Yes Flint Marko, the latest chapter of Amazing Spider-Man mega-arc “The Gauntlet” focuses on you, and Fred Van Lente and Javier Pulido are doing the creative honors. Maybe a Dream of The Endless wig, black cloak and raven aren’t quite the right look for you, but I think it’s high time you changed shirts, and thought about a less Osborn-y hair cut.
But enough about your sartorial choices…let’s see what the rest of this week’s new releases look like, after the jump.
Amazing Spider-Man Presents: Anti-Venom—New Ways To Live #3: Good God, everything about this book looks great!
From the ludicrous title (a colon, a dash and the word “Presents”!) to the image on the cover, which looks to be an Anti-Venom possessed Punisher with a gattling gun*. Zeb Wells writes, Paulo Siqueira draws, and Marvel charges $4.
Batman: The Brave and the Bold #12: I don’t know about you guys, but all I needed to know about this comic was that the cover featured Adam Strange and Batman versus Calendar Man on a flying sleigh streaking by a giant Christmas tree.
If you do need to know more, it’s by Landry Walker and Eric Jones, it’s called “Final Christmas,” and it’s about the heroes of two worlds trying to save Earth, Rann, the universe and, most importantly, Christmas. If that’s not quite up your Crime Alley, don’t fret. This week it looks like DC has a Batman comic for everyone. There’s Batman #694, Batman Confidential #39, Batman: Streets of Gotham #7, a Batman 80-Page Giant, Batman: Arkham Asylum Special and Batman: The Dark Knight Archives Vol. 6.
Black Jesus: Well, it’s got a catchy title. This $15, 100-page trade paperback from Arcana Studio is by David Krintzman and Nicholas Da Silva, and is about a character named Chris (which is sort of like Christ, you see) who is either a mutant or a messiah, according to what little info’s available at Arcana’s site. You can see a brief preview there though.
Gahan Wilson: Fifty Years of Playboy Cartoons: It’s publishing projects like this that make me envy the rich. Three hardcover volumes in a slipcase make up 940 pages of all of Gahan Wilson’s Playboy cartoons, over 1,000 total, and all of his prose pieces for the magazine. You can download a 25-page preview here, or just look at the slideshow and drool.
Green Lantern Corps #43: In this Blackest Night tie-in from Peter J. Tomasi, Patrick Gleason and Rebecca Buchman, Green Lantern Guy Gardner gets a new ring. I gotta admit, I kinda like the word “Corphans” from the solicitation info.
Incorruptible #1: Mark Waid launches a new Boom book set in the same universe as his Superman-gone-bananas book Irredeemable…this one with an opposite narrative arc. Instead of the story of a good guy gone bad, it’s the story of a bad guy gone good. It’s drawn by Jean Diaz, and it will run you $4.
The Next Issue Project #2: Silver Streak Comics #24: Wow, it’s been so long since the first issue of this series came out (February of 2008, to be exact), that I just sort of assumed the project has been abandoned. It hasn’t been, but it’s format seems to have been tweaked a bit. The first issue was 64 Golden Age-sized pages for $6, whereas this second issue is 32 pages for $4. The idea’s still the same though—modern creators doing “the next issue” of long since canceled Golden Age books. This time around it’s Silver Streak Comics #24, one-time home of speedster Silver Streak, the Golden Age Daredevil, and one of the greatest comic book supervillains of that early era, The Claw. Erik Larsen and Paul Grist are among the creators who are contributing, and you can check out a five-page preview here.
The Rocketeer: Complete Collection: IDW has collected the late, great Dave Stevens’ signature work in a single volume, all re-colored by Laura Martin as per Stevens’ wishes. It’s a 144-page, $30 hardcover, and it’s really something that oughta be on every comics reader’s shelves. If you’ve got an extra $45, you can upgrade to the 250-page, oversized Complete Deluxe Edition, which comes complete with a slipcase and hundreds of never-before-seen drawings and sketches.
Showcase Presents Wonder Woman Vol. 3: Huzzah! The Showcase Presents collections have finally got to the point in the original volume of Wonder Woman where they published this comic:
That’s right, “Dinosaurs in a Department Store!” That sounds infinitely better than Snakes on a Plane, Sam Jackson or no Sam Jackson. This 500-page, $18 collection of Robert Kanigher, Ross Andru and Mike Esposito comics also includes the one where Wonder Woman almost marries a monster.
Spider-Man 1602 #3: Please note—this is the best Spider-Man costume of all time ever.
Don’t give me none of that “But what about the black costume?” stuff; look at the frilly color! You’ve gotta respect that ruff. This is writer Jeff Parker and artist Ramon Rosanas turn in the 1602-iverse sandbox, but for a more modern (and $1 cheaper!) Parker-written story, you can check out Thunderbolts #139, in which the T-Bolts take on the Agents of Atlas. Francesco Mattina and Miguel Angel Sepulveda draw that one. And if you’d like to read a Jeff Parker written comic this week, but aren’t so keen on Marvel superheroes, the prolific Parker also has the fourth issue of his collaboration with Steve Lieber out this week. You can check out five pages of their highly recommended Image book Underground here.
Thor: Ages of Thunder: Remember all those cool Matt Fraction-penned Thor one-shots with metal names like Reign of Blood and Man of War? This 160-page, $20 collection puts ‘em all together in a single trade paperback. Artists include Doug Braithwaite, Dan Brereton, Marko Djurdjevic, Clay Mann, Patrick Zircher and others. And hey, it looks like Fraction is going to be the new ongoing Thor writer, so Thor fans who were on the fence about this might wanna get off the fence for this one.
Vengeance of Moon Knight #4: So, the solicitation for this issue says, “Bushman is back and he’s emptied Ravencroft Asylum, flooding the streets with a torrential wave of homicidal maniacs,” and the cover shows urban vigilante Moon Knight taking on a bunch of escapees.
Hey, do you remember Batman #491, where Bane emptied Arkham Asylum, flooding the streets with a torrential wave of homicidal maniacs, and the cover showed urban vigilante Batman taking on a bunch of escapees?
That is intentional, right? Like, an homage?
What If? Daredevil Vs. Elektra: Oh come on Marvel, that’s not a complete sentence! But then I guess this bit from the solicitation woulda made an even lousier title: “What If…events occurred differently? What If DD was inducted into their evil order in her place? WHAT IF DAREDEVIL DIED AND WAS RESURRECTED BY THE HAND?” That story is by writer Karl Bollers and artist Rafael Kayanan, and your $4 will also get you a back-up by Mike Gallagher and Dave Manak.
*Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, it’s not technically a gattling gun. But I don’t know what you’d call the modern equivalent…I’m not much of a gun guy.
December 15th, 2009 at 5:20 pm
Perfectly fine to call it a Gatling gun. Gatling-type guns of that size are usually Miniguns, particularly the Vulcan M134.
No normal human could actually use one of those unmounted, despite what the movies and video games would have you believe. No man-portable minigun has ever reach production stages.
December 15th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
Those Wonder Woman Covers are so AWESOME!
December 15th, 2009 at 11:10 pm
I have that Batman #491… But anyhow, I don’t think the covers are all THAT similar. Passing likeness at best.
BTW, this is my second attempt at posting this. The first try failed, saying I needed to slow down because I was posting too fast. Funny, this is my first posting here in at least a week!
December 16th, 2009 at 11:07 am
@Shaun
I think Caleb was referring to the whole story, not just the cover.