New Comics: July 31, 2013

BY DAVID BERCK

It’s the fifth week of the month (or it was when I wrote this) and you know what that means! Annuals!! That’s right, DC has decided to hit the market with five annuals and a director’s cut. Otherwise, it’s kind of a slow week, but Boom! decided to release the sequel to 2 Guns, which has been filmed and is open for wide release. Marvel hits us with a reprint collection, and the alternate version of their mega event of last year, Avengers vs. X-Men. This seems like a good week to maybe play catch up on some old titles or, hey, maybe even try the new Deadpool game!

Boom! Studios
3 Guns #1
Are you excited for the feature film release of 2 Guns featuring Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg? I am, too! Most people are probably unaware that this is actually a comic book movie based on a Boom! Studios release from 2007. Well, Boom! is timing things just right by releasing the sequel to the original story the week of the movie release. The main characters are still in loads of trouble and dealing arms. This time, the Russians and another anti-government group is involved. And there's a third gun! If you think two government agents busting each other for gun running is a great concept, you may want to jump on this bandwagon right now!

Adventure Time Summer Special
It’s summer time summer time sum sum summer time, which means ... it’s time for summer! Join Finn, Jake, and your other favorite characters from Adventure Time as they battle at the beach. Summer flavored tales of adventure await!

Dark Horse
Captain Midnight #1
So Dark Horse is doing this whole Super Hero Initiative thing, and Captain Midnight figures to be a major part of it. Check him out as he zooms out of World War II to the present day to dispense justice. And somewhere, somehow a polar bear is involved.

DC
Flash Annual #2
When the New 52 began (two years ago!), Justice League began with The Flash and Green Lantern having already met each other. Have you been wondering how they met? Well, wonder no longer! In this annual, you’ll see the story of how the scarlet speedster met his ring bearer.

Batman Annual #2
Many times, annuals just go their own way with self-contained stories. But, this time, Scott Snyder continues with the Zero Year theme to tell a tale from the Dark Knight’s beginnings in Gotham shortly after his return from his worldly journey.

Hermes Press
Scratch 9 #1 Cat Tails
Check out this all ages comic of the world’s greatest cat ... Scratch is a superhero cat, so how can he not be great? He has to use his nine lives to rescue pets from the C.R.U.E.L. Corporation, and must battle demons, cats from the future and even not so plain ol’ bad luck. You’ll get four stories for the price of one!

Marvel
Black Bolt: Something Inhuman This Way Comes
How in the heck did Black Bolt, leader of the Inhumans, lose his memory and end up in San Francisco? How did Medusa, Karnak, and Gorgon get kicked out of the hidden city? How did Maximus the Mad end up on the throne?And what the heck does Magneto have to do with any of this? This collected volume containing five issues of Amazing Stories and one Avengers entry tells the story. It's nice to see this volume released now that Black Bolt is intimately involved as one of the Illuminati in New Avengers and the upcoming madness that will involve Thanos. It's also nice to see what a multi-issue story arc looked like back in the 70s, when so many titles usually concentrated on single issue concepts.

What If... AvX #4 (of 4)
The conclusion to the mini-series that asks what if AvX had been handled differently by different people? Jimmy Palmioti has condensed Marvel's mega event of 2012 down to four issues, but hasn't taken any shortcuts. Multiple events have changed due to multiple choices being made. Will the same heros still live and die? What will happen to Hope, who has fully embraced the chance to be the latest host for the Phoenix Force? Will Cyclops still be forced to splinter off from his X-Men and be reviled? What role do the Avengers actually have? And how will Wolverine face the choices he's already made?