DEATHBLOW & WOLVERINE #2 - February 1997

Credits: Aron Wiesenfeld (story & breakdowns), Richard Bennett (finishes), Mike Heisler (letters), Monica Bennett (colors)

Summary: The mysterious man transports Deathblow and Wolverine to a mystical library where they meet the Librarian, a figure from Chinese folklore. The robed figure explains that Sung Li is the descendant of a priestess who placed the souls of her tribe in an urn. Sung has reached maturity and now has the power to bring these Chinese warriors to life. Descendants of the tribe want Sung to revive the warriors and have brought the urn to Chinatown. Its presence is causing the residents to behave oddly. Wolverine and Deathblow return to San Francisco, where they locate the urn and rescue Sung. After saying goodbye to Deathblow, Wolverine reveals to Sung that he knows she’s the Librarian. Sung claims that she was never using Wolverine, but he chooses to leave anyway.

Review: Well, of course Sung Li couldn’t just be a normal girl. Characters with foreign backgrounds are legally required to have ties to whatever folklore might be associated with their homelands. If the first issue didn’t make it clear, it’s now obvious that this mini is essentially an “art book” and the story isn’t a major concern. It is a ‘90s Image comic, after all. Although a few pages are spent on detailing the plot, the majority of the issue is dedicated to dialogue-less fight scenes. The parallels with the original Claremont/Miller Wolverine miniseries are more obvious now, as an extended sequence gives us several shots of Wolverine fighting a horde of ninjas against a white background (Miller’s cover of the Wolverine trade paperback). Although the art isn’t as finely detailed as the first issue’s, this is a nice looking comic. Is the art enough to carry the thin story? Not exactly, although I think the story is bland more than it is terrible. (The only major issue would be the lack of resolution to the story of Deathblow’s missing friend. The plot thread isn’t even brought up, which is ridiculous since it’s the reason why Deathblow is involved in this story in the first place.) Two issues of extended ninja fight scenes are a little much, but I probably wouldn’t have minded if it was just a one-shot. It is curious that Image produced a Deathblow/Wolverine team-up that was essentially a Wolverine story guest-starring Deathblow. I wonder how Deathblow’s fans felt about this.

DEATHBLOW & WOLVERINE #1 - September 1996

Credits: Aron Wiesenfeld (story/breakdowns), Richard Bennett (finishes), Mike Heisler (letters), Monica Bennett (colors)

Summary: In 1982, Wolverine is living in San Francisco with his girlfriend Sung Li. Sung’s mother is acting odd, so the couple goes to visit her. The elderly woman, who now inexplicably speaks English, slaps her daughter, just before a group of ninjas crash through the window and attack. An injured Wolverine is rescued by Deathblow. Deathblow learns that Wolverine’s address is the same address used by his friend Phil Chang, who just wrote a letter asking him for help. After facing more ninjas, they return to Wolverine’s apartment. A mystery man informs them that Sung Li is in great danger.

Continuity Notes: Deathblow is a paramilitary Jim Lee character from the Wildstorm Universe. Why this story is explicitly set in 1982 is beyond me. You would think this was done to place the story in Wolverine’s pre-X-Men, secret agent days. However, Deathblow finds a photo of Wolverine with the X-Men in his wallet, so that clearly wasn’t the reason.

Review: Another Marvel/Image crossover I’ve only recently discovered, Deathblow and Wolverine teams Wolverine with the hardened soldier whose name isn’t amusing at all. Not one bit. Despite the brief acknowledgment of the X-Men, the story is played as your standard Wolverine prequel story. Wolverine has an Asian girlfriend, some ninjas are involved, and he nearly dies but is saved by his miraculous healing factor. At least he hasn’t fought back his berserker rage yet. Deathblow is brought into the story through what appears to be coincidence, but we later learn that he’s in Chinatown to respond to an urgent letter from a friend. Why exactly Phil Chang is using Wolverine’s address adds some intrigue to the story, along with the bizarre behavior of Sung’s mother. The main draw of the mini is the art, which has Aron Wiesenfeld and Richard Bennett emulating the “open” style of European and Japanese comics, with little or no shading and a bit of Geoff Darrow thrown in. The architecture looks beautiful, and while we’ve seen a thousand Wolverine/ninja fights by now, this one is visually exciting.

