain from roughly a mile above — one of the more kinetically inventive uses of the character's power set in the Bronze Age.
- Yellowjacket (Hank Pym) revives the Vision, who had been comatose since sustaining injuries from Ultron in issue #162; Beast notes that the revived Vision seems more robotic and less emotional than before.
- The issue reveals an ironic twist: Professor Sturdy's dying claim that Nefaria is rapidly aging is a lie — the ionic energy infused into Nefaria's cells actually renders him effectively immortal.
- Henry Peter Gyrich, who debuted in the previous issue (#165) as the Avengers' National Security Council liaison, appears infiltrating Avengers Mansion during the chaos to photograph the team's operations.
- Written by Jim Shooter with co-writing by John Byrne; pencilled by John Byrne; inked by Pablo Marcos; cover by George Pérez and Ernie Chan; edited by Archie Goodwin. The issue's cover date is December 1977.
- The arc and this issue are collected in both the Avengers Epic Collection: The Final Threat and Marvel Masterworks: The Avengers Vol. 17.
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Reprints
↩ Reprints [Marvel Hostess Ads] #20 (1977)
Reprinted in Comic Reader #148 (1977), Los Vengadores #2 (1983), Vengeur #13 (1986), Σπάιντερ Μαν [Spider-Man] #389 (1988), Marvel Gold. Los Vengadores: Grandes Amenazas #[nn] (2011), Essential Avengers #8 (2012), Avengers: The Bride of Ultron #[nn] (2012), Avengers Epic Collection #9 (2013), Avengers: The Vibranium Collection #[nn] (2015), Marvel Universe by John Byrne Omnibus #[1] (2016), Marvel Masterworks: The Avengers #17 (2017), Wonder Man: The Early Years Omnibus #[nn] (2023), The Avengers Omnibus #6 (2025), Die Rächer #6, Heróis da TV #85, Les Vengeurs #96/97, Marvel Superheroes [Marvel Super-Heroes] #360, Thor e i Vendicatori #218
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