SPIDER-MAN, PUNISHER, SABRETOOTH: DESIGNER GENES - June 1993

Credits:  Terry Kavanagh (writer), Scott McDaniel (penciler), Keith Williams (inks), Joe Rosen (letters), Tom Smith (colors)

Summary:  Peter Parker discovers that numerous lab animals at ESU have been slaughtered by a mystery creature.  Nearby, the Punisher faces a group of arsonists called the Scorchers.  After the Scorchers are neutralized, a homeless woman shows Punisher the mutilated bodies of several of her friends.  Spider-Man and the Punisher’s investigations lead to an underground lab, where they discover Sabretooth.  They mistake Sabretooth for the killer until he reveals that he’s hunting a former Weapon X scientist named Phil Chambers.  Sabretooth leaves Spider-Man and the Punisher to fight amongst themselves and heads to Roxxon’s headquarters.  Spider-Man and the Punisher eventually follow and meet Roxxon executive Brandon Chambers, who has hired his brother Phil to conduct genetic research.  Phil, from his lab, unleashes his genetically modified creature to kill the heroes.  Brandon is shocked to discover the monster is their brother Mitchell, who Phil was allegedly treating for cancer.  With Brandon’s help, Mitchell is restrained.  Sabretooth kills Phil and escapes.  Later, Brandon tries to make amends by using his brother’s altered DNA to advance cancer research.

Continuity Notes:  Sabretooth remarks that “my claws only kill for money...and revenge.”  At this point, Marvel tends to portray Sabretooth as a mercenary rather than a serial killer.

I Love the ‘90s:  Phil Chambers tries to escape with his floppy disc archive of scientific research.  Also, the very concept of “designer jeans” seems unique to the ‘80s and early ‘90s.

“Huh?” Moment:  The Punisher escapes the Roxxon building when Microchip arrives in a helicopter.  The Punisher has his own helicopter…and chubby computer hacker Microchip knows how to pilot one?

Creative Differences:  An added line of dialogue has Spider-Man confirm that one of Roxxon’s guards is still alive after the Punisher forced another guard to shoot him with a laser rifle.

Production Note:  I hesitate to call this a bookshelf format one-shot, because an argument can be made that it’s a full-fledged graphic novel.  It’s not oversized like Marvel’s earlier graphic novels, but it is sixty-four pages of original material at the whopping price of $8.95.  (And that’s in 1993 dollars!)  The cover also has foil effects and raised lettering.

Review:  Do you think Peter David was kicking himself when Terry Kavanagh got to the pun “Designer Genes” first?  If only Peter David had written this one; the silly title probably would’ve remained, but I’m sure he could’ve done something with a Spider-Man/Punisher/Sabretooth team-up story.  Terry Kavanagh does pretty much what you expect Terry Kavanagh to do, which is fill pages with words but never really say anything.  To be fair, there is an effort to give one of the Chambers brothers a character arc, but at no point does Kavanagh actually make him sympathetic or believable.  Instead, Brandon’s redemption is just tossed in during the final pages to create the impression that this comic has more to it than mindless violence.  The story mainly consists of the three lead characters, most likely chosen for marketing reasons, having brief fight scenes with one another that are interrupted by quickie plot points, which lead to more running and fighting until the sixty-four pages are mercifully over.  While the dialogue isn’t as bad as some of Kavanagh’s later work, there are quite a few groaners in here.  The Punisher specifically is saddled with some hideous one-liners, like “He's a killer who needs being dead” and this egregious one: “Just get me to the hurt on time.”  Get me to the hurt on time.  Yeesh.

The back cover plays up the idea that the one-shot contrasts the idea of the hero, the anti-hero, and the villain, but that’s kind of a joke.  Sabretooth and the Punisher are essentially the same character in this story, with Spider-Man playing the part of the overwhelmed hero who accomplishes nothing by the end of the comic.  I will say that Kavanagh writes Spidey pretty well for most of the story, and I was relieved to see Spider-Man make some effort to apprehend the Punisher.  Stories where Spider-Man just accepts what the Punisher does aren’t true to the character, so I have to give Kavanagh some credit for trying to stay loyal to Spider-Man’s values.  However, not only does Spidey fail to apprehend the Punisher, he fails to do anything in this one-shot.  The Punisher escapes.  Sabretooth escapes and kills the main villain.  And the secondary villain gets a redemption arc that Spider-Man has zero participation in.  It’s almost as if Spider-Man’s only here to sell comics or something…

I’m not sure why someone thought that Scott McDaniel at this stage could handle a nine-dollar prestige format book, but he’s clearly out of his depth here.  While his interpretation of Spider-Man is remarkably consistent (and not a bad variation on Ron Lim’s portrayal at the time in Spider-Man Unlimited), the rest of this art looks like any other subpar Jim Lee impersonation from the era.  I’m assuming this was penciled before McDaniel began experimenting with his style on Daredevil; I wasn’t a huge fan of that run, but there was something stylized and cool about it.  Designer Genes just looks like any random Wildstorm comic from 1993, without the fancy computer colors.  This is pretty bad stuff all around.  In Marvel’s quest to reprint everything, I wonder if this is something they’re just going to overlook.

