Iron Man: Director of SHIELD #33-35; Christos Gage, writer, Sean Chen & Sandu Florea, artists

“To me, [War Machine]’s a man who has always stood up for what he believes and never shied away from the tough battles.? From his childhood, surviving the streets of Philadelphia, to his service as a Marine, to his tenure as Iron Man and then War Machine, he’s the guy you want at your back when everything goes to hell. What he hasn’t been is the general; the guy who gives the orders that cause others to live or die. He’s always been the one on the front lines. Sure, he’s led others into combat, but he’s been right there with them. Now Rhodey is going to have to make the kinds of decisions Tony usually makes, when there is no positive outcome, just one in which fewer people die. He’s not happy about it… and whoever has the misfortune to take him on is going to find that out.” – writer Christos Gage @ Newsarama

Pilot Season: Genius; Marc Bernardin & Adam Freeman, writers, Afua Richardson, artist

“I am most proud of the fact that we delivered a quality book. No matter what line of work you do, people always want to tell you what you CAN’T do. ‘You make “widgets,” you couldn’t possible make “thing-a-ma-bobs.”‘ You have written books about monsters and explosions, not this. We took Genius to a lot of places and were told numerous times, ‘This is an amazing story. We just don’t think YOU can pull it off.’ Well, thanks for that. So I guess what I am most proud of is that we delivered a product that lived up to the great concept we sold.” – co-writer Adam Freeman @ Comic Mix

Presidential Material: Barack Obama; Jeff Marriotte, writer, Tom Morgan, artist

“These stories had to be told in a balanced fashion, and everything Jeff [Marriotte] and Andy [Helfer] wrote needed to be credible and verifiable – we weren’t doing a Mad magazine parody of the two candidates, but actual graphic biographies – they would have to hold up under scrutiny or there’d be no hope to be taken seriously… We tried to show some of the key scenes that helped shape both candidates’ lives, but there’s only so much you can fit in – but I think readers will appreciate the amount of detail we have beeen able to present.” – editor Scott Dunbier @ Newsarama

Vixen: Return of the Lion; G. Willow Wilson, writer, Cafu, artist

“I had a lot of room to flesh out the world Vixen comes from and create a great story… She has so many interesting elements. Yes, she’s got these hardcore physical powers, but she’s not a cavewoman – she’s opinionated, she gets scared, she gets angry, she has doubts. For a superhero, she felt very approachable to me as a writer. She’s not a goddess. She’s a person.” – writer G. Willow Wilson @ Comic Book Resources

Young Avengers Presents #1; Ed Brubaker, writer, Paco Medina, artist

“[I] decided to explore Eli’s character a bit, and get to the question of how it might feel to be a black kid with his history, with his family’s history, calling himself Patriot in the post-Civil War Marvel Universe. Might that be a difficult and conflicting thing in many ways? And how does he feel about the death of Captain America, who he’d actually come to respect recently?… the idea that the Super Soldier Serum was tested on black soldiers first seems fairly honest with the times it was set in, even if it is controversial.” – writer Ed Brubaker @ Newsarama