Any week with a brand new original Ed Brubaker/Sean Phillips graphic novel is a GREAT week in our book!! Add in Cliff Chiang drawing AND writing a Black Label Catwoman series, a new Critical Role series (written by LITTLE BIRD's Darcy van Poelgeest) and the sequel to Basketful of Heads (Refrigerator Full of Heads, of course) and this week can’t be beat!!

     —SPOTLIGHT BOOK—
•DESTROY ALL MONSTERS HC A RECKLESS BOOK (Image)
The next book in the red-hot RECKLESS series is here! BRUBAKER and PHILLIPS bring us a new original graphic novel starring troublemaker-for-hire Ethan Reckless. It's 1988, and Ethan has been hired for his strangest case yet: finding the secrets of a Los Angeles real estate mogul. How hard could that be, right? But what starts as a deep dive into the life of a stranger will soon take a deadly turn, and Ethan will risk everything that still matters to him.

      —NEW GRAPHIC NOVEL OF NOTE—
•TIME BEFORE TIME VOL 01 (Image)
2140. To escape a world with no future, many turn to the Syndicate - a criminal organization that, for the right price, will smuggle you back in time to the promise of a better yesterday. Syndicate smuggler Tatsuo wants to leave his life of crime behind, but when an FBI agent disrupts his escape plan, they both find themselves hunted across time by his former employers. Collects issues #1-#5.

     —NEW COMICS OF NOTE—
•CATWOMAN LONELY CITY #1 (DC)
Drawn and WRITTEN by Cliff Chiang! Ten years ago, the massacre known as Fools’ Night claimed the lives of Batman, The Joker, Nightwing, and Commissioner Gordon…and sent Selina Kyle, the Catwoman, to prison. A decade later, Gotham has grown up—it’s put away costumed heroism and villainy as childish things. The new Gotham is cleaner, safer…and a lot less free, under the watchful eye of Mayor Harvey Dent and his Batcops. It’s into this new city that Selina Kyle returns.

•PHOENIX SONG ECHO 1 (Marvel)
Against all odds, one of the most powerful entities in the Marvel Universe chose Maya Lopez, a deaf street fighter, as its new avatar. And the burning question on everyone's minds is: WHY?! But Echo is the last person to answer. Still learning her new cosmic abilities Echo strikes out to return to her roots. But the reservation has even fewer answers. And where power goes, evil follows.

•CRITICAL ROLE: TALES OF EXANDRIA #1 (Dark Horse)
Written by LITTLE BIRD's Darcy van Poelgeest! Leylas Kryn, the Bright Queen of the Kryn Dynasty, has spent multiple lives in pursuit of assembling the Luxon. With her eternal lover Quana at her side, she will stop at nothing to use its otherworldly power to bring a Golden Age to the peoples under her rule. So when what might be the final piece of the Luxon appears nearby, Leylas sends Quana to collect it...

•DUNGEONS & DRAGONS MINDBREAKER #1 (IDW)
The prelude to the much-anticipated video game Baldur's Gate III begins here! Changed by their experiences in Avernus, Krydle, Shandie, Delina, Nerys, Minsc, and Boo return home to Baldur's Gate to find that something much more insidious has taken root... what could be behind the odd behavior of the Head Librarian of the Knowledge-Hold?

•NUBIA AND THE AMAZONS #1 (DC)
Nubia becomes queen of Themyscira, but the new title also brings challenges. With the unexpected arrival of new Amazons, our hero is forced to reckon with her past and forge a new path forward for her sisters. Little does she know, a great evil grows beneath the island and it’s up to this former guardian of Doom’s Doorway to unite her tribe before paradise is lost forever!

•REFRIGERATOR FULL OF HEADS #1 (DC)
For a year now, the mysterious axe that unleashed pandemonium during the hurricane of ’83 has waited at the bottom of the bay but nothing that powerful stays buried. Brody Island has new visitors, and a new sheriff in town, too—not to mention a dangerous great white shark spotted in its waters...

•GUNSLINGER SPAWN #1 (Image)
Introducing the second new monthly title spinning out of the SPAWN UNIVERSE, with one of the most popular characters in the entire SPAWN mythology! Will his 200-year-old past come back to haunt him as he navigates the strange world of 2021? Get ready for the past and present to collide in this new ongoing title!

•HELLCOP #1 (Image)
When mankind first broke through the walls between dimensions, nothing could have prepared them for what they would find in Known Reality Plane 1301-A: it was absolute Hell. Literally. A covert security force was quickly assembled to patrol the Hellplane and ensure that none of the nastier denizens made their way Earthside. They were dubbed the Pan-Dimensional Security Corps. The HELLCOPS.

•NITA HAWES NIGHTMARE BLOG #1 (Image)
From the universe of Eisner-nominated series KILLADELPHIA comes a terrifying new tie-in horror series by acclaimed Marvel writer RODNEY BARNES and fan-favorite SPAWN artist JASON SHAWN ALEXANDER.