GAMBIT ‘99 - September 1999

With or Without You

Credits: Fabian Nicieza (writer), Walter McDaniel (penciler), Vince Russell, Dan Green, & Scott Koblish (inkers), Gina Going (colors), Richard Starkings & Comicraft (letters)

Summary: After the green energy living inside Gambit saves him during an accident in the Danger Room, Professor Xavier demands that he reveal the truth. He relents to an examination, which leads to the green energy violently making her presence known. While the X-Men recover from her attack, Gambit awakens in Manhattan, Indiana. He investigates the flashes of memory placed in his mind and realizes that the green energy succubus is a mutant named Mary Purcell. She was believed dead after her mutant powers manifested at a gas station, and years later encountered Gambit while he was stranded at Magneto’s Antarctic base. After following the trail left from Antarctica, the X-Men find Gambit and use Beast’s invention to detach Mary. Gambit tries to free Mary from the device, but his powers dissipate her from all known existence. Later, at Mary’s grave, Rogue and Gambit make peace.

Continuity Notes:

· Xavier remarks that Gambit’s bio-kinetic energy has always made it difficult to mind-link to him, and even more difficult to read his mind.

· While watching surveillance footage in Antarctica, the X-Men discover that Magneto was impersonating Erik the Red during Gambit’s “trial” in Uncanny X-Men #350. The only explanation for why Magneto would don the disguise is that he wanted to “distract” the X-Men.

I Love the '90s: Gambit is watching a Buffy marathon on his VCR when Professor Xavier confronts him about hiding secrets from the team.

Production Note: Someone forgot to paste in images of the X-Men on Xavier’s videoscreens as he monitors their mission in Antarctica. Instead, we merely see the words “Beast,” “Marrow,” and “Rogue,” written by the artist, on the screens.

Review: Fabian Nicieza was stuck with the “Green Mist Lady” mystery when assigned the Gambit series, and I’m not sure if he was ever thrilled about it. I don’t recall any readers being too excited over the concept either, considering that it was introduced at the very end of Steven Seagal and Joe Kelly’s stint, an era dominated by editorially mandated “exciting new directions” and numerous dropped storylines. Nicieza puts an honest effort into it, though, and he manages to address the horrific ending of Uncanny X-Men #350 in the process (another mess he wasn’t responsible for).

Forcing the X-Men to travel to Antarctica and face their abandonment of Gambit is something that should’ve already happened in the main books by this point, but evading the issue for so long works to this story’s advantage. Nicieza plays the angle that the X-Men have avoided thinking about their actions because they’re so ashamed of them, making their discovery of Gambit’s audio diary (kept on an old tape recorder he found) even more demoralizing, as they’re forced to listen to his first-hand account of stripping plastic off of wiring and seat covers for food. Nicieza’s choice of a team is also smart, as he pairs two X-Men who were there (Rogue and Beast) with one who wasn’t (Marrow). As Marrow points out, what did Gambit do that was so bad that he was sentenced to starve and freeze to death…by the same people willing to take her in? The story also makes it clear that the X-Men are deliberately keeping Gambit’s role in the Morlock Massacre a secret from Marrow, a continuity point that really should’ve been addressed in the main titles as soon as Gambit was brought back.

The origin of the Green Mist Lady presents more of a problem, though. Nicieza wants to ground her in reality by giving her a suburban origin and typically dysfunctional home life, which is fine, but it’s hard to reconcile that with the early appearances of “Mary.” We learn that Magneto discovered Mary when she tried to bond with his body, but the reader never discovers how exactly she ended up in Antarctica. (And why she would want to go there.) Nor do we learn how she teleported Gambit from New York to Indiana instantaneously, unless the idea is that she can turn Gambit’s body into mist form. We also have to assume that her mist form moves extremely fast for this to work. And Mary’s motive, that she wants to create a new life form with Gambit so that the world will finally discover she exists, is just batty. I guess this is an attempt to reconcile her dialogue from her early appearances in X-Men, but the concept is just nonsensical. Still, the ending isn’t all bad. Making Gambit indirectly responsible for her death plays into his ongoing guilt complex, as he’s left to mourn another person he’s used and accidentally hurt. Not that he’s too broken up about it, of course; I don’t think we hear about Mary the Mist Lady ever again.

