Instead, Doc Savage #1 is what Alan Moore thinks of on those rare lonely nights when he thinks of mainstream comics; just another tired rehash, a futile nostalgic flailing from modernity's waves. I hope, at least, that it brings some joy to the Doc Savage faithful. Because if they aren't pleased by this, then it really is a total bust.

Why take this so seriously? Because Harley Quinn is better placed than any other character at DC (yes, including Batman) to entice new readers and appeal to a wide range of audiences. She's in comics and video games, she's a cosplay stalwart, the Joker's squeeze, a disgraced professional, and a young person trying to redefine herself despite herself. She could be DC's Hawkeye, better even, a buzz-generating aesthetic experiment with laughs and heart. But instead she's batted back and forth between industry in-jokes, less Inside Baseball, more Inside Tetherball, while all the cool nerds laugh at how nobody outside comics gets it. We're better than this.

Considering Soule's intelligence as a writer, this is very basic superhero comics. Considering Daniels' popularity, this is bland art. Considering the potential chemistry between Clark and Diana, this is a frigid first date. To paraphrase Irving Berlin, there may be trouble ahead, but while there's moonlight and music and love and romance, why read this comic?

Hickman, like Snyder at DC, is deep in the "go bigger" hole. Deodato, like Finch (but better) is working a steroidal groove, spritzing layouts with flash that his characters could really use. Find a facial expression amongst our boys. I'll wait. And we're not counting Namor's impression of Jin from Tekken. This is a superstar team on a big money book, but nothing's popping. I'm all for going large, for supplanting the false event cycle with a more circadian continuity of peril, 20/20 endangerment feels more existentially authentic, but there has to be some relief. Yes, it's great that this crazy lady is around to puncture the patriarchal pomp, and yes, the Namor/T'Challa/Humanity love triangle is compelling, but every issue reads like Physics major fan-fic laid over beat 'em up cut scenes.

If EGOs is going to go anywhere, it's going to need to find a heart, and soon. As of issue #1, it's a little too knowingly familiar, too superheroically insular to be compelling. Perhaps as the focus shifts away from dull Deuce, his anodyne clone-squad and feisty-bland wife, towards the interestingly designed villains Masse and Top Quark, or the precocious Shara, EGOs will stop being genre commentary, and start being a good story.

Mighty Avengers #1 seems misplaced in time (fitting, what with all the temporal disturbances in the Marvel Universe) and ill at ease with the galactic scale of events surrounding it. If it can survive the predictable "New Yorkers unite to repel all invaders" scenario with internal tensions still fizzing, watching this cast realise Luke Cage's Heroic vision for the Avengers might just make for a must-read Avengers title. But that's a way off yet.

As a Marvel Universe book, though, I see trouble ahead. Wilson's deft dialoguing of Kamala vs. ignorant Caucasian peers is a refreshing antidote to ham-fisted 'Jock threaten; cheerleader hiss' high-school-by-numbers scripting, and I dig depicting the Terrigenesis cocoon process as a socio-spiritual fusion experience, but" you called it" continuity. I fear many new readers (Ms. Marvel #1's target audience, right?) will fall for the 'superheroes doing Big' treatment, only to be disappointed when that poeticization gives way to the established 616 'science,' when the mists of Jersey magic are dispelled by Big Apple empiricism.

Everything interesting that Polar has to offer is visual or thematic (and therefore communicable visually). If you subscribe to the "8 universal plots" theory, then everything interesting comics as a medium has to offer is visual or thematic. And while words may keep a reader on a page longer, they keep them there reading, not looking. That's the problem with words, they belong to plot. Santos and his story are better served by silence, where the reader can infer, and the unresolved tension of the assassin who finds their sunset can be heard, humming beneath a final smile.

Rather than sleepwalk into nihilistic revenging, Zombie War seems to suggest that redemption is ours to seize, and in doing so shows less concern with craft, and more heart, than any other comic on the racks. Maybe we could learn a few things from the '90s.

From basic survival to conquistadorial "one elf to rule them all" shenanigans, what sells the various motives of Hinterkind's cast is their affectless characterisation. In neither the acting nor the dialogue do the Hinterkind reference their own outlandishness, there are no awkward self-consciousnesses, nor any "noble savage" style elevation. Everybody in this comic is flawed, whatever their provenance, flawed, scarred, and oppressed by somebody. So it's just as well artist Trifogli invites readers in with humane expressions, and backgrounds bathed in golden light (courtesy of Cris Peter's perfect palette). Together, Edginton and Trifogli manage to pull off enjoyable complexity, offering a paradise which runs more like purgatory. It's a place with serious potential.

The key to this book becoming a true all-ages title lies with Roger, the as-yet unused Abe, and the wealth of other truly bizarre supporting characters the Hellboy cast contains. Hellboy himself in strictly one-dimensional in this issue, but making him straight man to a cornucopia of cute kook might not be a bad plan. It worked for Mignola, after all.