•ANT #1 (Image)
Erik Larsen takes on a whole new wall-crawler! ANT's epic adventure kicks off with this all-new origin issue! A new ongoing title by ERIK LARSEN.

Okay, so the first week of getting Marvel Comics from their new distributor resulted in more damages than we’re happy with, but that still doesn’t change the quality INSIDE the comics! And this week, that quality looks amazing! SIX SIDEKICKS OF TRIGGER KEATON #5 is coming out! IMMORTAL HULK comes to a frightening conclusion. There are new, known and unknown Batmen (BATMAN THE IMPOSTER and I AM BATMAN). There’s even an analysis of the whole of the Marvel Comics Universe in ALL THE MARVELS JOURNEY TO ENDS BIGGEST STORY EVER TOLD. This week has it ALL-- Including a book about Captain Marvel's cat (MARVEL MEOW).

     —SPOTLIGHT BOOK—
•BATMAN THE IMPOSTER #1 (DC)
Bruce Wayne’s mission as the Batman has only been underway for a year or so, but he can tell he’s making a difference. Unfortunately, he’s made some powerful enemies. All the traditional power brokers of Gotham resent the disruption the Batman has brought to town…and it seems one of them has a plan to neutralize him. There’s a second Batman haunting Gotham’s rooftops and alleys—and this one has no qualms about murdering criminals, live and on tape.

     —NEW GRAPHIC NOVEL OF NOTE—
•MARVEL MEOW HC (Marvel)
Join Captain Marvel's pet, Chewie, as she wreaks havoc in the lives of Marvel's most popular characters! Gain a new perspective on beloved favorites such as Spider-Man and Iron Man, formidable villains including Thanos and Galactus, and antiheroes like Deadpool, as they all become the playthings of this capricious "cat" creature.

     —PROSE BOOK OF INTEREST—
•ALL THE MARVELS JOURNEY TO ENDS BIGGEST STORY EVER TOLD
The super-hero comic books that Marvel Comics has published since 1961 are, Douglas Wolk notes, the longest continuous, self-contained work of fiction ever created: over half a million pages to date, and growing. The Marvel story is a gigantic mountain, smack in the middle of contemporary culture. Thousands of writers and artists have contributed to it. Looking over close to sixty years of Marvel's comics, Wolk sees fascinating patterns - the rise and fall of particular cultural aspirations, and of the storytelling modes that conveyed them.

     —NEW COMICS OF NOTE—
•BLACK PANTHER LEGENDS 1 (Marvel)
T'Challa and Hunter are brothers growing up in the idyllic royal palace of Wakanda. Theirs goes beyond the usual sibling rivalry, though - Hunter, although older, is adopted, and T'Challa is the true heir to the throne. Both brothers wrestle with fairness and the
future, readying themselves for responsibility, when tragedy strikes and takes the choice from them.

•ET-ER #1 (AWA)
Intergalactic virus liquefy one of your heads? Feeling a bit "off" ever since you drove through that black hole? Then visit the ET-ER, the galaxy's leading medical facility. This interplanetary crew of doctors, nurses, paramedics, and technicians is uniquely qualified to cure what ails you. There's no planet too far, no asteroid too small, no patient too, well alien - and they accept most forms of insurance. This super-sized debut special includes two stories of medical madness that are out of this world.

•STAR WARS HIGH REPUBLIC TRAIL OF SHADOWS 1 (Marvel)
A Jedi Master is dead. Another is in a state of complete shock. It's a murder the likes of which the Jedi Order has never seen before. There are no leads. There are no suspects. There is no motive. But Jedi Investigator EMERICK CAPHTOR must solve the case before it's too late. The fate of the Jedi, the Hutts, the Nihil and everyone in the galaxy, hangs by this tangled thread of lies and deceit.

•TRANSFORMERS WRECKERS TREAD & CIRCUITS #1 (IDW)
Out in the Cybertronian colonies, good entertainment is hard to find. Fortunately, there's always the Wreckers-brave Cybertronians broadcasting death-defying stunts and action-all as a cover for undercover operations! When the only event bigger than a new Wreckers broadcast, the Speedia 500, a race for governmental control of a whole world, is threatened, the Wreckers have a new mission: Save the most viewed race in the galaxy... without getting caught. Wreck & Rule!

•WONDER WOMAN ADV OF YOUNG DIANA #1 (DC)
The world may know her as Wonder Woman, but once upon a time she was Diana, the young princess of Themyscira. Back then, she struggled to find her place on an island deemed paradise by many, but which was, to her, a prison. Trapped in her role as a royal and shielded from the harsh realities of Man’s World, Diana yearned for adventure, or at least a purpose. So when ancient texts portraying her home’s history go missing, she gets both.

