This week's comic expectations

To quote "Blues Brothers," "We're on a Mission From God."

That's us. This week. Mission From God.

What is this mission, whether you choose to accept it or not?

Get "Irredeemable's" sales numbers to where they should be!!! Headlining this week's comic book releases is Irredeemable #5, priced at 99 cents! Check out the list of this week's stuff at THIS LINK.

I've been doing my part to get the word out on how fantastic Mark Waid's tale of Superman gone wrong is. It is at once the most cerebral read and the most marvelously horrific read on the market. And yet, the sales numbers have never even reached the 14,000 mark, and they've been stumbling.

Folks, you want to be reading this book several times an issue. It isn't just that Waid is telling the tale of Earth's greatest hero turning into its greatest enemy, Waid finds the most creative and well-developed ways to use The Plutonian's powers to their most devastating extent. And it's not always in the flexing muscles sort of way — in the second issue The Plutonian turns an entire office of people into psychological wrecks simply by pointing out the many downsides to finding out his secret identity. And all the while, we slowly learn more and more about where The Plutonian comes from and how he slowly spiraled down the rabbit hole.

I would gamble my salary for the next five years — there are many, many, many more of you that would love this book than the piddly 11,000 or so it averages now. At 99 cents, you all had better be buying this book!

Marvel's top book in a slow week is Captain America: Reborn #2, continuing the story of Steve Rogers' return to the land of the living. Now, I've been as big a fan as anyone of Ed Brubaker's run on Cap, so I trust his storytelling and long-term plans. That said, Bru's got a lot of 'splaining to do over that last issue. First off, I am going to need to see much more before I classify this whole "lost in time" thing as interesting in the least. For two, I am hoping against hope that this doesn't turn into yet another Norman Osborne-dominated story. "Captain America" has been my last refuge from "Dark Reign" stories, so the climax to the story had better not revolve around it.

But, I do trust Brubaker and find myself anticipating this release, mainly because the biggest mystery of this run, ever since issue #1, has been the Red Skull's master plan. At this point, even knowing Cap is lost in time, we still don't know what that endgame is. And so, I keep reading.

Also from Marvel this week is War of Kings #6, the conclusion to the Inhumans-centered space epic. Plenty of big, BIG developments have already taken place in these pages, from Crystal's marriage to Ronan to the Inhumans getting serious about killing to Lilandra's death. Amazingly, though, we enter this final issue with still little idea of how this will all shake out.

Will Vulcan survive? That's the biggest question on my mind, mainly because I've felt like Brubaker created this character of great potential (between the relationship to Cyclops, relationship to Shi'ar and his bratty personality), and yet we have not gotten to see that potential play out yet to the fullest — attacking the main X-Men team in an all-out war. If he does survive then the next logical question is, will Havok survive? I doubt this series will end without a confrontation between the two, and neither is likely to show any mercy. And oh, by the way, with all this talk of killing, Black Bolt was just about to use a weapon that would kill him, wasn't he? So who will lead the Shi'ar? Who will lead the Kree? Will the Inhumans succeed in advancing the Kree's evolution? So many questions!

From DC, Superman: World of New Krypton #6 kicks off the four-part "Codename: Patriot" crossover encompassing the Superman family of titles. Last issue closes with the apparent murder of General Zod. Apparently Zod told the guy to kneel one too many times. If you read solicitations, it seems Zod may survive, but that's besides the point. The point is, one minute Zod is putting Kal-El on trial, the next moment Kal-El needs to go hunt down his killer, who is heading to Earth. Do I smell a reunion show? Seinfeld has me in that mood.

Meanwhile, Justice League: Cry for Justice #2 is out this week, and this is a pivotal issue for the series. The debut issue of this long-delayed mini was, well, a piece of crap. All that beautiful painted art readers waited so long for was only given pages upon pages of dialog in which the only thing each character said — individually, I might add — was that they wanted "Justice." The saddest part about it was that in every instance where the characters wanted "Justice," they didn't actually want "Justice," the wanted Revenge. So this was either a case of James Robinson not knowing the differences between the two words, or maybe this is the entire theme to his story, the characters learning the difference, in which case we're looking at a real dud of a mini-series.

On top of all that first-issue-sucking-pressure in this second issue, we now know Robinson will be taking over the main "Justice League of America" book following this mini, and carrying some storylines and characters over. Which means, if this mini continues to be as horrible as it began, then we're not looking at a case of one bad mini, we're looking at a case of the whole Justice League line of books being taken down by this bad mini. And after the years of Dwayne McDuffie's horrible Justice League stories, I cannot take more crapage.

As I take my leave of you, remember, we're on a Mission From God this week. Go buy "Irredeemable!!!"