Don’t Ask! Just Buy It! – April 13, 2011: Hulk. The Incredible Hulk.

Reading Comics author Douglas Wolk runs down the hottest comics and graphic novels coming out this week.

KEY:

* Changing times

@ Changing clothes

^ Changing bodies

* ^ CASANOVA: GULA #4

The lead feature is a reprint of Casanova #14, the final issue of the original series, in which an exceptionally clever bit of plotting comes to fruition; that's followed by a new story by Matt Fraction and Gabriel Bá, leading into the new Casanova series that's expected sometime this summer.

@ EX MACHINA DELUXE EDITION VOL. 5

The final hardcover collection of Brian K. Vaughan and Tony Harris's political serial in superhero drag, or vice versa, reprinting #41-50 plus Special #4.

@ ^ INCREDIBLE HULKS #626

Amadeus Cho moves back over to the mothership from the Incredible Hercules serial; Greg Pak writes, Tom Grummett draws, Jock handles the cover; the Hulk, apparently, appears as a super-spy. Why has no one ever thought to do this before, besides the obvious? In further Marvel super-spy action, this week sees the release of S.H.I.E.L.D. Infinity, a one-shot by Jonathan Hickman and Gerald Parel that I bet is a full issue's worth of Hickman's backmatter-isms.

* @ ^ NEW AVENGERS #11

Brian Michael Bendis's dual-timeline, two-artist serial continues, with Mike Deodato drawing the sleek curves of modernity, as he does, and Howard Chaykin drawing the part where everybody looks like an extra from Mad Men, as he does. The backup is more oral history. Also this week: Paul Tobin and Ronan Cliquet's Marvel Adventures Super Heroes #13.

^ THE TAXIDERMIST

A collection of the several extant storylines of this Judge Dredd spinoff, written by the splendid John Wagner and drawn by Ian Gibson, Cam Kennedy and Steve Dillon, in which human taxidermy becomes an Olympic sport and wackiness ensues.

^ THOR BY WALTER SIMONSON OMNIBUS

$125 gets you Thor #337-382 (less two fill-ins) and the four-issue Balder the Brave mini. That's a whole lot of comics to squeeze into a hardcover; they're all recolored by Steve Oliff. As part of the massive 2011 proliferation of all things Thor-related, the thunder god's series also re-assumes the title Journey Into Mystery (which it hasn't had in over forty years) with this week's #622, and Kieron Gillen and Doug Braithwaite take over. (Thor proper is relaunching as The Mighty Thor in two weeks.)

* THE UNWRITTEN #24

The one-shot story that ran in The Unwritten a year ago--a Beatrix Potter parody involving the foulmouthed rabbit Mr. Bun attempting to find out what was beyond the veil of children's-book reality--was the most fun issue of the series to date, so this one's apparently a sequel to it, by Mike Carey, Peter Gross and Al Davidson.