Marvel’s got a bunch of news that came out today – after a slow, slow, slow week – so here’s the roundup’s rundown:

• Marvel: Ultimate Alliance finally ships this week. Just to remind us that it’s happening, here’s a slick new trailer for it! I’m looking forward to this game. And the trailer looks pretty good too.
• To celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Heroes Reborn nonsense and the Onslaught mess that spawned it, Marvel’s putting out a mini starting in November called “Onslaught Reborn.” In true celebratory fashion, it’ll be written by Jeph Loeb and drawn by Rob Liefield, as they both played a large role in the original Heroes Reborn launch. Here’s the new trailer!
• And, just because Marvel trailers are all the rage today, here’s the one for the upcoming Guiding Light crossover. It made me laugh a lot. Probably wasn’t supposed to though.
• There’s been a lot of photos shown online for the wedding scene on the roof for the Fantastic Four 2 movie. But the newest set of photos looks pretty interesting, largely because they show Jessica Alba stopping a helicopter with some sort of invisible powers! One of which is mirrored here.
• Lastly, Rich Johnston confirms that Stuart Immonen is the new artist taking over on Ultimate Spider-Man, following Mark Bagley’s insane stint of 110 issues. Please note – none of those issues shipped late, he all too often shipped more than 12 issues in a year, and they all looked fantastic. Immonen, you’ve got big boots to fill.

When the new Ghost Rider trailer was released, apparently a lot of fans assumed that what we saw in it was the full transformation of Johnny Blaze into the Ghost Rider, despite the quick cutaways that likely suggested otherwise. Well, the writer/director Mark Steven Johnson immediately hit the internet – most specifically at the SuperHeroHype boards – to say this:

I just wanted to say thanks for both the kind words and the criticisms on the new trailer. It all goes towards making a better movie. There’s a couple things I thought I’d mention that might help explain what you’re seeing. First, the TRANSFORMATION. Ghost Rider is a PG-13 movie, albeit, a very intense PG-13 movie. The MPAA governs the movie trailers as well. And one of the rules is that you can’t show people on fire in a PG-13 trailer. Obviously, this presents a problem for us. So for the fans who have wondered if that’s all there is for the transformation — God no. Not by a long shot. But that’s all we can show. In fact, we had to cut many shots out of the trailer for being too intense or horrific. … Second, the VOICE. The voice of Ghost Rider can’t be judged on an internet trailer. There are multiple tracks of animal growls, fire, rusty chains, etc. mixed into Ghost Rider’s voice. But all of those tracks have to be terribly condensed into a trailer like this and so all you can really hear is a deep, raspy voice. Trust me, GR’s voice will rock the movie house.

He speaks more on other points, but those are the two I found most interesting.  And today he lives up to his word on the first one, showing us the full transformation of Blaze (Nic Cage) into Ghost Rider (flaming skullhead), available HERE.  Trust me, you want to check this out.  It’s good ‘n creepy.

Ultimate Power #1
written by Brian Michael Bendis, pencils by Greg Land

Here at last, it’s the big crossover between JMS’s Squadron Supreme and the Ultimate Universe! It’s a 9 issue series – which is supposed to take place between Ultimates 2 and Ultimates 3 – and it’s being divided into three sections: Issues 1-3 will be written by Bendis, issues 4-6 will be written by J. Michael Straczynski , and issues 7-9 will be written by Jeph Loeb. Er, I guess Greg Land’s onboard for the whole thing.

If you read Squadron Supreme or the Ultimate books, this book is something worth keeping an eye on – At the end of the series, someone from the Supremeverse will end up in the Ultimateverse, and vice versa. Granted both universes have their set of crap characters, but I can’t imagine someone like Ultimate Longshot in the Supremeverse being the gimmick they’re selling. And heck, even if it is, it should still make for an interesting read.

The story kicks off with Reed Richards trying to find a cure for Ben Grimm, and accidentally opening up a connection between the two universes – You’d think after the Zombie fiasco, he’d know better than to poke around like that, but thank God he doesn’t yet! Anyway, while the premise is a somewhat tired story concept in the normal Marvel U, I couldn’t help but notice this page in the previews –

I was moderately interested in the book, but not terribly, until I saw that. This puts a whole different pressure on Reed to find that cure, and while some of the work from these writers has been hit or miss for me lately, I find myself looking forward to this book a LOT.

This is gonna be one meaty issue of awesome. Not only do we get the first part of the last leg of Planet Hulk – Allegiance: Part 1 – but we also get a back up story with pencils by the awesome Gary Frank, fresh off his stretch on Squadron Supreme:

This back up story – which will also be written by the main story’s writer, Greg Pak – deals with events from Civil War (specifically, supposedly involving some new info about the Thor clone), and the Illuminati’s role in punting the Hulk into space, and ALSO someone finds out what happened to the Hulk. Gasp!

The super-duper-special anniversary issue will also include reprints of The Incredible Hulk #’s 3, 152 and 300. Issue #3 was chosen because it’s a story where the Hulk tore up Manhattan, which led to Dr. Strange exiling him (actually to space, according to the cover). #300 is a story … well, it seems to be one largely about the Hulk beating the crap out of stuff. Greg Pak hints that it might or might not be a teaser of World War Hulk, but more topically, it touches on the ideas of exile and of the Hulk being a monster. #152 is a story where the heroes of the Marvel U put the Hulk on trial, and try to decide whether the Hulk is hero enough, or too much monster. I’d say the connection’s only marginally less obvious than it is with issue 3.

Also, here’s some unlettered pages from the main issue. Art chores are by Carlo Pagulayan, who did the first arc, and he’s splitting this last arc with Aaron Lopresti, who did the second arc.

