Weekly Treats! Prophet, Swamp Thing, Dr. Manhattan

"I watch as a box containing a mystery is lowered into the soil."

That's a rather enigmatic quote to accompany the release of J. Michael Straczynski and Adam Hughes's Before Watchmen: Dr. Manhattan #1 of 4 (DC). Given that the origin of Dr Manhattan is featured quite heavily in the original series, the main draw is probably the rare chance to see some sequential art from Adam Hughes.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer: Spike #1 of 5 (Dark Horse) by Victor Gischler and Paul Lee sees Spike travel to the dark side of the moon to battle demons literal and metaphorical as he attempts to reconcile himself with his past. After Fantastic Four Annual and Daredevil Annual, Alan Davis brings his Clandestine re-introduction to a close in Wolverine Annual (Marvel). And there's a party going on in Amazing Spider-Man #692 (Marvel) as the title reaches its 50th Anniversary. By Dan Slott & Humberto Ramos plus short stories.

Prophet vol. 1: Remission (Image) has a host of creators taking lead from the talented Brandon Graham ploughing new depths through Rob Liefield's original sci-fi series. Earth in the future has changed somewhat resembling the sort of place found at the furthest place from our world. John Prophet awakens from a cryosleep with a mission to climb the towers of Thauili Vah and awaken the Earth empire. Almost entirely without dialogue - it's a lonely place for John if you don't count the hostile creepies - the story is propelled through imaginative sequential art and descriptive text. 

Fans of Batman and American Vampire (and there's a lot of them) would do well to take a look at the newly launched Swamp Thing vol. 1: Raise Them Bones (DC) as it is written by Scott Snyder. Once you've taken a sharp intake of breath and got your heart beating again at the notion of sweeping away Alan Moore's classic run there's a good horror tale here which, later in the run, has become a good companion piece to Jeff Lemire's Animal Man. Illustrated by Yanick Paquette. And finally, as it's the school holidays it would be remiss of me not to give The All-New Batman: The Brave and the Bold: Help Wanted (DC) borrowing it's visuals from the recent cartoon and tapping into golden, less complicated times.

As ever, Jason has pieced together a list of all the new releases out this week and tucked it away under the tab at the top of the page.