What I Read This Week

Given the number of titles here, yeah, these are going to be a little on the short side this week.

Tiny Titans #4 -- It's intense babysitting action as Wonder Girl has to take care of the Little Tiny Titans! As usual, this is too cute for words. I especially liked Starfire's new hairdo and Lil' Jericho's choice of clothes for Lil' Wildebeast.

Captain Britian and MI13 -- With the UK under Skrull invasion, it is up to Captain Britian and the combined might of all the British superheroes to defend queen and country. Very disappointed overall in this debut, which left me cold and unnethused. This title is on the watch list.

The All-New Iron Manual -- Part technical manual, part sourcebook, the new version of the Manual coveys lots of information about the Golden Avenger and his corner of the Marvel Universe. Some odd choices (I like Mrs. Arborgast, but she gets a profile over someone like the Controller?), but overall worth the money for an Iron Fan; others need not apply. There's a few errors and typos which are pretty noticeable, sadly. Also worth noting is that apparently Enter The Mandarin is in continuity.

Guardians Of The Galaxy #1 -- In order to prevent Annihilation Wave-level events from reaching that point, Peter Quill pulls together a group of adventurers to defend the cosmos. Great fun from DnA, this series looks like a worthy successor to Annihilation Conquest, with a hell of a stinger at the end.

Iron Man: Legacy of Doom #2 -- Lots of fans on message boards have demanded that Iron Man go to Hell, so I guess this answers that request. "Old school cool" from Michelinie, Layton, and Lim, with twists and turns and doublecrosses galore.

The Phantom #23 -- The Ghost Who Walks faces threats to Bangalla on all sides as his enemies all conspire to sow unrest and anarchy. The plot builds very nicely, but the action is a little light this time out.

The War That Time Forgot #1 -- An American Navy pilot finds himself stranded on an island filled with dinosaurs, and other anarchronisms. A little slow on the setup, but as this is 12 issues and not 6 as I had thought, I guess that is to be expected. Right now I am just marking out for all the war characters.

Invincible Iron Man #1 -- Tony Stark, in full "cool exec" mode, must leave the countessa in his bed to respond to a strange new terrorist threat. Very impressive all around, as this title manages to be a different animal from the senior series while covering similar territory.

Project Superpowers #3 -- Probably should have read this one before the FCBD Special. Anyway, the fighting reaches Shangri-La, and more of the Superpowers spill out of the urn. I really hope Ross and Krueger have a goal in mind here, because things are still somewhat jumbled.

House of Mystery #1 -- Go see last week's Weekly Dose of Weird for a recap. A tremendous new spin on the old classic. Also, I really like the non-glossy paper -- DC, please use this more often.

Tor #1 -- Joe Kubert's classic caveman is back for more prehistoric adventure. Tor runs afoul of a tribe of ape-men and interrupts their ritual sacrifice, with predictable results. This title is a throwback in more ways than one, but in a good way.

Iron Man: Viva Las Vegas #1 -- Jon Favreau and Adi Granov deliver a Shellhead comic which looks really, really nice (Granov can do tattoo babes like nobody's business), but this is really much too vapid for the price.

Nova #13 -- As Nova helps save the population of a world which has been targetted by Galactus, he discovers a spectral psionic being named Hallow using the opportunity to cause chaos. This title is essentially Marvel's answer to Green Lantern, and I mean that entirely as a compliment.

The Pick Of The Pile is Invincible Iron Man, unsurprisingly. The surprising thing, actually, to me about this title was how much it reminded me of the early-middle run of volume 3, almost like a less-jokey version of a story Frank Tieri would have written. (That's not a knock on Tieri, by the way -- I like his work.) Other strong features were more unusual or outlandish work like HoM and Tor, trad fare like GotG, Nova, and Legacy of Doom, and Tiny Titans is always a treat. Overall, a highly above-average set of titles over the last two weeks.