WOLVERINE Annual ‘99 - March 1999

Crying Wolf!

Credits: Marc Andreyko (writer), Walter McDaniel (penciler), Walden Wong & Scott Koblish (inkers), Gina Going (colors), Heisler & Revenge Graphics (letters)

Summary: Wolverine suspects famed author Duncan Vess is a werewolf. When he follows him home after a book signing, he encounters Deadpool, who’s been hired by a mysterious group to kill Vess. Their fight is interrupted by Lycus, a werewolf who’s targeted Vess for exposing werewolf secrets in his novels. Eventually, a council of elder werewolves appears. They reveal that they hired Deadpool to kill Vess, hoping that a human execution would be more inconspicuous. The Council punishes Lycus for acting on his own by turning him into a wolf. They leave when threatened by Wolverine, and Vess declares that he will go into hiding.

Continuity Notes: A footnote establishes that this story takes place prior to X-Men #90. Walter McDaniel, or perhaps the inkers, doesn’t seem to be drawing Wolverine with bone claws, even though he’s months away from regaining the adamantium.

I Love the ‘90s: Deadpool cites Bob Saget as an example of a hack comic. Presumably, Deadpool would know today that Saget is actually a filthy stand-up with a mean sense of humor. Deadpool would probably be a fan.

Review: I can just imagine the Twilight references if this story had been published today. Maybe they would’ve been funny, as opposed to what we have here. Some writers can give Deadpool brilliantly funny quips, while others can’t seem to go further than generic “light-hearted” banter. There is one amusing moment when Wolverine realizes that Deadpool’s too cheap to make his blades out of silver, but that’s really it. And, honestly, I’m not sure why exactly Marc Andreyko thought that a secret werewolf novelist would’ve served as a legitimate springboard for a Wolverine/Deadpool story. I will say that I was pleasantly surprised by Walter McDaniel’s pencils. Normally, I can’t stand his art from this era, but this is a better job than anything I saw in Deadpool. Sometimes he still resembles a subpar Jeff Matsuda, but his Ed McGuinness-style Deadpool isn’t bad at all.

Beer Run

Credits: Marc Andreyko (writer), Massimiliano Frezzato (art), Andrew Pepoy (inker), Heisler & Revenge Graphics (letters)

Summary: During a poker game, Wolverine takes Nick Fury’s SHIELD car for a beer run. On the way home, he’s abducted by the Hand and forced to fight a dragon. Wolverine escapes as the Hand are sucked into another dimension. Meanwhile, local hoods have stripped Fury’s car. Wolverine finally returns home to discover his friends are asleep.

Continuity Notes: Wolverine is drawn with metal claws in this story as well.

Review: I’m almost positive this story was originally going to appear in a 1998 black and white Wolverine holiday special that was cancelled at the last minute. The one-shot even made its way into the Bullpen Bulletins’ checklist, and “Beer Run” sounds like one of the stories listed in the summary. I seem to recall many fans at the time wondering (rightly so) how exactly something of this caliber ended up as an annual back-up. The gray-tone art by legendary Italian artist Massimiliano Frezzato is absolutely beautiful, blending the story’s elements of action, humor, and fantasy perfectly. The plot is obviously silly, but I was struck by how much it reminds me of post-2000 “New Marvel.” Wolverine is buddies with Captain America, the Thing, She-Hulk, and Nick Fury. He's wearing a wife-beater and jeans. Villains are used with no real concern for continuity (how often can the Hand summon dragons?). Art by a prestigious foreign artist. It stars Wolverine. That’s New Marvel, right? Did they ever reprint this back-up? Aside from the fact that it isn’t needlessly padded out and doesn’t feature any gore, profanity, or heroes fighting each other, it would fit right in with something published today.

WEB OF SPIDER-MAN Annual #8 - August 1992

The Dark at the End of the Tunnel (The Hero Killers, Part Three)

Credits: David Michelinie (writer), Scott McDaniel (penciler), Keith Williams (inker), Steve Dutro (letterer), Bob Sharen (colorist)

The Plot: Spider-Man teams with the New Warriors to rescue their teammate, Speedball. They battle supervillains employed by Justin Hammer at the scientific research station where Speedball is being held. During the fight, Silhouette is kidnapped, and Firestar discovers the body of Gamma Flight’s Auric. Later, the united heroes find Auric’s sister, Silver. She inadvertently leads them into a trap, where Speedball’s powers are used against the heroes.

