The Helm #1

What if you had a magical superpower, and it hated your guts?


Matt Blurdy's day has gone from crap to worse. Not only did his girlfriend break his heart at work—and in front of all of the video-store patrons—but he just got fired. All that's left to do is minibike his sorry, thirty-year-old (and freshly unemployed!) butt back home to his mom's basement and drown his sorrows in a bucket of extra-crispy chicken while contemplating where his life went wrong.


On the way home, Matt decides to quiet his aching heart with a brief detour to a garage sale. When an ancient-looking helmet calls him "the Chosen One," exhorting him to don the mantle of the "Valhalladrim," Matt touches it with trembling fingers—and is jolted by raw magical power. Holy crap! Is he going to be a superhero? Is this why he always felt special even when everyone else thought he was a loser? Then the Helm gets a sense of whom it's dealing with. Suddenly, it changes its tune: "I was mistaken. You are not the Chosen One. Good day."


But for once in his life, Matt's not taking no for an answer. Not today.


• A high-spirited new spin on the "destiny" genre, teaming artist Bart Sears (Captain America, Batman) with comics newcomer Jim Hardison!