The story-line begins with the release of Secret Invasion: Dark Reign, a one-shotBrian Michael Bendis (writer) and Alex Maleev (art), in December 2008. It continued in a standalone mini-series and some individual issues of ongoing Marvel Comics titles throughout 2009. Selected ongoing Marvel titles were temporarily renamed to highlight their involvement in the story-line.
There is no core limited series as there was in the preceding Secret Invasion event. Instead, the story-line is made up of one-shots that help fill in the gaps, limited series exploring the effect of the event on teams and individuals, as well as tie-ins with other ongoing series. The main story-line led into the 2010 “Siege” crossover event, although some plot elements were ongoing.
In 2011’s The New 52, DC Comics relaunched its entire line of publications to attract a new generation of readers, and thus released volume 4 of the Wonder Woman comic book title. Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang were assigned writing and art duties respectively and revamped the character’s history considerably. In this new continuity, Wonder Woman wears a costume similar to her original Marston costume (except with a red-black-silver color scheme rather than the classic red-blue-gold), utilizes a sword and shield, and has a completely new origin. No longer a clay figure brought to life by the magic of the gods, she is, instead, a demi-goddess and the natural-born daughter of Hippolyta and Zeus. Azzarello and Chiang’s revamp of the character was critically acclaimed, but highly divisive among longtime fans of the character.
In a world where Superman hasn’t aged a day since the Nazis won WWII; Clark Kent infiltrates Axis dominated Europe in pursuit of Lana Lang, who has fallen prey to the enchantress Circe, while Lois Lane finds herself transformed by the power of the ancient gods into a Wonder Woman.
As part of Marvel NOW!, a new volume of Uncanny X-Men was launched in 2013 written by Brian Michael Bendis, and drawn by Chris Bachalo. It features Cyclops and remnants of his Extinction Team recruiting new mutants to help them prepare for what Cyclops believes to be an inevitable revolution, coinciding events of the first All-New X-Men story arc. This volume saw Cyclops leading his team to an abandoned Weapon X facility to train new recruits and prepare for impending war against the humans, who see Cyclops as a terrorist’s due to his actions in Avengers Vs. X-Men. Eventually, Kitty Pryde and the time-displaced X-Men join his cause after facing a team of X-Men from a dystopian future. It lasted 36 issues, with the final issue reverting to the legacy numbering of Uncanny X-Men #600.
In the new status quo, all of DC history “counts” when understanding a character’s backstory, and legacy and history within the franchise is being emphasised by editorial mandate, with many characters now sharing the same codenames. For example, Stephanie Brown and Cassandra Cain share the Batgirl title, while Oracle (Barbara Gordon) reserves the right to also wear the Batgirl costume from time to time. Jonathan Kent and his father Clark Kent are both Superman, while Conner Kent is once again Superboy. Wally West has stepped up as primary Flash while Barry Allen and the Flash of China, Avery Ho, participate in Justice League Incarnate. While Diana of Themiscyra continues in her role as Wonder Woman from the afterlife, her mother Hippolyta serves in Wonder Woman’s place on the Justice League, and her sister Nubia explores the idea of succeeding Diana as Wonder Woman. New Batman Jace Fox succeeds Bruce Wayne for a short time, before later serving as the Batman of New York City while Bruce remains in Gotham. Another example of a relaxed approach to codename sharing among legacy characters is Robin: Tim Drake is officially Robin once again, but previous Robin (Damian Wayne) continues to head up the Robin comic book without an official codename, while newcomer Maps Mizoguchi steps into the role briefly in a short story.
The soft relaunch and new approach to history also completes what began with DC Rebirth in restoring the status quo of characters prior to popular New 52 changes, re-establishing characters’ memories and relationships with each other, while selectively retaining some of the simplified backstories from the modern era and many of the new characters. An example of this is Tim Drake once again serving as Robin. Some characters have simply returned to being as fans remembered then. For example Black Canary, who in The New 52 had been presented as a singular new version of the character, has been restored to being the daughter of her Golden Age predecessor.
Grifter was an ongoing comic book series originally published by Image Comics. It featured the popular adventurer known as Grifter – a member of the super-hero team, the WildC.A.T.s, as well as the 70’s black ops outfit, Team-7. Grifter is the first member of the WildC.A.T.s to receive his own series. Oddly, the series began as part of a ten-chapter story-arc called “WildStorm Rising“, which swept through all of the published WildStorm titles of 1995 and was book-ended by the two-issue WildStorm Rising limited series.
The first issue of Avengers: The Initiative was released on 4 April 2007. The tagline initially used in solicitations was “Marvel’s Army of Super Heroes just became a Super Hero Army”.
The series was originally solicited as a six issue limited series, but prior to the publication of the first issue, Marvel announced that this had changed and that Avengers: The Initiative would become an ongoing series, the third regularly published ‘Avengers’ title from 2007 onwards, after The New Avengers and The Mighty Avengers.
Issues #20-22 dealt with “Dark Reign“, the aftermath to Secret Invasion, and Christos Gage moved to full writing duties.
The series was canceled after Avengers: The Initiative #35 (April 2010), at the conclusion of the “Siege” storyline and replaced by Avengers Academy.
Lady of Pharis introduces new Lodoss characters including the heroine, Flaus, a savage warrior fire maiden, who leaves her evil master to live a life of her own amid the demons and vampires of Lodoss. She meets Wort and Beld, who join her quest to find the legendary King Fahn. They journey to Allania where they are tested to the limit in defending Lodoss from the horned Beast and the powerful witch Mana!
Record of Lodoss War – The Lady of Pharis #1 VF+ $24
Record of Lodoss War – The Lady of Pharis #3 NM- $5
Record of Lodoss War – The Lady of Pharis #7 VF-NM $4
Record of Lodoss War – The Lady of Pharis #8 NM- $4
After Eddie fought the Symbiote god Knul, and seemingly killed him, Eddie’s Symbiote has lost its personality. In a new tie-in issue Web Of Venom: Venom Unleashed #1, written by Ryan Stegman with art by Kyle Hotz and Juan Gedeon, that story pushes forward and it appears Carnage is attempting to fill the void Knull left when he died.
Web of Venom – Venom Unleashed #1 Bradshaw Variant NM $8
The English language version of the Dragon Ball manga is licensed for North America by Viz Media. Viz originally published the first 194 chapters as Dragon Ball and chapters over 195 as Dragon Ball Z to mimic the names of the anime series, feeling it would reduce the potential for confusion by its readers. They initially released both series simultaneously, chapter by chapter in a monthly comic book format starting in 1998, before stopping in 2000 to switch to a graphic novel format similar to the Japanese tankōbon.
EHT Comics 