The last few months of comics have been a thrilling exercise in rejuvenation, haven’t they? Across the line, we’re seeing fresh new takes on characters and shaking off more cobwebs than spring cleaning at the mausoleum. The Powers That Be have reassessed what worked and what didn’t, and unwieldy baggage is being jettisoned out the airlock and/or conveniently forgotten. It’s new creative teams and #1 issues as far as the eye can see, lately.

And DC’s been doing some pretty interesting stuff, too.

I’ve been thinking about this idly for a while now, but my friend (and probably yours) Timmy Wood crystallized those thoughts perfectly for me over the weekend when he took to Twitter and nonchalantly said, “DC actually came out and called it a relaunch, but Marvel has a soft relaunch happening right under our noses.” Last month, all we talked about (and bought, largely) were a barrage of #1 issues from Geoff Johns & Co., but take a second to think about all the books you bought from their chief rivals those same weeks that had numbers smaller than “12” on their covers.

The Incredible Hulk, Wolverine and the X-Men, and Uncanny X-Men will all be new from top to bottom with #1 issues and (one assumes/hopes) wide open storylines this month.

Moon Knight, Punisher, and Daredevil all started from scratch roughly simultaneously a few months ago, fairly gloriously. To one degree or another, thank goodness, all are unrecognizable from their previous incarnations. A year ago, Daredevil was like a cancer patient getting hit by a car at Jim Henson’s funeral; suddenly, it’s Six Flags with a buzz on, and not only is the transition not jarring, it’s amazing. The Punisher has turned into the shark from Jaws, and Moon Knight has turned into a character I want to read.

Equally new and twice as unrecognizable is Venom. Previously, my go-to example of How The Nineties Went Wrong has been “Well, they made Venom an antihero and started giving him his own series, and that should tell you everything.” Not only do those previous incarnations tell you nothing about Rick Remender’s book, they undercut the fact that it’s quietly one of the best on the shelves these days and pretty damn user-friendly. (I think. More on that in a moment.)

Everything I just said, from the “How The Nineties Went Wrong” to the “unrecognizable” to the “Rick Remender”: see also Uncanny X-Force.

Captain America just relaunched two times over; whether you’re a movie lover who wants to see him punch some Ratzis or prefer the here-and-now, there’s a book for that, one of which carries the ever-popular, new-reader-friendly low issue numbers on its cover.

We’re a month or two away from The Defenders #1.

They’re bringing back Scarlet Spider. Do you understand me? The Scarlet Spider. Making a character like that entry-level is going to be like juggling on a unicycle on a tightrope, but if they did it to Venom anything’s possible.

Although they are relatively more heady/baggage laden, even FF and The Mighty Thor have gotten new coats of paint and new direction this past year. To say nothing of your Hercs, your Black Panthers, your Iron Men 2.0, your Heroes For Hire….

And this Ultimate line? It’s like frickin’ DC Junior over here. Miles Morales? Are you kidding me with this? From out of nowhere, my favorite new book in forever. And an Ultimates book has gotten to #3 without me dropping it. I’ve been known to drop Ultimates faster than a plate fresh from the microwave.

This has all happened in stages, and without the spotlight that the “new” 52 has gotten all summer. In fact, with all of the attempted focus on whatever Fear Itself turned out to be and whatever the hell this “Point One” clusterfumble has been, it starts to feel like they were creating a diversion or something. Rather than dumping us in the boiling water like DC, they’ve been gradually turning up the heat around us while we sat here oblivious, carping about hammers.

You wouldn’t necessarily know it from hanging around here, frankly, but a lot of the line is as good as or better than it’s been in years. And coming out digitally, for whatever that’s worth.

Is any of it as welcoming to the new reader as DC would have you believe their line now is…? Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) I’m in no position to say, and I don’t want to presume. I have owned many a Marvel comic in my day, starting when I was in third grade or so, and I probably don’t have a whole lot of business telling you or your sister or your coworker, “Oh, yeah. You could pick up FF right away, no problem. Jonathan Hickman is super accessible.” I can’t pretend to unknow who Dragon Man and Artie & Leech are. My greatest unresolved frustration with the DC relaunch was having people who started reading DC books three Robins ago telling me how everything I needed was in, say, Wonder Woman #1. Listen: I respect (most of) you, but I do not want to hear a whisper about how new-reader-friendly that book was. I was an actual new reader, and I assure you that book did not want to be my friend. It was such blank paper, it hurt my feelings. I don’t want to be responsible for making anyone else feel that way.

That having been said: I gotta tell ya, a lot of this stuff feels super accessible. I can’t swear it. I haven’t done any testing. But from where I’m sitting, if you hand somebody a couple issues of Daredevil or Moon Knight and they don’t get it, this type of thing may not be for them at all.

Maybe I’m wrong. The sad thing is knowing I’ll never hear about it if I am. I just wish I could get you guys to open up about this topic in the comments for once.

Jim Mroczkowski knows a thing or two about a thing or two, no matter how it usually seems on Twitter.