The Subplots: None.

*See _________ For Details: Speedball was kidnapped in Amazing Spider-Man Annual #26. The final installment of this storyline appears in New Warriors Annual #2.

Review: This is the only chapter of this crossover that I own, but the basic concept sounds promising. As the Sphinx explains on the final page, a group of villains are inverting the government’s Project Pegasus program and analyzing the powers of heroes for their own ends. Spider-Man’s research reveals that the conspiracy involves the Life Foundation, the Brand Corporation, and Justin Hammer, which is a nice cross-section of Marvel villains, and at least two Michelinie creations. I’ve always enjoyed stories that have villains forming alliances, and this plot sounds like a perfectly logical scheme, within the context of the Marvel Universe, for the villains to be pursuing. The rest of the story is an extended fight scene, competently rendered by a pre-stylized Scott McDaniel, which has Spider-Man and the New Warriors fighting a cross-section of Marvel villains that range from Rhino and Boomerang to obscure losers like Bombshell and Stiletto. It’s not deep, but it’s fun.

First Kill - Part Three

Credits: David Michelinie (writer), Aaron Lopresti (penciler), Bruce Jones (inker), Rick Parker (letterer), Kevin Tinsley (colorist)

The Plot: Venom kills Bruno Markham in retaliation for the murder of an inventor whose work was stolen by Markham. When the victim’s nephew expresses remorse for helping Markham take his work, Venom gives him a second chance. Later, Eddie Brock decides to bond with the alien symbiote permanently.

*See _________ For Details: This story is continued from Amazing Spider-Man Annual #26 and Spectacular Spider-Man Annual #12 (incorrectly listed as #11 in the footnotes).

Creative Differences: The narrative captions leading up to Markham’s death are clearly not lettered by Rick Parker.

Review: The ongoing Venom series of miniseries is about to begin, which is why this year’s Spider-annuals are running a prequel story that shows Venom as an anti-hero fighting for justice in his own warped way. This is only eight pages, and without the context of the previous chapters, it’s hard to make much of a judgment. I was never a fan of using Venom as a vigilante, though, and retroactively inserting quasi-heroic adventures into his past just sounds like a bad idea.

The Security Gauntlet

Credits: G. Alan Barnum (writer), Tod Smith (penciler), Don Hudson (inker), Dave Sharpe (letterer), Sara Mossoff (colorist)

The Plot: While testing a family friend’s security system, Black Cat encounters Hydro-Man. She tricks him into an airtight display case and locks him inside.

Review: It’s eight pages of Black Cat skulking around a house and then fighting Hydro-Man. Nothing else going on, except a joke in the final panel that suggests she doesn’t trust herself as a security consultant because she’s still tempted to steal. Filler, obviously.

Down Memory Lane (Spider-Man’s Top Ten Team-Ups)

Credits: Tom Brevoort & Mike Kanterovich (writers), Aaron Lopresti (penciler & inker), Steve Dutro (letterer)

The Plot: Spider-Man reflects on various heroes he’s teamed up with while waiting for MJ to return home. He finally declares his marriage to MJ to be his most successful team-up yet.

Review: It’s a story co-written by Tom “Youth” Brevoort reaffirming Peter Parker’s marriage. Make of that what you will. Some of the in-jokes are humorous, such as Spider-Man’s funny feeling that he has something in common with Dr. Strange.

Evil’s Light - Part Three: Charge of the Light Brigade

Credits: Eric Fein (writer), Vince Evans (penciler), Don Hudson (inker), Dave Sharpe (letterer), John Kalisz (colorist)

The Plot: Cloak pulls Lightmaster into his Dark Dimension, angering the businessman, Chadwick, who’s using his powers for research. Cloak follows Dagger’s command to stop fighting and releases the comatose Lightmaster. Chadwick threatens to press charges, but can’t because he isn’t operating within the law either.

*See _________ For Details: A footnote says Spectacular Spider-Man Annual #12 has all of the details of the story so far.

Review: Another shred of a story that’s hard to properly judge. Pairing Cloak and Dagger against Lightmaster isn’t a bad idea, although I have a feeling this is another story about a generically evil businessman exploiting a villain for profit and then biting off more than he can chew. Unless Eric Fein had a great twist on the concept, it doesn’t sound very interesting.

