Weapon X #21 Review

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Reviewer: Jesse Baker
Story Title: Countdown to Zero Part 3

Written by: Frank Tieri
Penciled by: Roger Robinson
Inked by: James Pascoe
Colored by: Avalon Studios
Lettered by: David Sharpe
Editor: Mike Marts
Publisher: Marvel Comics

Unlike most of the people on the net, I’ve given Frank Tieri the benefit of the doubt about his writing but the last couple of months of Weapon X has made me openly question his talent as a writer. After “The Underground” the quality of Weapon X went straight into the toilet as Tieri dismantled the interesting set-up of the series in favor of crap involving the least likable characters possible (IE Chamber and Marrow). Oh yeah, that whole cheap and stupid decision of Tieri to have Chamber’s defection (which could have been interesting given that he had the perfect motivation to betray the X-Men) for a lame as hell cop-out revelation…..

Anyway, in this issue Tieri finally reveals the identity of Weapon Zero despite the fact that everyone and their mother knew that the masked man was Maverick. Meanwhile the new Maverick who’s been running around since “The Underground” arc is Maverick’s teen sidekick and former New Warrior, Bolt. Again, it’s horribly anti-climatic and is something that should have been revealed casually and not built up like this since the outcome was widely predicted ahead of time by readers.

And speaking of crap, this issue sets up Logan’s presence as a new regular in the book by having him go after the Weapon X project at long last. While Tieri’s Wolverine is decent, the character’s presence is just another soulless exploitation of the character’s popularity to boost sales. Am I the only one who would rather see Tieri devote more time to the other, much more interesting characters in the book instead of a person who already appears in three books at a minimum per month?