X-MEN UNLIMITED #4 – March 1994

Theories of Relativity

Credits: Scott Lobdell (writer), Richard Bennett (penciler), Steve Moncuse (inker), Dave Sharpe (letterer), Glynis Oliver (colorist)

Summary

Mystique murders a General who has been providing support to the Friends of Humanity. Graydon Creed learns about the death on the same day a private detective confirms that Mystique is his mother, and that he has a half-brother. Forge asks Rogue and Nightcrawler to investigate the murder. They discover Mystique at the funeral, posing as a minister. She tries to detonate a bomb but Rogue and Nightcrawler stop her. Mystique tells Nightcrawler to “come home” and he’ll finally learn the answers about his parents. Nightcrawler travels with Rogue to the home where Mystique raised her. Graydon Creed is there and he reveals to Nightcrawler that Mystique is their mother. He then tries to kill Nightcrawler, saying that he’ll be the first member of the family to be killed by the “prodigal son”. Not far away at a waterfall, Mystique affirms her love for Rogue when Creed appears. Mystique proudly tells him that years ago in Europe, she disguised herself as a villager and tossed a newborn Nightcrawler off a waterfall in order to save herself. She shoots at Creed, who teleports away, revealing himself to be Nightcrawler in disguise. The real Graydon Creed orders a helicopter to wipe out all of the mutants. Rogue captures Creed, but has to abandon him when she sees that Mystique and a barely conscious Nightcrawler are about to fall down the waterfall. Mystique claims that she’ll take the decision of who to save out of Rogue’s hands and falls to her seeming death. Rogue flies away with Nightcrawler as Creed escapes.

Continuity Notes

This is the issue that reveals that Mystique is Nightcrawler’s mother. A few hints were dropped during the Claremont run in the ‘80s, but it wasn’t confirmed until this issue. Mystique’s story about throwing Nightcrawler from the top of a waterfall seems to contradict the story of how Margali Szardos discovered him in Uncanny X-Men Annual #4.

Rogue tells Nightcrawler the story of meeting Mystique after her mutant powers surfaced as a child. Earlier appearances had Rogue saying that Mystique raised her before she even knew that she was a mutant.

Forge says that Mystique spent her time in his home secretly researching the Friends of Humanity, implying that her insanity was faked.

“Huh?” Moments

I’m no geography expert, but Mississippi isn’t really known for its waterfalls, is it? Especially a large waterfall that’s just “down the road” from a residential area. The idea that Rogue couldn’t carry both Nightcrawler and Mystique at the same time is also ridiculous.

Review

Yeah, this one’s terrible. If you do a Google Groups search on this issue, you can find even Scott Lobdell (posting as “Kid York”, I believe) mocking it in the late ‘90s. As the solution to a long-running mystery, it doesn’t work because it gets so much of the continuity wrong. Judged only as a stand-alone story, it’s still awful. The story mainly consists of Mystique, now acting murderously insane instead of regular old insane, behaving erratically while Rogue and Nightcrawler follow her. In the span of a few pages, she goes from tearfully telling Rogue how much she loves her to bragging about dropping Nightcrawler to his death as an infant. Of all of the characters who suffered in the post-Claremont era, Mystique has to be towards the top of the list. Who could care anything about this loon? The ending is especially ridiculous, with Rogue apparently forgetting that she has two arms and anguishing over whether to save Mystique or Nightcrawler. There’s an extremely long review of this issue, cutting it to pieces, that used to go around the internet. If you search posts in Google Groups by David R. Henry from 1994 you should find it. It’s worth reading.

X-MEN #27 – December 1993

A Song of Mourning, A Cry of Joy

Credits: Fabian Nicieza (writer), Richard Bennett (penciler), Bob Wiacek/Scott Hanna (inkers), Bill Oakley (letterer), Joe Rosas (colorist)

Summary

Rogue, Iceman, and Beast visit Infectia, who’s dying of the Legacy Virus, in a Los Angeles hospital. They speak to a Dr. Nathan Milbury before Infectia tells them that she came to Los Angeles to get help from a mutant researcher named Gordon Lefferts. The X-Men investigate Lefferts’ lab and discover a group of homeless people living there. Rogue tracks one of them, Threnody, because she suspects that she might have information on the lab. Rogue finds Threnody just as Mr. Sinister offers to help her. Rogue figures out that Mr. Sinister was actually Dr. Milbury before Threnody’s power erupts. Sinister reveals to the X-Men that Threnody translates emotion into plasma energy, and that she only absorbs pain from mutants dying of the Legacy Virus. Sinister wants to use to her to track more mutants because he also wants to cure the disease. Beast reluctantly agrees to let Sinister take Threnody with him. Later, at the hospital, Beast releases Infectia from her quarantine and holds her as she dies.

Creative Differences

Paul O’Brien's index on this issue talks about a page that was awkwardly re-edited, although I never really noticed it. I only notice two word balloons that have been obviously re-lettered in this issue, which isn't uncommon at all during this era.

Continuity Notes

Infectia is a very obscure villain from the early issues of X-Factor. She’s the only type of character the Legacy Virus ever seemed to kill.

At the end of the story, Threnody detects another mutant with the Legacy Virus nearby. Sinister refuses to tell Rogue who it is. The implication seems to be that Sinister has the Virus, even though this mystery is never referenced again. Of course, Sinister was revealed not to be a mutant a few years after this issue was written (although, later on, human Moira McTaggert somehow contracted the disease as well).

