Written by Andy Mangels
Art by Judit Tondora
Variant Cover by Dan Parent
Published by Dynamite and DC Comics

With a new solo movie coming out, Wonder Woman is more popular than ever, and fans in their thirties and forties are remembering the delightful Lynda Carter live-action television series. Shows of that era have made a comeback with such comic books as Batman ’66 and The Bionic Woman, so a crossover miniseries uniting two of the most important women in television is an inevitable treat for the nostalgic.

In this story, technologically enhanced Jaime Sommers and Wonder Woman team up for a multi-agency mission against a new cabal called CASTRA. The plot feels very much of the era, with knockout gas and goofy disguises, and the women get several large action sequences. Yes, the creative team knows to make “Deeneeneeneenee” sound effects when the Bionic Woman jumps or “ting ting ting” noises when Wonder Woman deflects bullets off her bracelets. The art captures the film quality of 1970s action shows, with plenty of era-specific props and costumes. Readers are in for a light-hearted blast with this issue. This will make a great stocking stuffer for the person in your life who wants to see the origins of modern TV women like Buffy and Supergirl.

But the most important part for you, Ultimate Comics reader, is that this issue comes with a variant cover exclusive to Ultimate Comics, drawn by Dan Parent, a longtime friend of the North Carolina Comicon and Archie comics veteran. So once you snatch up this gem, keep it handy and bring it with you this Saturday! Dan will be in town to sign books at all three Ultimate Locations. If you can’t make it to the Raleigh store from 10 to 11 or the Cary store from 12 to 3, come by the Durham/Chapel Hill location at 4 for a live interview and Q&A session, followed by signing until 6.

-MATT CONNER for Ultimate Comics

Written by Charles Soule
Art by Kenneth Rocafort
Published by Marvel Comics

With Civil War II winding down and Death Of X just finishing last week, Marvel is getting to launch this winter’s big war between the Inhumans and the X-Men. It’s going to cross in to a bunch of X-titles and set up a status quo for the spring that will have the X-Men back in Blue and Gold teams and the Inhuman royal family launched into deep space, and it should finally clear up the story about a giant cloud of Terrigen mist crawling around the world, killing mutants and empowering Inhumans. And it all starts here, gang.

This issue bridges the eight months between the end of Death Of X (Cyclops’s team destroyed a lot of Terrigen but lost to Black Bolt) to the present day. Half the book follows Beast as he tries to solve the problem with science but loses his faith when he sees what the Inhumans are willing to do to preserve their way of life. The other half details Emma Frost’s training and manipulations as she prepares mutants everywhere for battle.

This is a fantastic jumping-on point. New readers get caught up, and longtime fans get a taste of the scope of this story. Charles Soule, a longtime friend of Ultimate Comics, efficiently tackles a huge spread of time and manages to make a fairly talky issue move smoothly. It helps that his take on Emma as a woman tackling her trauma with alcohol and denial gives this military story a lovely soap opera element.

Come on in to Ultimate Comics this week to get ready for the event we’ll all be talking about for the next four months!

-MATT CONNER for Ultimate Comics

Written by Matt Kindt
Art by David Rubin
Published by Dark Horse Comics

Boone Dias looks at fantasy worlds and thinks, “Hunh. I can explain that.” Which makes him a great detective. And kind of a jerk.

In this new series by Matt Kindt and Davis Rubin, Boone is a scientist obsessed with cataloguing and rationally explaining all the elements of The Ether, a whimsical space of talking animals and magical creatures. In his investigations, he has accidentally solved a lot of mysteries, so the story picks up on his latest case, a locked-room murder. This update to the Sherlock mythology would be good enough on its own, but the issue ends with a shocking reveal calling the entire nature of The Ether into question.

Matt Kindt dazzled with the intricate plotting and mind games of his series Mind MGMT, and Rubin’s artwork dances through both the silly cartoons of The Ether and the harsh cruelty of Boone’s home in the real world. This book is a fun challenge for fans of Saga, I Hate Fairyland, and the Wizard Of Oz. Come on down to any of the three Ultimate Comics locations and soften your post-Con delirium with a great new series.

-MATT CONNER for ULTIMATE COMICS

Written by Dennis Hopeless with Ross Thibodeaux and Rob Schamberger
Art by Dan Mora with Rob Guillory and Tob Schamberger
Published by Boom! Studios

Sports and comics make for a tough intersection. For one, most of us reading would have been “indoor kids” growing up. Also, the movement in panels works well with punching and flying but not so much with shooting a basket.
Wrestling, though? Wrestling crosses into comics very well. There’s ample punching and flying, and the costumes and storylines engage viewers like when Spider-Man and Venom get to the last issue of their grudge match.

