Marvel NOW! is progressing nicely overall with some solid titles, mostly The Avengers by Jonathan Hickman but the new Fantastic Four is also quite good. Coming in April Brian Michael Bendis and Frazer Irving bring Uncanny X-Men into the NOW! with an all-new story starting with issue #5 that follows the mission of Marvel NOW! completely. The idea is that books in this initiative will start new stories and directions for characters so that lapsed readers can jump back in but current readers will still appreciate the story because it still exists within current continuity.

Uncanny X-Men #5 finds Cyclops deep in the caverns of the old Weapon X facility training the next great generation of Mutantkind in the Charles Xavier School for Mutants! With new mutants popping up all across the Marvel Universe, Cyclops and his team must race to recruit. Cyclops has a new team and a new master plan and it all begins to unfold in April when Uncanny X-Men #5 hits comic book shops and digital apps.

Check out the cover for Uncanny X-Men #5 here below.

Marvel Comics’ next big thing, well other than Marvel NOW!, was teased last year at Free Comic Book Day when Marvel first let it be known that there would be an Age of Ultron. Now, the new story begins in March from Brian Michael Bendis (All New X-Men, Avengers VS. X-Men) and Bryan Hitch (Ultimates, Fantastic Four).

Ultron, a creation of Avenger Hank Pym, has gone mad and began a plot to reach his ultimate goal: the utter destruction of humanity. In this story, a rag tag group of superheroes including Wolverine, Emma Frost, Invisible Woman, Taskmaster, Beast, She-Hulk, Luke Cage, Spider-Man, and Moon Knight are all to stand in the way of the robot revolution.

This is an odd grouping of super beings that should make for an interesting almost post-apocalyptic story. We have some images from Age of Ultron #1 for your perusal! Check it out here below.

Each and every week, I, “Rabbit Troop Forever!” Henchman21 read a lot of comics. Seriously you guys, a lot of comics. Maybe too many comics. I mean, it is possible”¦ theoretically. Naturally, I look forward to some more than others. I mean, who doesn’t? So, let’s take a look into the depths of my pull list, grab some comics, and I’ll let YOU know what the top books to look forward to are for the week of January 16, 2012. Single issues and trades, they’re all here.

You guys may not care about this, but hockey is back this week, and that has me excited. Almost as excited as the comics coming out this week. Okay, I’m probably more excited for hockey, but comics are a very close second. Anyway, it’s another great week with some pulp action, a milestone issue, and hey look at that, another new Wolverine series if you’re interested. All that, plus a collection from one of my favorite creators means I will have plenty to read while kicking back this weekend and watching the sport of Canadian kings. So, order some poutine, stop by a Tim Horton’s, and relax as we spend two minutes in the box with The GoD List!

We can now follow up on the teaser that Marvel released last week revealing a new title from writer Brian Wood and artist Olivier Coipel. As expected, it is a relaunch of the (adjectiveless) X-Men series, and will indeed feature an all-female cast. USA Today has an interview with Wood where he goes into details about the series. The team will be made up of Storm, Rogue, Kitty Pryde, Rachel Grey, and Psylocke, with Jubilee acting as the main star.

Check out the cover here below of X-Men #1.

According to the article, the series starts with Jubilee showing up with an orphaned baby that may save humanity, as well as a return of Sublime (not the 90s band, but the grand villain from Grant Morrison’s New X-Men run.) There will also be Sentinels, aliens, and an ancient war. The series will also have to deal with Jubilee’s current status of being a vampire, so there’s a lot going on.

Marvel continues to roll out new series as part of their Marvel NOW! initiative and the newest teaser image is for a new series by writer Brian Wood (Conan, Star Wars) and Olivier Coipel (Thor, Avengers Vs X-Men).

There’s not a lot that can be gathered from the image. Judging by the double X and the double helix, we can guess that this is a new X-Men series featuring a team of women. This is just speculation on my part, but it helps to know that Wood is the current writer on Ultimate X-Men, and just came off a run on the main Marvel U X-Men series. He’s also known for series that feature strong female characters, such as Local, New York Four, and the just launched Mara. From all this, it seems like a natural fit for Wood to write a series about a group of the female X-Men.