There's no getting around it; for almost every publisher this week, it's all about the reprints. DC collect some of the funniest self-referential comics ever in the black and white Showcase Presents Ambush Bug, Marvel showcases the next generation of mean green mothers with the Hulk: Skaar, Son of Hulk hardcover, Wanted creator Mark Millar's stab at religion, Chosen gets a reissue as American Jesus Volume 1: Chosen (worth picking up if only for the insanely terrible ending, and I say that with something approaching love) and a genuine classic gets new life as Ted McKeever Library Volume 3: Metropol.

(Also released, if Diamond's shipping list of this week's releases is to be believed - although I am convinced that it can't be, because this isn't due for another month - is the collection of IDW's Star Trek: Countdown, the prequel to JJ Abrams' big screen reboot of Gene Rodenberry's franchise, and a fun Next Generation story in and of itself. I keep thinking I should do a recap for Trek fans who haven't picked it up, and the same with IDW's Terminator: Salvation prequel - Would you guys be interested in that?)

That said, Boom! Studios have easily taken the win for the week's releases with two new books based on old friends.

Firstly, Pixar's The Incredibles come to their natural home with the first issue of The Incredibles: Family Matters (written by Kingdom Come, The Flash and many other great things writer Mark Waid), which manages to capture the tone of the movie pretty damn well... but even so, still isn't the best thing to hit stores tomorrow.

No, that title belongs to the first issue of Boom!'s new The Muppet Show series, which I will tenuously define as sci-fi for the purposes of inclusion here thanks to the Pigs In Space sketch contained therein. For anyone who loved the old Muppet Show TV series... you have to buy this. You really, really won't be disappointed. Unless you hated the comedy and only tuned in for the musical numbers.

For those who know what it is to laugh, you'll have to use the Comic Shop Locator to find out where to buy the wonder (and pick up The Incredibles, while you're at it). For everyone else...? Well, why not look and see what else is coming out this week to find something to tickle your fancy?

Marvel Comics are keeping their side of the bargain, admittedly; if you're not interested in the hardcover reprint of poorly-drawn 1980s miniseries Kitty Pryde and Wolverine or the Skrulls! oneshot (pretty much a collection of fact files to bring you up to speed about Secret Invasion's Secret Invaders), then you're pretty much limited to two books: the reprint of the first couple of issues of the Halo: Uprising comic to remind you what happened now that the end is finally nigh, and the far-more-enjoyable-than-it-has-any-right-to-be 500th issue of Uncanny X-Men, where the team moves to San Francisco and parties at the SFMoMA. In other weeks, it'd easily be the must-have book of the week.

Sadly, though, DC are doing their best to claim that title for themselves with the long-long-long awaited return of Ambush Bug in Ambush Bug: Year None, wherein Keith Giffen's fourth-wall breaking snarkfest takes the last five years of DC's output to task for being confusing, depressing and just plain not fun. You know you want to read that. Collections-wise, you can catch up on space religion in the unfortunately-named-but-actually-fun Countdown To Adventure (starring Animal Man, Starfire and Adam Strange from 52), catch up on the joys of matrimony with Green Arrow/Black Canary: The Road To The Altar, and catch up on how the mighty have fallen with Authority: Prime, where superhero comics' one-time most daring title is reduced to generic continuity schlock. If that last sentence made no sense to you, then perhaps you should avoid superheroes altogether and pick up the X-Files Special, instead.

Image Comics are also making a strong showing this week: The next big Witchblade storyline begins in the first issue of Broken Trinity, Mark Millar and Tony Harris get their political satire on with the debut of War Heroes, Mike Allred's Madman questions reality in the first collection of Madman Atomic Comics, and Tori Amos finally becomes the comic character she's always wanted to be in the indie-creator-tastic anthology Comic Book Tattoo.

