Comics this week

Hey all my buddies, it's the start to another new comics week so it's time to highlight the five I'm anticipating most. There are eighteen new books out this week and more than a QUARTER of them start with the worlds "ALL-NEW," as the list on the right would indicate (unless you're looking at this post sometime after the week of this post, in which case there are hopefully different comics there). Though I am interested to see how ALL-NEW GHOST RIDER 2 is after a pretty strong debut issue, I refuse to put it on this list because there are FIVE "ALL-NEW" TITLES and I kind of hate the "ALL-NEW" designation. The tiniest protest aside, there are still more than enough books to choose from this week.

Avengers Undercover 2
A strong opener from Dennis Hopeless and company put the survivors of AVENGERS ARENA back on the map and now they're reunited to try to save the revenge-fueled Cullen Bloodstone from destruction or worse at the hands of bigger villains than even Arcade because, you know, Arcade isn't that big of a villain outside of his island. The tone and the focus on characters drove the initial series and I'd look for it to drive this one too.

Captain Marvel 2
Carol Danvers has gone to space hoping that the time off Earth gets her in a new headspace. It's a whole new start for Carol Danvers and one that will shake things up a bit for our hero. She's taken on a role for the Avengers as a sort of space warning system, fighting off or alerting the Avengers to threats to Earth coming from space. She's also set to join up with the Guardians of the Galaxy as they continue to gain popularity. Could lead to interesting stuff.

Daredevil 1.50
This is one I'm not a hundred percent sure of as it launches. To celebrate the fiftieth year of Daredevil, this 1.50 issue is a standalone issue that will purportedly give us a glimpse into DD's 2014 from the creators of his current series as well as a few stories from DD's past from past creators. By "not sure of it," I mostly mean that I tend not to put in standalone stories or retrospective stories to this list but I really like Daredevil and I think this one will still matter in the long run. Plus, I'm sure it'll still be good.

Iron Fist: The Living Weapon 1
Everyone's favorite K'un-Lun chosen one returns to the forefront of Marvel comics as IRON FIST: THE LIVING WEAPON takes off. Writer/artist Kaare Andrews will lead Daniel Rand through all sorts of new and, given Andrews' work with Iron Fist before, presumably beautiful places in this all-new (but pointedly not ALL-NEW) series. I love Iron Fist; he's somewhere up pretty high in my pantheon of superheroes. I'm really excited to see where this series goes.

Nightcrawler 1
With the return of beloved mutant Nightcrawler comes the return of beloved X-Men legend Chris Claremont. I'm very intrigued to see how Claremont comes at this new series. He was always a little wordy for my tastes but that was also certainly a product of the times. Now, in a world where comics are more accepted and understood and the artists are able to do more storytelling with a page, we'll see how Claremont handles a brand new series. I'm interested enough that I'm not even going to mention how much I miss X-MEN LEGACY, the book this one is replacing (kind of, anyway. Originally Nightcrawler was just going to take over LEGACY but then they were like "well hey, let's just title the book NIGHTCRAWLER." Regardless, I think Spurrier's LEGACY would have been over anyway).

All-New X-Men 18, Marvel Knights X-Men 1, X-Men Gold 1

All-New X-Men 18
Bendis (w) and Immonen and von Grawbadger (a) and Gracia (c)

BATTLE OF THE ATOM has finally wrapped and the dust settles to find Kitty inexplicably bringing the original X-Men to Cyclops' camp. The team officially moves in and meets their new teammates, some of whom are already at odds with them (at least one Stepford Cuckoo truly dislikes Jean), all while trying to deal with their own problems, most notably the love triangle of Hank, Scott, and Jean. Kitty's still teaching them, they have some new teachers in Cyclops and his gang, and there's drama within the ranks. Oh, and they got new uniforms.

