Few people remember the time leading up to Iron Man 2 when the relatively new ‘it’ girl Emily Blunt was nearly cast to play Black Widow. Of course her schedule didn’t clear up and the role went to Scarlet Johansson, which has worked out well enough so far.

Now it seems like the lovely Ms. Blunt is getting another crack at the Marvel Movie-Verse with rumors starting to run rampant that she is going to be up for the role of Ms. Marvel. A popular member of the Avengers who has been a major player in the comics in the last decade.

Her set of super powers might sound familiar to any of you X-Fans who were confused when Rogue didn’t take off plying and punch things real hard in the X-Men movies. Ms. Marvel was zapped dry by Rogue in the ’80s setting up the version of that character who was popularized by the X-Boom in the early 90’s. Although it is not terribly likely that a Fox owned X-Character will be popping into an Avengers film to basically take out one of their new heroes.

Or is it?

Welcome to another edition of The Pull List Comic Reviews! This week, the Blackest Night event takes center stage, Bendis and Oeming make a triumphant comeback and Archie gets married (again). As always, WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD.

PULL OF THE WEEK:

Blackest Night #5 [of 8]
DC Comics – $3.99 US
Writer: Geoff Johns
Artist: Ivan Reis
Score: 9.0

The mastermind behind the dead rising stands revealed as the Blackest Night prophecy inches towards becoming true, but will the unified heroes of the world have enough to stop it? Not if a late dinner guest bearing gifts has anything to say about it.

Geoff Johns welcomes you all to hell. How could he not? In the thirty plus years that I’ve been reading comics, I can’t remember a time when things looked so grim in a story thanks to this issue. The big guns of the Justice League arrive in time to assist the Flashes – Barry Allen and Wally West – in confronting Nekron as the Black Lanterns’ power battery reaches full charge. Fast forward to the end of the issue and only two heroes remain standing while the rest are chomping at the bit, dying to feast on some good, old fashioned heart muscle. And this is only the fifth issue in an eight-issue series?!? Wow.

Johns, along with artist Ivan Reis, are obviously toying with us and giggling madly along the way. The re-emergence of “Bruce Wayne” – his name was in quotations in the issue as well – signaled that the next phase was about to begin, but what he did to heroes like Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Arrow, etc I don’t think anyone saw coming, characters and readers alike. The sixth issue cannot get here fast enough, if you ask me.

Go here for yesterday’s edition of The Pull List.

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Amazing Spider-Man Annual #36 – Marvel – #3.99
Score: 4.5

What are two things that don’t belong in a Spider-Man comic? One, forced Boston accents from all characters in dialogue boxes. And two, any mention of the Clone Saga. But I’m getting ahead of myself. The extra sized annual issue begins with a man in a house burning down around him as he fights someone who looks to be Peter Parker.

Fast forward to the modern day where Peter Parker sits at a banquet table in Boston for his Aunt May’s impending nuptuals to J. Jonah Jameson Sr. as he sits across from J. Jonah Jameson. Jameson Sr. reveals his engagement present to Aunt May, a photo of her family that she has lost touch with, before opening a door and revealing the entire family that May and Peter didn’t know still existed. And of all people to walk in with the reunited family, the man from the opening pages seen in the burning house with “Peter Parker”.

Moments later after Peter has awkwardly thought inappropriate thoughts about his newfound cousins, Peter is attacked in the restroom by the man now donning a supersuit and calling himself Raptor. What follows are a few pages of rather bland fight scenes and tons of Bah-ston speak and “Jeter sucks” shouts from the on looking crowd. Though some may consider this next part a spoiler, it’s obvious where this story was going right from the first page. Raptor isn’t after Peter Parker, he’s after Ben Reilly. (Insert ominous music here)