And just in case none of that is enough for you, consider the two takes on post-Buffy female heroes available in the indie comicsphere this week: Oni Press' The Apocalypstix finally bring their post-nuclear brand of rock, roll and kick-ass to stores at the same time as Cassie Hack of po-mo horror book Hack/Slash teams up with real-life emo pornlets in the Hack/Slash Annual Featuring The Suicide Girls. And, yes, I wish I was joking about that last one as well.

As ever! All of these books and many, many, more are listed here for your perusal and, if you've somehow made it this far without knowing where your local comic book store happens to be, you can find that out by clicking here. It's probably a great week to go to the store, really, because chances are they may be really quiet...

The Greatest American Hero. Soon to be a major motion picture, probably starring Will Ferrell or Jack Black. This TV show features probably the most archetypal semi-competent hero, complete with out-of-control flying and crashing into things. Ralph Hinkley loses the instruction manual for his super-suit and is stuck trying to figure out how to control its awesome powers by himself.

Green Hornet. No, not the original radio or TV versions of the Batman-esque crime-fighter — stop writing those angry comments! — but we're getting the distinct impression the upcoming Seth Rogen movie will feature a sloppy hero whose sidekick, Kato, is the famous and can-do member of the duo.

Ambush Bug. Actually, is Ambush Bug even a hero? In his first appearance (which I have somewhere, and which is probably worth a whole dollar now) the teleporting insect guy tries to assassinate the mayor of Metropolis. But he quickly becomes a kinda-sorta superhero, who mostly mocks the conventions and tropes of comics and gets killed over and over again. He also fails to save his doll sidekick, Cheeks The Toy Wonder, from being dismembered. Poor Cheeks.

Most of The Tick's supporting cast. At least in the animated TV show (It's been forever since I read the comics), the Tick is a semi-competent hero who often misses what's right in front of him. But at least he manages to defeat his enemies most of the time, with the help of his sidekick Arthur. Most of the other heroes i the Tick's world, like Die Fledermaus, American Maid and Sewer Urchin, are too self-absorbed or silly to be much use most of the time.

Most of the cast of Jim Valentino's normalman. Normalman crashes on a planet where he's the only non-superhero, but most of the superheroes he meets are worse than useless. Sure, Captain Everything has every super power ever, but he's so dim-witted he usually just makes matters worse. And Levram's main superhero team is too busy taking attendance to do anything else.

The Legion Of Substitute Heroes. They're the superheroes whose powers aren't cool or useful enough to join the future Legion of Super Heroes, but they keep trying anyway, and finally do save the world from an alien plant invasion. Antenna Lad can tune into radio broadcasts from any era, but only at random. Chlorophyll Kid can make plants grow fast. Color Kid can change the color of any object. Infectious Lass can inflict disease, but has a hard time aiming this ability properly. Etc. etc.

Rod Rescueman is a bumbling superhero in the animated movie Twice Upon A Time. He's got his superhero learner's permit, which is just a blank piece of paper (but it's notarized!). Attempting a practice run at rescuing a "damsel in distress," he inhales all the flames around her — then breathes fire at her, singeing her to a crisp.

The Inferior Five. Another parody superhero team, they have the requisite lame or out-of-control powers. "He can fly — if the wind's with him!" "She's stronger than an Ox — and almost as smart!" Ha ha, aaaaah yeah. Anyway, weirdly enough they had their own title that lasted 12 issues.

Irving Forbush. Marvel Comics' semi-mascot and hero of its Not Brand Echh comic, Forbush Man wears a crockpot on his head and stumbles through a series of wacky adventures.

Major Bummer. Soon to be a major motion picture (well, according to IMDB anyway), this short-lived 1990s comic was about a slacker who accidentally gets superpowers from aliens. But he just wants to sit around on his couch and watch TV. Unfortunately, the aliens also cause him to attract supervillains, including a Nazi dinosaur called Tyrannosaurus Reich.

