Spinning out of this week's Incredible Hulk #600, the storyline - that will join Loeb's Hulk series with Pak's revived Incredible Hulk for its duration - follows Bruce Banner now that he is unable to become the Hulk ever again. According to Loeb, the de-Hulked Banner isn't the nerdy, nervous scientist we're familiar with, but a "kick-ass guy" trying to help the Hulk's son, Skaar, survive in a world where the mysterious Red Hulk has made life more uncomfortable for gamma-irradiated beings. Just to complicate matters, the storyline will also feature Loeb's newest creation, Red She-Hulk, due to debut soon in the Hulk series. "And if I'm not told you who Red Hulk is, I'm definitely not gonna tell you who Red She-Hulk is," Loeb joked.

World War Hulks begins in December's World War Hulks: Gamma, written by Loeb and drawn by John Romita Jr.

Taking back the reins of Hulk from former Heroes' producer Jeph Loeb (Although, don't worry, he's going to continue telling stories about Rulk), Planet Skaar sees io9 favorite Greg Pak return to writing Bruce Banner in time to finish a trilogy that started with 2006's Planet Hulk and continued with the following year's World War Hulk. After accidentally sending the Hulk into a life as an intergalactic gladiator on an alien planet - and then dealing with his wrath when he returned to Earth - Reed Richards has discovered that the Hulk has a son. Only problem being, he hasn't realized that said son has now come to Earth for a family reunion that's centering more on the "I will kill you for being born" variety.

The storyline begins in Planet Skaar Prologue, available on Wednesday, and continues in the next couple of issues of Skaar, Son Of Hulk.

Planet Skaar Prologue #1 Preview [Comic Book Resources]

These images come from X-Men Magneto: Testament series, written by io9 favorite Greg Pak, a series that traces the origins of Ian McKellen's favorite oppressor from childhood into the mass murderer that we know and love today. The series launches at the start of next month.

Witness The Origin of Magneto! [Marvel.com]

Robert Downey Jr., Tombstone-esque gunfights, and aliens? Sounds like a dream com true.Cowboys & Alienswill force humans to ban together (even though they were in the midst of an all out war) to fight against a common enemy, their alien invaders.

The current writing team on Cowboys, Hawk Ostby and Mark Fergu, also lent their pens to Iron Man. So at least they are aware of the back and forth quip that RDJ is capable of. The movie also has an extensive list of Hollywood names attached as producers including Roberto Orci, Steven Spielberg and Ron Howard.

The graphic novel by Fred Van Lente and Andrew Foley is also available online at Drunk Duck. (And Van Lente is the genius writer behind such awesome works as Action Philosophers (a comic book anthology dramatizing the lives of Socrates and Kant), Supervillain Team-Up and the current Incredible Hercules, which he's co-writing with Greg Pak.) The movie has high hopes for a 2010 release.

[The Hollywood Reporter]

For those of you who haven't read the Planet Hulk and World War Hulk series, here's the quickie back story: Iron Man and his gang called the Illuminati blast Hulk into space for the "safety" of the human race. (Because, you know, the Hulk is always smashing and stuff.) Hulk crash-lands on a planet where he can at last be the hero he never was on Earth — he fights with a bunch of oppressed aliens against evil humanoid overlords, wins, gets crowned king, and marries an ultra-awesome, super-strong alien who becomes his queen.

Everything goes bad when the ship Iron Man and Co. sent him to space in suddenly blows up. Queen is killed, and Hulk's new home is ravaged. He and his alien buddies (his "warbound") go back to Earth to get their revenge on Iron Man. Hulk is so mad, and so righteous, that he's gotten bigger and greener than I've ever seen him. I mean, he is so strong he can withstand space vacuum and smash up the moon.

His showdown with Iron Man stretched across several comic book crossovers. I highly recommend the series, especially Planet Hulk. And for the record, Wolk is totally right in this clip. You won't be able to deny it after reading.

Another famous recent example of comic book allegory that Wolk discussed is in Mark Millar's Civil War series, all about the Superhero Registration Act. Apparently, however, Millar denies the importance of allegory in the series, calling it "just gravy." Wolk also talked about Grant Morrison's 7 Soldiers of Victory ("It's about meshing together different forms of enlightenment.") and Green Lantern vs. Sinestro ("Green Lantern is thoughtful about how power can affect the world, while Sinestro uses fear to gain power.").

Want more Wolk? Check out his book Reading Comics.

When we watched Battlestar Galactica: Razor, it reminded us of your BSG comics. Did you invent the idea that Adama's call sign as a pilot was Husker? Or was that in a bible you were given for the show?

I wish I could take credit, but Adama's call sign was introduced in the miniseries that launched the new show. Adama's crew has restored his old Viper from his days as a pilot — and "Husker" is painted on the side. Originally, I misread that as "Husher," and in the comic book I had him explain it with the sardonic line, "Guess I was always running my mouth." When the our sharp-eyed letterer Simon Bowland caught the glitch, we tweaked Adama's explanation to: "Just had a sore throat the day they handed out nicknames."

I did notice, however, that I did scoop "Razor" on another detail. When we showed the old school Cylons for the first time in the comic book, their first words were, of course, "By your command." "Razor" played their version of the scene the same way, which made me chuckle. Guess we're all osBSG fanboys at heart.

Your comics were also the first time we came across the idea that the human-looking Cylons could have been patterned on actual humans. Sharon Valerii thinks she's the "original" Sharon whom the others are patterned on. Was this something you came up with, or were you told it might be true?

I came up with that idea and wrote those stories before the show itself had made any big reveals about the origins of the Cylons. I think Universal let us run with it because in the comic, Sharon's belief that she's "Sharon Prime," a real human that all of the Sharon Cylons are modeled after, turns out to be part of a fantasy — the kind of dream that a machine with emotions and no clue about her actual origins might have. I'm just as clueless and curious as you regarding the actual explanations that may come in this next season of the television show.