Sources – Pak’s interview at The Pulse, Newsarama.com, Marvel.com

Updated – Previous articles indicated it would be issue #143 in the issue, but instead it’s issue #300. Sorry folks. On the upside, it makes previously confusing comments in other articles make a lot more sense, now that we know this. Also – We’ve added new images from the upcoming issue #100, both for the issue, and for Gary Frank’s pages.

Also, the issue will hit stands on November 1st, and it’ll cost $3.99.  I can’t wait!

If you read the comic sites at all, then you must know by now that there’s a new Thunderbolts team in the pipeline, coming in January. The book will be written by Warren Ellis (recently bustin’ his hump in the Marvel U on Nextwave), and drawn by Mike Deodato (recently bustin’ his pencils on New Avengers and Amazing Spider-Man). Here’s the lineup, according to Marvel –

• Venom
• Moonstone
• Bullseye
• Songbird
• Chen Lu, the Radioactive Man
• Swordsman
• “The mystery man called Penance”
• Norman Osborn, the Green Goblin

You should know most of these guys – Venom, Bullseye, and the Green Goblin are big names, what with one of the goals being to New Avengerize the lineup. Quesada even alluded to the fact that Osborn is supposed to be running the team. Moonstone, Songbird, Radioactive Man, and the Swordsman are all from the current lineup, and it’s nice to see (unlike last Thunderbolts revamp) that the current team isn’t getting stupidly kicked to the curb. But Moonstone’s an odd choice as she’s been brain dead for a while, and Swordsman’s an odd choice, because he lacks much of a discernable personality. And then, Penance? It can’t be the Penance from Generation X, since not only is she in The Loners, but SHE’S ALSO A SHE. I have no clue what’s going on there.

And the second question is, who’s missing? Well, on the last page of Civil War #4, we have Jack-O-Lantern, Lady Deathstrike, The Jester, and the Taskmaster, in addition to Songbird, Venom, and Bullseye. While Jack-O-Lantern and the Jester are probably earmarked for death (based on Millar’s track record), that doesn’t explain what happened to the bigger names – Lady Deathstrike and the Taskmaster.

The “stated mission” of the team – as editor Tom Brevoort told ComicBookResources – is “to protect the public by tracking down and apprehending unregistered superhumans,” a mission that should be pretty enticing to some of these characters. Since this story arc begins before the end of Civil War, that means the Act is in effect when they kick off their gameplan, but post-Civil War, well, that remains to be seen. And because of the “Suicide Squad” nature of the team – though with a main difference that the team will be publicly visible – the lineup can still go through plenty of changes, and no doubt it will over the course of the next year. Beyond that… Well, Ellis says he’s only on for a year so far, so we’ll see what happens past that.

Fabian Nicieza will be following up his current run on Thunderbolts with a mini called “Zemo: Born Better,” and he remains on Cable/Deadpool. He hasn’t been doing interviews about this, but it can’t be that nice for him finally to get the book back, and then get insane crossover sales boosts, but not to get the opportunity to run from there.

Well, we shared the forbidden trailer with you freely, but today the official trailer – with the company stamp of approval – is now available. Interestingly, while many of the scenes from the old trailer show up, they’re cut somewhat differently, and even better, there are plenty of new scenes to feast your eyes upon.

Interestingly, there’s also a behind-the-scenes type featurette available too. Personally, I think the trailer’s a little more exciting.

So once again, the trailer is available here. Watch it before it becomes forbidden too!

Justice League Heroes (the X-Men Legends-like game for DC characters) finally has a trailer letting us see some of the characters in action – specifically Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, Flash, Zatanna, and Martian Manhunter. It’s not going to change the face of gaming or anything, but it certainly looks to deliver the exact type of gameplay I’m expecting.

Also, there’s some stills of the game available for your perusal here. Plus, they talk about the game a little, but I have no stomach for this “reading” business. Just the pretty pictures.

Criminal #1
Written by Ed Brubaker, art by Sean Phillips

It’s tempting to pick out any number of the books coming out tomorrow (Vaughan on Dr. Strange, Wolfman on Nightwing, Incredible Hulk #99), but the book that you might not have heard of (that is, if you don’t read a lot of comics news) is also the one I’m looking forward to the most: Criminal, by Brubaker and Phillips.

We’ve talked about Brubaker a couple of times here before, referencing his current (and extremely well-executed) runs on Uncanny X-Men and Captain America, but the first time his work caught my attention, it was on the Wildstorm book Sleeper, his previous collaboration with Sean Phillips.

It was a brilliant story of subterfuge and spy games, with each issue being joyous mess of hell for the protagonist. It challenged the concepts of right and wrong; and the clever role of super-powers (in a world with super-powered individuals) was the icing on an already glorious cake, as things were regularly viewed through a different sort of lens, making every experience fresh and surprising, much like how he’s been handling Captain America.

Now, I realize that those titles all involved super-powers, and to a certain extent the spandex uniforms that go with them, and here is where Criminal differs. It’s a straight up crime book, with nothing tying into the super-hero universes that we know and love. And that’s not a bad thing – If this inspires him to such devious heights as he took us to on Sleeper, then this will be my favorite book to come out this year. Not to mention, Brubaker is reuniting with his former Sleeper co-conspirator, Sean Philips, who you may have recently seen in the Marvel Zombies title.

I guess I’ve done enough fanboyish gushing to tell you how I feel about this comic to make me feel like a chump if the book doesn’t turn out as good as I hyped it (I’m looking at you, Boys #1). But based on the glowing track record of these two creators, it’s really hard for me to believe that it will fail my expectations in the least.