This issue is split into two eleven-page stories, each representing
the first of a two-part story. I think it’s meant to serve as an entry
point for fans of the Wolverine movie into the comic books, although
given how late it is (despite now being published in advance of the
72nd issue) and how little involved the actual character of Wolverine
is in much of it, I wonder how successful it could be towards this
goal.
“A Mile in my Moccasins” Part One
The initial story, by “Wolverine Weapon X” writer Jason Aaron and Adam
Kubert (whose career kicked off with a three year stint on the title),
confronts head-on the oft-made joke about Wolverine’s unbelievably
prolific number of appearances in Marvel’s many titles every month (in
fact he has something like eleven solo titles this month, and that’s
not even starting on his many appearances in team books). We get a
montage of glimpses into a whole month of Wolverine’s life, wherein he
indulges in various battles and team-ups set across the entire breadth
of the Marvel Universe.
The problem – there’s no real meat to this story, yet. The last three
pages scratch at a deeper meaning to all of this, but it is
unfortunately cut off as soon as it really gets going. Why these two
stories had to be packaged together and split across two issues,
instead of presented as two single-issue stories is beyond me. This is
just half a story and it doesn’t stand on its own very well.
Not to say that watching Wolverine at breakneck speed isn’t a great
deal of fun. Kubert is very much the star here. He has a huge variety
of complicated scenes to draw in every single panel and he does a
superb job in almost them, ably assisted by the smooth inks of Mark
Farmer and the precise colours of Justin Ponsor.
Aaron expertly squeezes some smart lines into the limited space
afforded by Kubert’s intense visuals. I caught at least one reference
to Aaron’s previous stint on the title (“Get Mystique”) and I suspect
there are more in-jokes sprinkled throughout the sequence that I
missed.
I’ve got to wonder, though… who goes bank robbing on a Sunday?
5 out of 7
“One-Percenter” Part One
The second story, by “Wolverine: Origins” writer Daniel Way and
“Marvel 1985” artist Tommy Lee Edwards, introduces a former compatriot
of Logan’s, a biker ganglord who has rejected his former ways of drug
dealing but lost the loyalty of his son to another gang.
This time, it takes up to the very end of the episode for Wolverine to
even get involved. I have no personal affinity to biker gangs or drug
barons so this plot was unfortunately a little lost on me, not helped
by a rather unfortunate information dump in the first few pages. Most
of the story is told in the dialogue rather than making use of the
artwork, which is a shame as Tommy Lee Edwards is a fine
artist/storyteller and he doesn’t disappoint here. If only the artwork
had room to breathe amongst all the dialogue during the bar scene, it
might have worked twice as well as it did.
Edwards does a great job at mood-setting as well as creating some
distinctive character designs so I can’t help but wonder what he’d
have done if he’d been given some real action to work with, instead of
ten pages of talking heads. Ah well, maybe next issue.
4 out of 7