Mystery Men. Already a major motion picture! William H. Macy, Ben Stiller and Hank Azaria are loser superheroes: Macy's The Shoveler, who can handle a shovel, Stiller's Mr. Furious, who has rage powers, and Azaria's "effete British superhero" The Blue Raja. Loosely based on the awesome Flaming Carrot comic by Bob Burden, this movie shows second-rate superheroes who finally do triumph over the A-list supervillain Casanova Frankenstein.

Kinnukiman was one of the most influential characters in the Japanese Shonen Jump anthology comic back in the day — a weak superhero that you'd call on if all the other, better heroes weren't available. A muscle-bound idiot, he was always getting into wacky scrapes. Later, he turned out to be an alien prince, and he went off to fight in an intergalactic wrestling federation.

Nuklear Man: Like Hancock, the hero of Brian Clevinger's novel The Nuklear Age has amnesia, and can't remember anything before he appeared in the rubble of a nuclear attack on Metroville's power station. Also like Hancock, he has Superman-esque powers and is totally self-absorbed and obnoxious... plus, he's easily distracted by shiny objects.

Superflop was the alter ego of British comedian Les Dawson, the superhero who failed utterly to protect the town of Leeds from the Masked Fred. (Dawson's show Sez Les, regularly featured John Cleese and Olivia Newton John — a combination that' s hard to imagine.) Superflop also got to star in his own comic strip in British comics magazine Look-In.

The Roach is the all-purpose stand-in for every lame superhero, in Dave Sim's misanthropic comic Cerebus. The Roach's other guises include Wolveroach, MoonRoach (a take-off on obscure superhero Moon Knight) and Punisheroach.

Super Melvin is possibly the dumbest ventriloquist's dummy of all time, operated by ventriloquist Jeff Dunham. Here's a clip of his act, from Comedy Central.

Zeroman was an animated series a few years ago, starring Leslie Nielsen as the ne'erdowell protector of Fair City, the alter ego of mailman Les Mutton.

Webcomic VG Cats features Pantsman, the alter ego of the comic's author, who disguises his identity by wearing underpants on his head.

Demolition Man. Poor D-Man. He started out so promising, as a super-wrestler who refused to throw a fight with the Thing from the Fantastic Four. (How exactly do you throw a fight with the Thing anyway? Lose more?) Later, it turned out he was addicted to super-strength drugs and had to kick. Finally, in the pages of Daredevil, he went nuts and started stealing jewelry thinking he was collecting infinity gems for a "Cosmic Gamemaster." He was living in a pitiful sewer lair, until Ben Urich sent D-Man's idol Daredevil to get him out of there.

Captain Rightful is "the incompetent, armless superhero" in Jay Stephens' graphic novel The Land Of Nod.

Red Tornado. The original Red Tornado was Abigail "Ma" Hunkel, who put a saucepan (yes, again) on her head and went out to fight crime. But she ripped her pants and had to go home again. Later, she was replaced by an android that used to be evil but isn't any more, who has the awesome power of making wind. Yeah.

Wonderella is sort of a ditzy female version of Superman, in the webcomic The Adventures Of Wonderella.

Commenters daviddonne and Johnny Zito point out that I somehow forgot the Great Lakes Avengers, the midwestern branch of Marvel Comics' flagship super-team. They're mostly pretty useless, like Mr. Immortal, who's like Torchwood's Captain Jack — kill him and he just bounces back. But the group has a ringer: Squirrel Girl, who can control squirrels and somehow manages to defeat Doctor Doom and a number of other A-list supervillains single-handed.

And then commenter Trystero pointed out I missed The Pro, a sex worker who gets superpowers from meddling aliens. She's actually quite an effective superhero, but she's also a bad role model, urinating on a vanquished foe and using her superspeed to give tons of blow jobs for a quick profit. You can read the whole thing here, for now at least, but be warned — it's pretty NSFW.

Thanks to Lauren Davis and Graeme McMillan for research help.