“Huh?” Moment

When the X-Men discover a group of homeless people, Beast tells Rogue to “assuage their fears” because she is most “normal in appearance” of the three X-Men. This overlooks the fact that Iceman can revert to human form at any time.

I Love the ‘90s

In the Bullpen Bulletins page, it’s jokingly suggested that Marvel might change its name to “Marvel Grunge Productions”, “Marvel Technoraves”, or “Marvel Fresh Hip Hop Jams”.

Review

This is the introduction of Threnody, another new character from 1993 who never caught on. She did become a cast member in the X-Man series, though, so she’s probably made more appearances than any of the other new characters from this year. Her powers are frankly ridiculous and obviously exist for plot convenience. It’s one thing to have a mutant who turns emotional energy into “plasma energy”. That’s fairly dumb, but it can work in the context of a superhero comic. It’s another thing to suggest that this power only works on mutant emotions, more distinctively, on mutants with a specific disease. That’s ludicrous. Why would her power only single out this one disease? If a mutant dies a painful death of AIDS, nothing happens; but if the mutant dies of an AIDS allegory, suddenly she explodes? I understand the need to introduce a mutant who can find other mutants infected with the Legacy Virus. Figuring out a convenient way to find those infected with the disease would be a logical step in developing the storyline. But revealing that one mutant has a power that only allows her to feel the pain from Legacy Virus victims is way too much of a stretch.

As he often does, Nicieza gives the heroes an ethical dilemma to contemplate. Despite my objects to how specifically Threnody’s powers are defined, he does create a strong question for the team. Is it okay to allow Sinister to take advantage of Threnody’s power, which causes her to live in constant pain, in order to help all mutants? Nicieza’s able to give the X-Men an answer without making them appear unsympathetic. More moral ambiguity is applied to Xavier, which seems to be a trend during this era. Rogue implies that Xavier is using her rather than helping her control her powers. This doesn’t work as well for me, since a) Rogue came to Xavier for help, not the other way around, b) Rogue’s using her powers to actively help people, not for any ominous purposes, c) it’s already been established that Xavier wants to cure Rogue and is concerned for her condition, and d) being cured of her condition wouldn’t prevent Rogue from being an X-Man since she wants to control her powers, not necessarily be totally rid of them. I don’t really know why the “let’s reveal that Xavier secretly has dark motives” theme keeps cropping up, even to this day. Why is Xavier specifically singled out for this? Xavier started a school to train mutants on how to use their powers and to stop mutants who use their powers to harm humans. Where’s the hidden darkness in that?

This is another issue that’s hard to look back on, as so much of it is spent on building up the Legacy Virus storyline. It’s still hard to believe that Marvel spent so many months selling this storyline, only to totally drop it a few years later. Nicieza is successful in giving the team an interesting question to deal with, but it’s hard to get past the way he got there. Fill-in art comes from Richard Bennett, which I thought looked great at the time, but it certainly hasn’t aged well. He does a few more jobs for Marvel before leaving for Jim Lee’s studio.

UNCANNY X-MEN #303 – August 1993

Going Through the Motions

Credits: Scott Lobdell (writer), Richard Bennett (pencils, inks), Dan Green (inks), Chris Eliopoulos (letterer), Joe Rosas (colorist)

Summary

While the X-Men are away, Jubilee and Kitty Pryde spend time with Illyana during her final hours. Colossus returns to the Mansion to learn of his sister’s death and has no visible reaction. Later, Jean Grey attempts to comfort Jubilee.

Review

This is the death of Illyana issue, a death that actually stuck until a few months ago (I don’t follow New X-Men, but it’s my understanding that she’s officially returned). If you’re going to kill off a character in order to build up the Legacy Virus storyline, Illyana isn’t a bad choice. Her long-running character arc had already concluded during the Inferno storyline, leaving the character as a small child who was rarely seen. Because she was a prominent character for a few years, the fans still had memories of her, but she was essentially unusable in the context of most superhero stories. If Illyana dies, it still comes across as a big deal without actually upsetting the status quo of the book. Killing her off in the service of a larger storyline makes sense. Unfortunately, this greater storyline became yet another “dangling X-plot” that was only resolved years later during a fill-in issue. As a result, I can understand why some people tend to view her death as rather pointless.

I will say that Illyana’s death is treated respectfully (as opposed to the bloodbaths of earlier issues) and doesn’t come across as cheap shock value. Jean Grey offers Jubilee some cliché advice on how to deal with death, but I still think their scenes together work pretty well. If anything holds this issue back, it’s Bennett’s artwork. Bennett was a well-respected inker during this time that would occasionally show up as a fill-in artist. His ability to draw architecture and machinery is fine, but most of his human compositions don’t work (check out Xavier’s giant head and tiny arm on page 8, and Iceman’s bizarre anatomy on page 28). As a kid, though, I thought this was a great-looking issue and wanted to see more from him.