Don't get me wrong, I'm extremely happy that BATTLE OF THE ATOM is over but I still have reservations about Kitty moving the original X-Men to Cyclops' camp, one that she has pretty adamantly refused to take part in and who she, up to now, has by and large been against. I also thought it was pretty weakly defined why she felt she needed to bring them there at all. She's reacting to the fact that the team she's been with for so long didn't trust her to make the best decision for the kids (??) and so she's decided to uproot and move to the militant X-team, despite her previous very outspoken qualms about the X-Men becoming something more militant. As if these two teams were the only two options. ALSO, if this is how things are going to play, why do we have ANXM and UNCANNY X-MEN? Won't they be focused on the same team, now? Argh.

Marvel Knights X-Men 1
Revel (w and a) and Peter (c)

The Marvel Knights line continues with a brand new X-Men book brought to us by Brahm Revel, who brings a noticeably darker tone to this corner of the world. In the first issue, Wolverine, Rogue, and Kitty head out from the Jean Grey School upon reports that kids (noticeably mutants but seemingly a bunch in general) are going missing in a small town in Virginia. Rachel Summers was inadvertently contacted by one of these mutants reaching out for help and now the small X-team is heading out that way to investigate. They manage to find a girl who seems to have pre-cog/persuasion powers and who is running out of a party after stealing drugs from a guy in that party. She flees the X-Men at first but eventually reluctantly joins up with them as they swear she'll be protected. Pretty sure there's something sketchy with her, you guys. Anyway, the gang comes to a seemingly abandoned house giving off a reading of a mutant inside. Wolverine goes through the front to investigate, sending Rogue to the back, and finds himself abruptly confronted by Sabretooth, who I'm actually getting a little sick of.

I like this book at its onset, even if I'm not a hundred percent sure of the story yet. It's already an interesting look at the characters and a darker look into this corner, something we haven't had for a little while now. Most of the books in the X-Men line right now are going for something more of a light-hearted feel, despite the tension of the situation mutants are in right now. Bendis certainly brings a more banter-filled air to the book while Jason Aaron tends to be more light in his approach to a lot of these stories as well. Brian Wood is a bit different but X-MEN hasn't really had a chance to show much of anything yet and ULTIMATE X-MEN (which I just found out today is apparently OVER, most depressingly) doesn't really count as this part of the universe (I mostly mentioned it so I could express sadness at it being over). Revel brings a darker and more mysterious story to the forefront here and his art emphasizes that. The art here is nice, a little more fluid than other X-books at the moment, with darker and more ominous colors from Christiane Peter to really sell the mystery. It's not quite like the art of MARVEL KNIGHTS SPIDER-MAN, which is going for a more experimental tone; this is still very much a comic layout but the appearance of the art looks more in line with indie books than with Marvel books. Very nice though, good opening piece. Still a bit sick of Sabretooth and unsure where this fits, as Kitty is still with the Jean Grey School and, again, is the first to express disdain at Cyclops' branch. Maybe Revel and Bendis should have had a talk.

X-Men Gold 1
Chris Claremont, Stan Lee, Len Wein, Louise Simonson, Roy Thomas, and Fabian Nicieza (w) and Bob McLeod, Walt Simonson, Bob Wiacek, Pat Oliffe, Jorge Molina, and Salvador Larroca (a) and Israel Silva, Andres Mossa, Chris Sotomayor, and David Ocampo (c)

As you might have guessed from that laundry list of legends up there, this is a 50th anniversary X-Men book featuring new stories from in-between-the-lines of old X-Men stories. The legends listed above each wrote a story set to take place between different moments of X-Men history, meant to slot nicely between the plots. It's a nice little compilation and one I can't add too much to, frankly. If you're a big X-Fan, you'll likely be best served checking out this book, even if it's not anything to really add to continuity or character or anything like that. It's a nice idea and a solid piece of X-history to boot. Fun bits here and there and old X-fans will certainly recognize the tones of each writer as not really having changed over time so it'll feel like they didn't miss a thing. Neat little book.