The Pull List: Wednesday, February 25, 2009

This week’s haul at the comic shop was joy and pain in equal measure with lots of great new comics on the shelves and a staggering toll at the cash register. Two Marvel Masterworks volumes in one week? WTF?!? The Avengers were not just New and Mighty this week, but they also showed some Initiative as Marvel’s Dark Reign saga continued to build momentum. New Avengers #50 was fun as Brian Bendis and Billy Tan delivered an action-packed story for this milestone issue as the team deals with the shocking news of the existence of the Dark Avengers. Another great book this week was Conan The Cimmerian #8 in which our favorite barbarian leaves his trials and regrets behind in Cimmeria and heads into the next phase of his adventurous life - his mercenary career. This book continues to deliver month after month! Another honorable mention in the swords and sorcery genre was an unexpectedly great issue of The Incredible Hercules with a tale set in his youth in ancient Thebes. Greg Pak continues to impress! Among my buys this week were:

Avengers The Initiative #22
Captain America #47
Conan The Cimmerian #8
Dr. Doom and the Masters of Evil #2
Fantastic Four #564
G.I. Joe Origins #1
Hulk #10
The Incredible Hercules #126
Justice Society of America #24
The Mighty Avengers #22
Mouse Guard Winter: 1152
Ms. Marvel #36
The New Avengers #50
Sgt. Rock: The Lost Battalion #4 of 6
She-Hulk #38
Skaar Son of Hulk #8
Teen Titans #68
Thunderbolts #129
Ultimate Spider-Man #131
The Umbrella Academy #4
Wolverine: First Class #12
Wolverine: Origins #33
Young X-Men #11

Next up in my selective reviews of Pull List books – in alphabetical order, in case you were wondering whether there was any rhyme or reason to my comments – is Teen Titans #68. Candidly, I was a bit worried that this book might not make it through Infinite Crisis or be changed in some material way, but I’m pleased to see that Sean McKeever and Eddy Barrows are still cranking out great stories. Wolverine: First Class #12 was another great read this week. I was worried that it would be another over-the-top Wolverine book when First Class first came out, but the series has been great so far and filled with fun stories set in X-Men continuity during my personal Golden Age of comics in the mid-80s. In this issue, Kitty Pryde teams up with Cyclops in an interlude set on Magneto’s Bermuda Triangle base. Another cool thing to see this week from a nostalgic point of view was the Alex Ross cover to the new New Mutants #1 on Marvel Previews. Can't wait!

Check out the full list of the week's new releases at the Diamond Comics web site.