This one-shot sets up Dennis Hopeless’s WWE series, due next year, by detailing the deeper character moments that went into the formation of tough guy team, The Shield, and the stunning betrayal that ended them. I don’t know the story from watching the event, so I was surprised, but WWE fans will enjoy the buildup even with the known ending. I’m not sure where this is headed as an ongoing series, but Hopeless proves he can write these men as more than grouchy meatheads, and I have faith he can pull a satisfying drama from this tragedy. Dan Mora, whose art balanced the muscularity and grace of Klaus last winter, has brought the beauty out of this sport. His characters seethe with pent-up aggression and release with a kinetic celebration that makes sound effects unnecessary.

The backups are a bit of a let-down, mostly jokes about wrestling that I think I’m just not in the loop for and a beautiful but trite sequence about how wrestlers inspire kids to be who they want to be, as long as that’s “a wrestler.” But the main story is good enough for me to recommend this one-shot and to happily anticipate the ongoing series.

– MATT CONNER for Ultimate Comics

Written by Steve Orlando
Art by Fernando Blanco
Published by DC Comics

Midnighter is this amazing, hyperviolent Batman character who has a computer brain that tells him how to kill people. That sounds ridiculous and one-note, I know. And DC has plenty of disturbing extremes of violence. But hear me out. Midnighter is actually richly textured, with humor and tragedy and fear. And he’s gay.

Steve Orlando has been writing Midnighter’s amazing solo book in the New 52, and the character has had this terrific open sexuality, hooking up and flirting and punching out bad guys. But the absence of his boyfriend, Superman analogue Apollo, has been looming over the series, and in this new miniseries, Orlando gets to show what he can do with a great gay romance.

This week, the guys stop some pirates and save some kids, then have some friends over for dinner and talk about their views on the necessity of violence. In the background, wicked Dr. Bendix enacts a vengeful plan against the black-leather antihero. And yes, Apollo and Midnighter have a two-page sex scene – for those of you who might be put off by that, there’s no nudity or explicit language; for the rest of us, it’s really, really hot.

So here we have an issue of a comic book combining fight scenes and domestic happiness. It’s amazing, it’s exciting, it’s normal, it’s like every love story and it’s unlike every love story. It’s about being gay, and it’s also not just about that. It’s a book that could not have launched without years of increasing diversity in mainstream comics, and it’s going to make it easier for future books to really represent the breadth of who people are. You are going to love it. When you come to Ultimate Comics to check out the new North Raleigh store or pick up your Comicon tickets (which are selling out fast), give this one a try.

MATT CONNER for Ultimate Comics

Written by Marguerite Bennett and Cameron Deodio
Art by Audrey Mok
Published by Archie Comics

I read Archie comics as a kid, and five years ago, I would have rolled my eyes at the thought that anyone was still enjoying this simplistic Americana. Then Archie and Val from the Pussycats had an interracial love story, which opened the doors for new gay teen Kevin Keller. Which brought in grownup readers and supported the masterpiece horror story, Afterlife With Archie. Which translated to the supremely scary Chilling Tales Of Sabrina, the reinvention of Archie as a smart comedy, the tightly creative Jughead, and now this modern take on Archie’s favorite band.

Bennett and Deodio take readers to the beginning this issue, following Josie as she puts together a band with her best friend, Melody, and their new friend, Val. Josie has to learn to drop the ego and work as a band in time to play a set at a concert benefitting, of course, animal rescue. Longtime rival Alexandra is making trouble, and supercute Alan M is waiting in the wings, but the bulk of the book is about the rich characterization of the three bandmates.

This comic works perfectly. It’s a treat for longtime fans of the comic, the cartoon, or the underappreciated 2001 movie version. It also stands alone, even from the other Archie books. The jokes are fast and effective, with new ways to skewer hipster culture, and each woman has a distinct voice. Melody steals every scene with her delightful combination of innocence and savvy, and it’s worth noting that she has both men and women on her phone’s dating app screen. Archie comics has moved sexual diversity to the fore, and having Melody has a bisexual woman without making it melodrama draws positive ties to the spiritual sister book, Jem And The Holograms.

I love this book. I am shocked at how many of my favorite books this year are Archie Comics titles. Even if you’re not reading any of the others, this is an issue to pick up. Then talk to the staff at Ultimate Comics to get it on your pull list, so you can enjoy it every month.

-MATT CONNER for Ultimate Comics