X-MAN #6- #9, August 1995 – November 1995

#6 (Loeb/Skroce/LaRosa/Thomas/Digitial Chamelon/Starkings/Comicraft) – Once again, we’re given a story about a powerful villain sending a flunky to find X-Man. This time, it’s Sugar Man sending Rex, instead of Apocalypse sending Domino. It ends predictably with more giant panels of X-Man’s powers erupting, while the villain survives to continue the hunt. The rest of the issue is spent on X-Man’s conversation with Madelyne Pryor, which mainly consists of the two of them acting confused and clueless, since Nate still thinks he’s in the AoA and Madelyne doesn’t know where she came from. Loeb does drop a few hints about Madelyne that have potential (she’s terrified of Sinister’s name, and X-Man accidentally creates a monster that looks like Havok when he enters her mind), but I don’t have a lot of faith in a satisfactory conclusion. Skroce’s art brings a lot of energy to the thin story, and he’s one of the few artists that can capture the freakiness of Sugar Man.

#7 (Loeb/Skroce/Hester/LaRosa/Ryan/Williams/Thomas/Digitial Chamelon/Starkings/Comicraft) – On the run from Rex, X-Man and Madelyne end up in Paris…as the story begins to disturbingly hint at a romance between the two. If you’re a new reader and know nothing about these characters, I guess this doesn’t stand out, since the story presents it as two desperate people drawing comfort from one another. But any long-time fan (and who else would care about the return of Madelyne Pryor?) knows that Madelyne’s a clone of Nate’s mother. So not only is Nate a teenage clone of an existing character, but he’s also got the hots for his mom? And the story doesn’t even hint at how freaky this is? What a way to launch a new character! Was Loeb actually going somewhere with this? The story’s main plot involves Selene discovering Madelyne in Paris and tempting her over to her side. It’s not much different from the plots of the previous issues, only now it’s Madelyne who’s the villain’s target. Selene is actually successful in this story and it’s not dragged out over several issues, so at least there’s some variation, I guess. Selene says that she knows Madelyne’s identity and the power she possesses, but I can’t think of any previous comics where the two met. Selene is a sorceress, so I guess it’s possible she learned through supernatural means, though.

#8 (Loeb/Rozum/Skroce/McDaniel/LaRosa/Miller/Russell/Pennington/Ryan/Thomas/Malibu’s Hues/Starkings/Comicraft) – And now we have an issue with a plotter, a scripter, two pencilers, five inkers, and an extra ghost letterer who’s replacing pages of scripted dialogue (also notice that Malibu’s Hues did color separations, so Marvel must’ve purchased Malibu Comics at this point). This issue’s plot involves X-Man taking a job on a luxury boat, as he tries to deal with Madelyne’s departure in the previous issue. He has wild mood swings and gets drunk for the first time, and then fights Rex for a few pages. The crazy mood swings come out of nowhere, leaving you with the impression that he’s truly mad and not just troubled. So now he’s an insane clone of an existing character who’s got a thing for his mother. Not only is the art rushed and unattractive, but the dialogue annoyingly switches between thought and word balloons, so Nate ends up spontaneously saying things like “I’ve spent too many hours thinking about my past” to a girl who just complimented him on his paint job. Dark Beast saves X-Man from Rex on the final page, which isn’t that bad of a cliffhanger, but it doesn’t compensate for such an aimless issue.

#9 (Loeb/Ostrander/Skroce/Haynes/LaRosa/Carani /Lowe/Hanna/Pennington/Thomas/Malibu’s Hues/Starkings/Comicraft) and (Ostrander/Weeks/Sienkiewicz/Becton/Malibu/Comicraft)– “Creative differences” surface as Jeph Loeb receives a “story idea” credit and is replaced by John Ostrander. Loeb said in a recent interview that he left the book because he disagreed with Bob Harras over the title’s direction, which shockingly implies that someone at Marvel thought that this title had a direction. Counting the backup story, this issue has a co-plotter, a writer, three pencilers, and six inkers. I’ll give it credit for not looking like a total mess like the previous issue. Rob Haynes draws most of this issue, turning in some nice-looking pages that remind me of Rick Leonardi’s work. The story consists of Dark Beast trying to draw X-Man over to his side (gasp!), X-Man getting angry at him and unleashing his powers in a two-page spread (shock!), and a few pages of Blaquesmith tailing X-Man. At the end of the story, Nate decides that he should go find the X-Men, which leads into this issue’s back-up story. The backup, featuring Blaquesmith “in his first solo adventure” has decent artwork by Lee Weeks and Bill Sienkiewicz, but a nonexistent plot. While on his way to warn Professor Xavier about X-Man’s arrival, Blaquesmith is attacked by a strange aircraft. Blaquesmith plays possum, gets one good shot in, and leaves. End of story. This title’s only nine issues old and it’s already forced to run pointless filler. Not exactly a positive sign of what’s to come.