Comics this week

Back down, it seems, to only a handful of new comics this week. And by handful, of course, I still mean 13 or so. Always makes it tricky to pull five pre-game picks but I feel certain we'll still make it through this day yet.

Astonishing X-Men 63
Interesting stuff happening in this series as we focus on Bobby hiding something within him from the X-Termination event that he's not even aware he's hiding. To make matters worse, that something seems to be affecting him in ways he can't stop. On top of the somewhat more mild "accidentally reconvening all of his ex-girlfriends," Bobby unknowingly created massive snowstorms all over the planet. There is certainly reason to fear here as Bobby's powers are pretty strong, if largely untapped. Add to that the headache with his exes (and the questions it's raised in his current girlfriend Kitty) and we have a story worth watching here.

Avengers Assemble 16
The second chapter (which is really labeled "part 1", with Avengers: The Enemy Within serving as a prologue but BOY it felt like a first chapter to me) of The Enemy Within storyline featuring Captain Marvel and all sorts of Avengers pals squaring off against Yon-Rogg to save Carol and more starts here, heralded in by the talented Kelly Sue DeConnick. Very excited about this event as a whole and the prologue/first chapter kicked it off very nicely. This will be a good one, worth following between this book and Captain Marvel.

Thor: God of Thunder 9
The Godbomb storyline continues and, for the first time, all three Thors have joined up with one another and are heading for Gorr. Will they be enough to stop the deranged killer? Will they, in turn, team up with Thor's daughters, also held by Gorr? There is a fear, for me anyway, that after such a strong start to this series we're going to move to slightly cheesier places, with the three Thors guffawing about and his three daughters joining them at some point. I have faith that Aaron will execute this well but there are plenty of tropes here to make things a little goofier than this series has been so far. Still, the series has been incredible as a whole (even if it's slowed a little the last few issues) so it's fair to expect great things from it as we continue.

Uncanny X-Force 6
My last two picks are all about new storylines. As Uncanny X-Force continues, it is primed to focus on the Fantomexes (if the next story isn't called "Fantom-Ex" or "Fantom-Exes" I'm going to be very sad) as Cluster has just absconded with Betsy in hopes of protecting her from the evil Jean-Paul or Weapon XIII or whatever they're calling him. Describing this book will only get harder as we see more Fantomexes. So now Ginny has been taken from Spiral and Betsy has been taken from X-Force. Where are the other Fantomexes while all of this happens? Maybe we'll find out. There are plenty of ways for this story to go and it's exciting to get to watch.

Venom 36
I've largely enjoyed this series despite a few slow issues or arcs here and there. It'll start another arc (or continue the one with the creepy figures, perhaps) as Flash has shaken off Toxin and hopes, once again, for things to settle down a bit in his new-ish Philadelphia home. However, he's Venom and the star of a comic book so there's little doubt that he will run into another problem before long. We're just going to have to check in this week to see what that problem is going to be.