I’ve enjoyed Lopez’s style whenever he popped up at DC, but he’s been putting out a lot of great work with the New Mutants over at Marvel as of late. Marvel just released the Mystic collection he worked on just a few weeks back, so you should give that a try if you’re into fun sci-fi/fantasy. Fans of Terry Moore’s expressive line work and the clean line style popular over at Marvel right now (think Marcos Martin or Paulo Rivera) should keep an eye on Lopez. Check out more of his work on his blogspot.

Avengers Annual #1- There are so many reasons why this book bugs me, and all of them make me desperately wish Bendis would leave the Avengers.  So let’s start with the package itself. Thirty-two pages of story for $4.99 is kind of a crap deal, especially considering this is a Bendis script. You just don’t get a solid enough story in the small amount of pages presented. Then you have Dell’Otto’s art, which is still ok despite not being in his usual painted style but I’m pretty sure most people who buy a book for his art are doing it for the painted style. Considering this book is so late and that the first issue was painted, you would have thought the holdup would have been for painted art. On top of that, he has some pretty lazy copy-and-paste panels showing up.

Wolverine #300- Yes, because the constant renumbering isn’t getting old. Besides that stupidity, this was a decent story because it’s still Jason Aaron. It’s a good balance of humor and violence and it doesn’t take itself too seriously. Art was nice with Ron Garney and Adam Kubert.  The package is weak for the price point though as there are only twenty-eight pages of relevant story.  I’m not counting the Sabertooth Reborn preview because A) It’s Loeb and Bianchi which means it’s kinda crap already, B) I don’t really care about Sabertooth being reborn, and C) you should never have to pay extra for a preview.  A good story wrapped in a crappy $4.99 package. If you’re a Wolverine fan or an Aaron fan you’re going to get this regardless, but it just pisses me off that they freely abuse consumer loyalty. It doesn’t surprise me, it just continually pisses me off. B

Prophet #21- You have to enjoy a project that takes all of the assorted Rob Liefeld Extreme properties and boots the Liefeld out of them entirely (well, except the variant covers). This was a pretty solid first issue, sparse yet dense at the same time. It doesn’t waste time but the art is so nice and rich with detail that you slow your reading down to enjoy it. This is definitely a break out project for Simon Roy and having Brandon Graham at the writing helm doesn’t hurt for visibility. Prophet feels like a healthy mix of Heavy metal meets American Indy with a taste of manga tossed in for good measure. You could do worse than twenty-four pages of story with no advertisements for $2.99, plus you get a nice little map by Graham in the back. A

Spera HC- This is a pretty awesome all ages fantasy romp, the only trick is that there are some fairly violent parts dealing with slaying monsters so parents probably want to check it out before hand. It’s a nice addition to the collection of any fan of Mouse Guard, Courageous Princess, Castle Waiting, and Bone. The main story revolves around two princesses who are on the run from one of their evil mothers. The daughter of the evil queen steals away with her friend from a rival kingdom who would be put to death upon capture, so with the aid of a fire spirit (a shape changer who flips between human and wolf form) she sets out to save her friend and create a life of adventure for both of them. What’s nice is that each chapter has a different artist and a different tone and all of the artists are pretty stellar. The four main chapters are drawn by Kyla Vanderklugt, Hwei, Emily Carroll, and Olivier Pichard. Each artist is so impressive that you regret finishing their chapter but then get enthralled by the next.  Plus their styles complement each other, so the flow of the book is interesting because even though it changes it maintains the same sense of energy. After those four creators the book is split up into smaller chapters by another five artists, and while I like all of their styles they are a so different that it sort of breaks up the flow a little.  Regardless of that, this is a great package as it is a nicely produced hard cover for only $19.95. Archaia is really kicking some ass this year with nice releases like this, so it’s worth keeping an eye on them. A