This is a thick slice of good clean comics fun, aiming at entertainment without ever trying for epic.

While Trakhanov lends heft and texture to the exiles' various technologies, Orlando elucidates at length upon them, when the simple sight of the Deliverer, a twin-hulled craft capable of submerging or flying (beat that, Helicarrier) says it all. Then there's the dun-dun-DAH ending with large multi-limbed beasty, strangely reductive for a book with such big visions. And sadly, the ladies have so far had very little to do but coax and gaze. It's possible I want this book to be more cerebral, more allegorical than it intends to be, that actually it's a strikingly original adventure book, for which Trakhanov will doubtlessly provide jaw-dropping cliffhangers and page-turns. Either way, hopefully issue #2 will plot a clearer course, and we can all be joyfully pulled under.

Sure, it's a mixed bag, and those who choose their comics by writer will find little outside of Grampa to please them. But as a break from the oppressive new Bat-reality, and a showcase of fine artists working near their peak, there's no other show in town. If you have $5 a month for some special Bat-sauce, and the time to luxuriate in top-drawer comics art, this book can't be beat.

This, this is a good superhero book, one where strength is the only certainty, and escalation is unavoidable, not unbelievable. It leaves me asking my favourite comics question: "How's he going to get out of this one?"

There's a pretty limited sweet spot for this comic consisting of those who still enjoy the original movie, and those who can forgive it and Miller their excesses. For comics progressives there's less to entice, but for fanboys lapsed and practicing, it's a blast. Come and get it.

Packaged up in a wealth of variant covers at cover price, and a recap page intrographic that should be industry standard, Unity is every bit as good a cape comic as anyone else has to offer, and cements Valiant's place alongside the major publishers. If you're crossover-fatigued, this might be your antidote.

This creative team knows the material they're dealing with, the importance of balancing concept-justifying period designs, and trimming the fat that slowed these projects down back in the day.

Provided it avoids glamourizing or decrying substance abuse and stays lockstep with this cursed character's quest for control, Buzzkill could be the mini of the year and still leave enough meat on the bone for a return series. Fingers crossed!

There is of course a final strip (from Bill Parente and Ernie Colon) which will please nostalgists and genre junkies, even a real letters page and a Braun/Bagge rear cover, but Creepy #14 malingers because of Matthew Southworth. It's worth recognising, however, that without Dark Horse's commitment to craft over basic genre box-ticking, "Blind Contour" might have been buried in a shallow grave of humourless horror tropes.

As a package, Deadly Class is a big idea with a filthy starting point, setting us up to wonder whether Marcus will escape the grimy streets and his own "bad voice", or be snapped back just before some kind of ascension. What will make or break this book will be Remender's ability to avoid glibness, especially as his young protagonists get more and more blood on their hands. This book is already one of the coolest on the racks, but it could be resonant too, a comic book Breaking Bad of sorts for a younger, differently disenfranchised audience. As a lapsed Remender fan, who'd been disappointed by Uncanny Avengers and Captain America, Deadly Class read like the Remender comic I'd been waiting for.

Longtime Mignola-verse fans already know of this character's demise, Mignola himself says there can only be so many of these occult-infused, noir-bizarre minis before that last clip is spent, and the hand of Justice burns no more. But that's for the history fans. You don't need to know anything to devour this comic with relish and find yourself hungry for more. People, if you've never tried the Lobster, now is your time.

This issue has a little of everything Mind MGMT offers, from the surreal psychic recurrence of Lyme's confessional, to visceral effects achieved not through gore, but by positioning the "camera" to catch readers in complicity. There are, of course the shorts at front and rear, far superior to recap pages or second features, fleshing out the world of the comic through smaller-scale file entries, like the risibly bad 1900's novelist whose prose killed. Kindt does more to involve the reader with this whimsical monochrome flow-chart riff than Hickman has done with all his Marvel infographics put together. And at the end of it all, that's why this jumping on point opportunity should be seized. Kindt isn't flogging continuity. He's inviting you to the world he's made, offering you a key to the kingdom. Despite the issue number, it's not too late to accept.

Fundamentally, Mara is a hopeful book, drawing inspiration from humanity's striving to be more "super", our group grasp for the stars, but also from our individual capacity for perspective. Mara finds herself and her future when she experiences a "tertiary power manifestation". Empathy. From there, she can build a future, outside of Wood's allegorical world, which is our world minus the actions and creations of individuals. Mara shows us the way out of the corporatized, constitutionalised mechanism that traps us. We must learn to care far less how we are perceived, and far more how we perceive. Simple, right? It's no wonder that this is the issue where Doyle lets Mara smile, and I encourage you to be there when it happens.

After all, how much hoisting by one's own petard is a monkey, or a comic reader, supposed to endure? Mojo Jojo, like us, has seen his helplessness in the face of genre, and resolved that if the rules won't change, then he shall. If only more supervillains showed such initiative, an entire genre's latent potential might be unlocked. But we may have to make do with a single free-thinking monkey for now.