One of Marvel NOW’s most anticipated books releases this week, Avengers #1 by Jonathan Hickman and Jerome Opena.  I must say that I’m super excited for this book.  Hickman quickly made Fantastic Four one of my favorite books, so it’ll be great to see what he can do with Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.  From DC we see the Rotworld story continue with both Animal Man and Swamp Thing releasing their 15th issues.  Now for some covers.

Animal Man #15

Cover by Steve Pugh

Since the debut of the New 52 over a year ago, both Animal Man and Swamp Thing have been building up to this huge “Rotworld” event.  Every month I’ve found the two books to be great reads, and now they’re really delivering.  They’re not your usual superhero books, both have a very strong element of horror and the mystical about them.  Filled with great characters, great art, and great writing, they’re a real treat every month.

Before Watchmen: Minutemen #5

Cover by Darwyn Cooke

Darwyn Cooke has such a distinctive style that I really enjoy.  On top of his great art, he can write really well too.  Minutemen gives a really deep and interesting look into the back story of the Watchmen universe.  Things were mentioned in passing in the graphic novel are explored in great detail in this series.

All-New X-Men #3

Cover by Stuart Immonen and Wade Von Grawbadger

Only on issue three and already All-New X-Men is moving at a great clip.  It’s great to see Bendis’ take on everyone’s favorite mutants, and Immonen’s art is a treat as well.  This cover showing a pretty angry Cyclops wrecking things up is pretty dang cool.

Avengers #1

Cover by Dustin Weaver & Justin Ponsor

Variant Cover by Skottie Young

If the Marvel NOW! project had a flagship book, it would be this one.  One of Marvel’s best writers teamed up with a jaw-dropping artist working on Marvel’s currently most popular super hero team.  The addition of Cannonball and Sunspot to the team is an interesting choice, and I’m looking forward to seeing what HIckman does with them.  It’s going to be epic.

Avenging Spider-Man #15

Cover by Gabriele Dell’Otto

More Spider-Man!  More Devil Dinosaur!  More Gabriele Dell’Otto!  Sure, this cover is very similar to the one last month, but last month’s was awesome too!  If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.  Dell’Otto’s artwork is great, and Devil Dinosaur and Moon Boy, are a couple of wacky characters you don’t get to see too much of.  Fun times in Avenging Spider-Man

Hawkeye #5

Cover by David Aja

This book delivers pretty much everything I could possibly ask of it.  It’s Hawkeye getting himself into crazy situations and eventually getting his way back out again.  Fraction’s writing is great, the dialogue is spot on, and it’s very, very funny in parts.  Add to that Aja’s artwork and you have a book I genuinely look forward to each month.

Punisher: War Zone #2

Cover by Marco Checchetto

Frank Castle has problems.  For the past few months the Marvel Universe has been kind of crazy, the X-Men Schism, new Mutants appearing, the X-Men fighting the Avengers.  Because of this, the Punisher has been able to operate under the radar.  Now however things have calmed down and he finds himself directly in their sites.  It seems the Avengers aren’t happy about a vigilante murdering people in their town and they plan to do something about.  Frank Castle has Avengers problems.

Thunderbolts #1

Cover by Julian Totino Tedesco

Variant Cover by Skottie Young

I always liked the idea of the Thunderbolts.  Villains as heroes, against their will.  The previous series was quite good and eventually ended up morphing into Dark Avengers.  I don’t know too much about this book going into it, but I like the team on the cover.  Punisher, Red Hulk, Venom, Deadpool, and Elektra.  Elektra has been pretty much absent from the Marvel Universe these past few months, so it’ll be nice to read some stories containing her again.

X-Men #39

Cover by David Lopez

Domino!  She’s pretty awesome.  Crazy combat skills and luck powers?  She’s a female version of Longshot, or he’s a male version of her.  Either way I very much enjoy this cover.