Daniel Wise is a former police detective in a near-future Los Angeles, a city that has been victimized by terrorists who set off an EMP (Electro Magnetic Pulse) and rendered the city without power. Months after the incident, electricity still won’t work in the affected area. Horses and walking are the preferred modes of transportation, lighting is by candles or sunlight, and much of the region has plunged into looting. Now the mayor has been kidnapped and Wise finds himself in the middle of it.

Writer Mark Evanier and Steve Rude have once again teamed up, this time for a Space Ghost one-shot at Comico.

The team consisted of Woo, Namora, the Human Robot, Marvel Boy, Gorilla Man, and Venus. One of the main reasons this collected edition is so cool, is that it also includes the first appearances of these characters from the pages of Marvel Mystery Comics #82, Yellow Claw #1, Venus #1, Menace #11, Men’s Adventures #26, and Marvel Boy #1, all gloriously restored. The beautiful rendition of Yellow Claw #1 alone is worth the price of admission.

Under the care of writer Josh Trujillo and artist Andrea Di Vito, two very different worlds have collided in the poorly titled but very nicely executed (thus far) Planet of the Apes versus Fantastic Four.

Scene of the Crime #1, originally published by Vertigo, cover dated May 1999. I didn’t know a whole lot about the series, and I didn’t yet know much about the creators, writer Ed Brubaker, pencil artist Michael Lark, and inker Sean Phillips. Like a lot of comic fans, over the next few years I would get to know plenty about them, but at this point, I knew what I read in PREVIEWS and what my friends at DC Comics told me. That’s it.

Unlike the standard comic book size hardcover Nexus Archives or the 9” x 6” softcover Nexus Omnibus collections from Dark Horse, this new 888-page omnibus is presented in the oversized, 11” x 8” hardcover format familiar to fans of Marvel’s and DC’s omnibus editions.

While the title of this issue is a bit misleading – it is distinctly not a true facsimile edition – it’s nonetheless fantastic to see this wonderful story back in print. The volume of Marvel Team-Up began in 2005 had a number of really inviting issues, Marvel Team-Up #14 was and remains the cream of the crop for that 25-issue run.

Unlike their science fiction- and horror-themed anthologies, Alien Worlds and Twisted Tales, which were produced by Bruce Jones, Vanguard Illustrated was produced in-house at Pacific Comics. Edited by David Scroggy, who would later become very well known at Dark Horse Comics, this anthology was about upcoming creators, and often mixing that new talent with established professionals.

This one, subtitled Secret Origins: Super-Villains, is a treasure trove of vintage origin stories and key appearances of such villains as Lex Luthor, the Joker, Captain Cold, and Dr. Sivana, among others. For longtime DC fans, this is a welcome trip down memory lane. For those of us who in our youth skewed more toward Marvel, it’s a change to the characters in their best Golden Age and Silver Age incarnations.

Often adapted, Beowulf is probably the best-known epic Old English poem. The subject of multiple translations and frequent scholarly discussion, its true origins are unknown, although there is a manuscript which dates to between the years 975 and 1025.