<<Here's a thought: Why didn't Hank just threaten to hit Jan in that story, then stop himself when he realizes "Oh my God! What am I doing?" You still get across the plot point that Hank is having a mental breakdown without having him actually cross the line of doing something that will forever tarnish his character.>>

Yep, have him tread the line, not cross it.  Crossing the line is an expression I've often used.  The thing i not everyone's line is in the same place.  What is acceptable for one person is not for another.

With Hank, my issue is one of principle.  He's not among my favorite Avengers.  I wasn't going to drop the book over his treatment, even if I disliked it.

I dropped every X book when Cyclops started committing adultery.  He has crossed a line that I can not abide.  You can not fix it by writing him better moving forward.  Not fo me.  If they want my money again, it has to be undone.  That is not a negotiable point. 

<<Frankly, no matter what guys like Bendis and Millar do...they never seem to make much of an emotional impression on their audience, even their fans.>>

Oh, Millar's Reed Richards made an emotional impression on me.  Extreme anger.  Like stopping buying the FF type anger.  And what used to infuriate me was continuing to read Quesada, Millar and Bendis invoke Lee and Kirby to justify what they do.  We're only doing what Stan and Jack did.  My ass you're doing what Stan and Jack did.  That is not how Stan and Jack flawed their characters.


<<1.  If a man, in a moment of extreme emotional distress, hits his loved one one time...does that make him irredeemably evil?  I seem to recall Peter Parker smacking MJ during the Clone Saga.

Peter was in the middle of fighting Ben Reilley and MJ tried to seperate him. Out of reflex he knocked her across the room. Not exactly the same as what Hank did.>> 

Agreed.  What Peter did was not the same thing.  I still
very much disliked what he did, but he did not cross that line.  Not for me. As with Cyclops,  I am much more emotionally invested in him than I am Hank.  
 

<<Haven't read the current NEW AVENGERS in quite some time, so someone please help me here;  sounds like Bendis! has brought Hank Pym, the wife beater, back to the fore.  How and why? 
 
 I'm not sure but it may have been Chuck Austen.  It was a point that was brought up during the "Lionheart" arc.>>

That's where I remember it starting.  All of a sudden it was something that Jan and some of the other Avengers had never really gotten past.

Shortly followed by the infamous Hank/Clint/Jan panties scene.
 

Upon further reflection, there was an entire issue devoted to Hank and Jan.  They were in Las Vegas, I think, and Hank proposed but Jan turned him down citing that incident (this was shortly after they were shown in bed together).  Then the Whirlwind shows up but not before he is shown beating (or having beaten) a woman.  I don't remember much more than that (and don't have my Avengers DVD-ROM with me to check).

It was pencilled by our very own Stephen Sadowski (whom I've not seen recently 'round here).

Shortly followed by the infamous Hank/Clint/Jan panties scene.

*******

Yeah turned out Clint hated him for years. So much he tried to break him out of prison and begged him to join his Avengers team.

Could someone please explain or post the situation in which Hank "beat" his wife.

I would like to clear up for myself if it was a slap, a punch, a beating and the context that it happened. 

It was a very hard slap.

 I'm not sure but it may have been Chuck Austen.  It was a point that was brought up during the "Lionheart" arc.>>

That's where I remember it starting.  All of a sudden it was something that Jan and some of the other Avengers had never really gotten past.

Shortly followed by the infamous Hank/Clint/Jan panties scene.

***

It was Austen.  Not much more can be said about what a bad run that was.

Could someone please explain or post the situation in which Hank "beat" his wife.

--

Here you go. From Avengers #213

I should mention that a superhero hitting someone is bad(perhaps allowable if she is a villainess and about to detonate a bomb unless stopped) in the context of it being a result of anger and opressive in nature. It shows a hostility and lack of control that are definite harmful character defects that must be adressed. But a superhero who hits someone outside of the context of a scuffle is not yet a completely intolerable psycho.

BEATING  someone is much much worse in my mind, especially someone who is not fighting back or obviously "tank-like" enough to stand up to it. Beating someone is probably a sadistic thing where the beater enjoys the pain of the beaten and the damage being done is the intended outcome of repeating a violent action on a pssive or helpless taget. It could be a sociopathic act where the beater has no connection to the harm being done or the target and is trying to condition the other, or coerce them into doing something, or make an example of them, or just see how much harm they can dish out before they get tired or  become bothered at what they are doiung. Maybe its to get the target to leave and never come back. Whatever.  Any of these beating examples goal or emotion oriented are more evil (to me) than just losing your temper once and then immediately pulling back and regretting it.

Also Pym was written as something of a buffoon even prior to his "fall". He grew so much that he passed out a couple of times from the strain. He made himself big and then couldn't shrink for a while because doing so might kill him. He faked his own murder while under the influence of toxic fumes. He let Hawkeye have his giant man identity for a while. He studied the Dragon Man and in the course of it built a killer robot capable of evolution embodying the oedipus impulse. For some reason Pym became a "dump on" character who couldn't seem to do anything right much like Hal Jordan over at DC. Then he had a big fall. They seemed to do something similar to Ms. Marvel and Iron Man.

Then over in the Ultimates they took the wife beating thing to a really insane level where he initiates a brawl with his wife/girlfriend, sprays her with bug spray, and sends ants to nearly sting her to death after calling her a mutie slut.

Everything about the above dialogue with Hank is totally contrary to how the character had been written previously. It doesn't sound at all like Hank Pym, the guy who left the Avengers several times to do research, but was always there to help when needed.  The guy who was totally devoted to Jan.

One issue he's normal, and the next he's incompetent, can't get this suit to work right, can't tell what's going on in a fight, and he's a total hothead.

It never made any sense.  It's gotta be the worst example of writing a character in comics history.  Of course, this was just after Shooter decided to kick the Vision, Scarlet Witch, Beast, and Wonder Man out of the Avengers.

Somewhere there's a universe where the writing helm on the Avengers went from Micheline straight to Stern...