•WORLD OF DARKNESS CRIMSON THAW #1 (Vault)
Cecily Bain has become everything she never wanted as The Prince of the Twin Cities. But her rule over a fractured, backbiting vampire court is interrupted by an intruder-something big, hairy and full of teeth. Good. She was missing a good scrape. There's worse living in the shadows than vampires.

Welcome to a week of change at Challengers! It’s the first week we’ll be getting Marvel Comics from someone other than Diamond Comic Distributors since we opened! It feels like it’s a little bit lighter of a week, probably to make it easier on the new distributor, but it’s still full of plenty of great New Comic Goodness!
There’s also another big change in store, but for that you’ll either have to come in or listen to next week’s podcast (Episdoe #553)...

     —SPOTLIGHT BOOK—
•RIGHTEOUS THIRST FOR VENGEANCE #1
When an unassuming man stumbles upon a dark-web contract assassin's vicious plot to kill an innocent target, he turns himself into one. The Professional meets Road to Perdition in this story of a family's unlikely guardian being hunted by rich and powerful men who are used to getting away with everything. Join RICK REMENDER and ANDRÉ ARAÚJO for a uniquely atmospheric murder mystery with sudden bouts of brutal violence.

     —NEW GRAPHIC NOVEL OF NOTE—
•SCARENTHOOD (IDW)
TO-DO LIST: Drop kids at preschool; Grab coffee with other parents; Go ghost-hunting in woods; Fight demonic entity; Collect kids; Nap time. What's scarier: fighting demons or letting your kids down? That's what a group of parents will find out as their plans to solve the school's long standing mystery lead to one parenting nightmare after another!

     —NEW COMICS OF NOTE—
•AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #75
Spidey is back to thrice-monthly because this story is pure jet fuel. Ben Reilly has returned to NYC and has fully taken back the mantle of Spider-Man, but what does this mean for Peter Parker? The greatest team of web-writers has come together with the most epic arachnid-artists ever assembled to bring you a Spider-story that will shake up Spider-Man's 59th year in ways you CANNOT PREDICT!

•ARE YOU AFRAID OF DARKSEID #1
Gather ’round the fire, fellow campers, because it’s time for that most terrifying of traditions—campfire stories so scary you’ll never sleep without a night-light again! The Teen Titans guide those brave enough through tales of Batman and the hidden killer, Superman and Lois Lane and the killer in their back seat, Harley Quinn and Darkseid versus a furious Bloody Mary, and more stories so hair-raising you’ll call your momma to come pick you up.

•ARKHAM CITY ORDER OF THE WORLD #1
The attack on Arkham Asylum left the long-standing Gotham establishment in ruin, most of the patients killed or missing, and only a handful of surviving staff—a few nurses, a gravely injured security guard, and one doctor. In the chaos of the assault, it is believed that several of the asylum’s patients escaped and scurried off into the dark nooks and crannies of Gotham City. Now, these Arkhamites walk among us, and it’s up to the Asylum’s one remaining doctor, Jocasta Joy, to round up her former patients.

•CHICKEN DEVIL #1
Mitchell Moss is about as regular as it gets. He's married with two children, and co-owns a successful chain of Memphis Hot Chicken restaurants. It's not the life that screams hero/vigilante...until he discovers that his business partner is in bed with the mob and owes them $2 million. Unfortunately, Mitch is ill-equipped to be a badass-he's just a guy who makes really good chicken. Can he protect his family from cold-blooded gangsters? Absolutely not. But maybe the CHICKEN DEVIL can...

•DIRTBAG RAPTURE #1
She's stoned. She's selfish. She's all that stands between us and the end of the world. Where do you go when you die? Kat, a stoner with a flexible moral code, can answer that, and the answer is: not very far. Unfortunately for Kat's peace of mind, a near-death experience has left her with the ability to see and hear ghosts, as well as take them into her "mindscape" so she can bring them to locations of their choosing, essentially playing transporter to the deceased.

•OUT #1
In the waning days of World War Two, with the Allies advancing, a desperate Nazi officer unearths an ancient force of evil that he hopes will turn the tide of battle: a vampire. To test the power of his secret weapon, he unleashes the monster on an unsuspecting group of Allied POWs. It's up to Nocona, a Comanche language expert, to communicate with the vampire to find out what it really wants.

•SOUL PLUMBER #1
From the creators of The Last Podcast On The Left. After attending a seminar hosted in a hotel conference room by a mysterious group called the Soul Plumbers, Edgar Wiggins, disgraced former seminary school student, discovers what he thinks is the secret to delivering souls from the thrall of Satan. But after stealing the blueprints and building the machine himself, out of whatever he can afford from his salary as a gas station attendant, Edgar misses the demon and instead pulls out an inter-dimensional alien with dire consequences for all of mankind.