*Marvel: The polymath skill-pilferer Taskmaster has proved one of the more popular characters from the later 20th Century Marvel Universe, achieving the status of reluctant anti-hero through nuanced and well-written stints in the series Avengers: The Initiative and Avengers Academy. Now announced as the villain in the forthcoming Black Widow film, Taskmaster’s star is rising, and we have his first appearances in stock: Avengers #195 (NM- p £25), in which he makes a suitably menacing last-page cameo having overcome both Hank Pym and Scott Lang, and #196, in which he makes his full nefarious debut. 
PICTURED: AVENGERS #196 VF+ p £100