Finally with this third issue of the Gargoyles comic we get our first new story.

New Avengers #29
written by Brian Michael Bendis, art by Leinil Yu

New Avengers vs. Mighty Avengers

It’s been a big year for the Avengers, and between Mighty and New Avengers, Bendis has gotten plenty opportunity to write teams named Avengers. This Wednesday, Marvel’s two powerhouse teams come head to head, and lucky us, we get to see Leinil Yu show off his awesome pencils as the two teams duke it out.

Honestly, I don’t know what more to say about this. It’s New Avengers vs. Mighty Avengers. Either you’re excited already, or you’re never going to be. (Also, Leinil Yu is awesome!) Chell the preview below. Alright, I’m out.

Free Comic Book Day is in exactly one month – May 5th, 2007! (That’s the first Saturday in May.) It’s gotten bigger and bigger each year, and this year there are over 40 different books to choose from! That is, if your local shop orders them all.

Looking over the selection of books, boo to DC for just reprinting JLA #0 and issue #1 of the animated Legion book – Yet another year of DC participating in a totally half-assed way. (I guess some jeers go to IDW too for reprinting the Transformers Movie Prequel Comic #1, even if they’re actually pushing a movie here.)

Books to watch:

• Marvel – Amazing Spider-Man: Swing Shift – written by Dan Slott, art by Dan Jimenez
• Marvel – Marvel Adventures Three-In-One – featuring an Iron Man, Hulk, and Franklin Richards story (grab one to give to a kid!)
• Image – Astounding Wolf-Man #1 – new book from Robert Kirkman
• Antarctic Press – Pirates vs. Ninjas #1 – because it’s PIRATES VS. NINJAS
• Fantagraphics Books – The Unseen Peanuts – over 100 strips of Charles Schulz’s Peanuts that have NEVER been reprinted
• Rude Dude Productions – Nexus Special – Steve Rude picking up the reigns on his long dormant character
• Topshelf Productions – Owly & Korgi – Owly is a regular favorite of Free Comic Book Day fans
• Wildcard Ink – Gumby Special – because it’s Gumby!

Wanted, the movie based on the miniseries by Mark Millar, is supposed to start filming this month in Prague. (That’s in the Czech Republic, knuckleheads.) You might have heard of this, as Angelina Jolie was recently cast, and Morgan Freeman also stars in it. Obviously, neither of them are the title character – a gumpy white guy that finds out his father was a supervillain-type assassin and gets trained to fill his shoes. This is James McAvoy‘s role. It’s a fairly messed up book, burdened with one of the lamest last pages I’ve ever encountered (depending on your interpretation, it’s either Millar laughing at you for buying the book, or telling you to go out and be like the character). Oddly enough, it sounds like the film adaptation is removing most (if not all) of the superhero/supervillain aspects – perhaps the most endearing aspect of the story.

Anyway, all of that was to bring you up to speed, so you have some semblance of context for the little piece of concept art Bazelevs has treated us to. In their words, New American project of Timur Bekmambetov with the working title “Wanted@ is in progress. For right now the revisualization for the future feature is being made. CG specialists develop “art” and camera moves, objects, characters interaction, shots composing, animation – in a word, it is already seen now how the future featyre will look like. This work is being done for ‘Universal Studios”.

Ah, translations.

Madman Atomic Comics #1
written and drawn by Mike Allred

Mike Allred has an impressive comics resume, ranging from Spider-Man to the recent (and acclaimed) X-Statix, to the Bluntman and Chronic comic pages in Chasing Amy, and even to “The Golden Plates” – an adaptation of the Book of Mormon. Wait, really? Huh, really. Well, anyway, one of his most prominent works remains his creator-owned work on Madman. Having previously been published under smaller publishers, I’ve never gotten my hands on a Madman comic, despite being able to instantly recognize the character on sight. You have to admit – he makes for an intriguing visual.

As for who he is, Madman “was a hitman who was killed in a car accident, then stitched back together and brought to life by a pair of mad scientists.” I don’t know much else about the character, other than the fact that Bruce Timm admittedly used Madman as a direct inspiration for Freakazoid – “with comics open and referred to when developing the show.” And Freakazoid was pretty awesome, right? So, with a movie currently in the works, a hard-earned reputation for excellence, and a new issue #1, what better time to get acquainted with the character? The answer is NONE. So be cool like me – Gamble with a couple bucks and pick up the issue this Wednesday.

Textless preview pages after the jump…
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Legendary Superman director Richard Donner recently teamed up with Geoff Johns to write a Superman story in Action comics – a story that came is still coming out at a glacial Civil War-like pace. This summer, Donner and Johns are teaming up again, to put out a 5-issue sequel to another nostalgia-ridden film property that Donner directed – The Goonies. The story picks up only a few years later for the characters, with the story centering on Sloth’s disappearance … on the exact same day those evil genius Fratelli brothers escaped from prison. Expect the book to be finished sometime around spring, 2012. (I kid, I kid.)

Wizard has the full story here.

We here at Powet have come across a news source which has exclusively supplied us with a number of upcoming Marvel storylines! In fact, I can personally PROMISE you proof of these upcoming stories from Marvel:

• Daredevil: Agent of SHIELD!
• Wolverine vs. Hulk… To the death… OF BOTH OF THEM?
• AND THEN, Wolverine comes back… as a vampire!
• The Surfer is Galactus’s herald for now… Until he’s replaced by Dazzler!
• The new Thor series puts the hammer in the hands of someone new: Rogue!
• When Punisher becomes the new Captain America… Venom will become the new Punisher!

All the proof you could ask for AND MORE … After the jump!
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The Spirit #1 (2nd Printing)
written and drawn by Darwyn Cooke

Darwyn Cooke is most recently known for his brilliant work on DC’s New Frontier book (Vol 1 & Vol 2), a story told around the Golden Age of DC. However, you might recognize his art style as being similar to the awesome Batman and Superman (and Batman Beyond) animated series of the ’90s, which is fitting, since he spent a lot of time doing storyboarding work for them. These days, however, he’s doing some fantastic storytelling every month in Will Eisner’s The Spirit.
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