Speaking of robots with emotions, one thing that really blew us away about Robot Stories was its portrayal of robots having unexpected emotions. At one point, two androids designed only for office work fall in love. At the same time, you have people having emotional reactions to robots that clearly can't feel anything (like action figures). Do you think people will have trouble telling the difference between humans projecting emotions onto robots and robots having emotions of their own?

Absolutely. I read something recently about people already attributing emotions to things like Aibos and Furbies — even after being told that the machines are absolutely non-sentient. And no doubt robots will be designed to recognize and mimic emotions long before they have any of their own. On an everyday, individual level, I don't see any real problem with that — people already personalize their stuffed animals and computers and cars — it's just in our nature. The big challenge will come the day everyone who fantasized that their robots had emotions will have to confront the responsibilities and moral and ethical challenges that arise when robots really do have emotions. The fantasy's so much easier — because the main thing we'll fantasize about is unconditional love, or maybe a bit of cute mischievousness. But the reality very well may include less pleasant emotions such as anger or contempt or more complicated things such as neediness, existential dread, or mental illness.

That sounds like it could lead to some awkward moments.

I imagine it could be a bit like the experience of some folks who adopt baby raccoons — so cute! But then they turn into adult animals with very distinct needs and instincts that have very little to do with the comfort level of their owners.

We loved Planet Hulk, your storyline where the Hulk gets trapped on an alien world and forced to become a gladiator. One of the coolest parts was the planet Sakaar itself, with its patchwork of different species and cultures. How did you come up with that concept for the planet?

I'm mixed race — half white and half Korean — which I think made me hyperaware of race and racism and the promise of a genuinely pluralistic society from a ridiculously young age. So it was a natural thing for me to populate Sakaar with a variety of different sentient species interacting in a society dominated by racist and classist ideology — and then to turn the various prejudices and stereotypes about the various characters on their heads as the story progressed.

Was the planet's mix of cultures something that evolved in the process of writing the story, or did you spend a lot of time on world-building beforehand?

Under the expert guidance of Hulk editor extraordinaire Mark Paniccia, I spent a huge amount of time developing the world ahead of time, but also developed a great deal of the specifics as we went along. It was a great way to work — I'd nailed down all of the big picture ideas about the planet's ecology, history, society, politics, mythology, zoology and theology before I started writing the first issue, so I knew how all the working pieces fit into the story we were telling. But there was space to explore and expand and discover along the way, which was incredibly invigorating.

The most engaging character in Planet Hulk was probably Miek, the cute bug who turns into a warlord. In some ways, Planet Hulk seemed to be Miek's story as much as the Hulk's. I was glad he turned out to have a pivotal role in the end of World War Hulk, the sequel. But do you think the ending of World War Hulk would make sense to people who only read the World War Hulk miniseries and not the Incredible Hulk issues (which focused more on Miek)?

No doubt folks who have been following the story from the first issue of "Planet Hulk" will get the deepest appreciation of Miek's journey. But having talked to tons of fans at Wizard World Texas in November, the ending seems to work pretty well with folks who only read World War Hulk. One of the things I'm pretty proud of, actually, was the way we worked important moments for each of the Hulk's alien Warbound companions within World War Hulk proper. It's not every day that that many new characters get such a big spotlight in the Marvel Universe.

And we're going to see more of the Hulk's companions from Sakaar, who came back to Earth with him on his mission of vengeance, right?

Yes, I'm getting the chance to feature these characters in a brand new adventure right here on planet Earth with the Warbound miniseries (the second issue of which hits stores on January 16).

Another great new character is Amadeus Cho, the angry coyote-carrying teen super-genius who took the Hulk's side during World War Hulk. We're hoping the "Incredible Hercules" issues of the Hulk comic will be basically a vehicle for Amadeus. Is that true?

Heh. Someday we'll do an Amadeus Cho solo book. But the "Incredible Hercules" is definitely the right place for the character right now. And it's definitely a shared book with Herc and Amadeus playing equal roles as foils for each other — the world's most irresponsible god and incorrigible teen genius get each other into a ridiculous amount of trouble in the wake of World War Hulk! What's not to love?

So is there any chance you'll make another independent movie?

Absolutely. I have a dream project or two that I'll get made one way or another in the fullness of time. I can't spill the beans just yet, but I have a few creator owned comic book projects coming up in the next few months that could help the process along.

So what are you working on right now? Anything besides the Warbound and "Incredible Herc" comics you can talk about?

My craziest new project is "Skaar: Son of Hulk," a new Marvel series that launches in the spring. It tells the tale of Skaar, the son of the Hulk and the alien woman warrior Caiera the Oldstrong, as he struggles to survive and conquer on the savage planet of Sakaar. More epic science fiction adventure that picks up right where Planet Hulk left off. And then I have a couple more top secret projects I can't talk about just yet — but the latest news can always be found at pakbuzz.com.

Famous names: Greg Pak, Carlo Pagulayan, Aaron Lopresti, Gary Frank

Crunchy goodness: 5

Sequels: World War Hulk, in which the Hulk comes back to Earth with an alien army and vengeance in mind.

Elevator pitch: It's just like Spartacus — except this time nobody has to ask which one he is.

The shit: Pak and his collaborators put in major overtime on the world-building, creating an incredibly complex society with tons of alien races, not to mention the rampaging robotic wildebots. But what really makes Planet Hulk unforgettable is the Hulk's insect sidekick Miek, who evolves from scared larva to giant bug king to grief-stricken widower. Most comic book characters don't get that much development in twenty years.

Review of Planet Hulk