Daredevil Message Board

[Neilan]

I have to say that I was never that interested in Wolverine. A character that was almost impossible to kill who could bounce back from any injury and had indestructible weapons as part of his body made me think of Superman, but without the same level of morality. I didn’t think that I would be able to care about this hero’s fights, since I need the threat of death or serious injury to get emotionally invested in the outcome. But having been exposed to Logan the guest star, in many other books, it dawned on me that there was this whole mystery, conspiracy back story, and I can be, at times, a sucker for a good conspiracy theory. So, not being a reader of the X-Men, except for the original 1st dozen issues, prior to being cancelled, I jumped into the wonderfully wacky world of Wolverine. The biggest thing I learned was that you can’t fully know Logan, without reading X-Men, but I think that you can come somewhat close.

Even though it was Len Wein, who I recently saw in the credits of my daughter’s Simpsons comic, who created Wolverine, it seems like it was Chris Claremont who brought the full character of Logan to life. Besides his X-Men work, which is unknown to me, his solo Wolverine had a sense of adventure and seemed like a throwback (at least viewed in 2007) to the silver age with a nod towards the old movie serials. There was a palpable edge to the character, as this was the eighties, but he seemed to be portrayed as basically, a decent, if somewhat wild, man.

I found Larry Hama’s long run on the book both enjoyable and frustrating. The quality of the stories was pretty good, but there was more emphasis on Logan as part of a team, that his solo book was akin to seeing him on his days off. This bothered me at first, as not knowing much about the X books, I found that the big crossovers and guest appearances of his various teammates and X villains didn’t excite me much. I did appreciate the appearances of Jubilee, as I found their relationship to be touching and amusing, and was glad that what seemed like a young girl’s crush, at first, grew into a strong, accepting friendship. I would like to know more about the Wolvie-Kitty Pryde relationship. How was it different than the one with Jubilee? I found that the occasional standalone stories usually were my favorites, one in particular was #34, the 1st appearance of the Hunter in Darkness. It reminded of the few old stories by Lee and Ditko that I had read prior to the creation of the FF, the tales that were creepy and ironic. Additionally, I would get excited when Hama would dangle clues to Logan’s past, and then get infuriated when at least half of the clues turned out to be false. This reminded me of my love/hate relationship with the X-Files TV show.

The majority of the writers on Vol. 1 didn’t do much for me. A couple of exceptions were Chichester’s 2 parter and I really liked the “Not Dead Yet” arc by Warren Ellis. My favorite period in Vol. 1 was near the end. Frank Tieri’s run was, I felt, a great use of the character. It may not have delved into Wolvie’s psyche and motivations as much, but the stories and surrounding characters rang true to me and were just downright entertaining. I loved the mob tale even though gangsters are, obviously, no match for Logan.

Tieri’s run was a great transition into Vol. 2 and Greg Rucka. More entertaining stories of the Canadian samurai (or should it be ronin? I’m not up on Japanese culture). Rucka’s take on Logan as a mostly moral, but brutal man dispensing his own interpretation of justice, while building on elements of Claremont's and Hama’s run, made this character much more interesting to me. I also liked the portrayal of his relationship with Nightcrawler.

Mark Millar’s arc was great. Yeah, he threw a lot of guest stars into it, but it didn’t feel sensationalistic to me, just sensational. There were a few moments when I felt that he strained credibility a bit, but those moments didn’t take much away from the overall fun and excitement of the story. I enjoyed this so much more than his Marvel Knights Spidey story, and I’m a big Spidey guy.

Marc Guggenheim’s run on Wolvie had been the only thing I had read prior to this “journey”. I had bought his issues, originally, due to the Civil War tie-in and had liked them. I liked them just as much when reading them within the Wolverine context but I did find the return of the “best there is at what I do” tag line to be tiresome.

Daniel Way. I liked his House of M issues, but what I liked best about his Wolvie work, on both the main title and Origins, is that it’s convinced me to stop reading the title, thus saving me money.

All in all, when I go back to reread Wolverine, it’ll probably be Tieri, Rucka and Millar. To borrow from Forrest, that’s my 2 cents. Okay, in this case, 12 cents.
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It's never too late to have a happy childhood!

[Blind Alley]

[james castle]

Here's a super brutal review of Wolverine 55 (full of spoilers):

http://www.thexaxis.com/wolverine/wolverine55.htm

The review beats the sweet bejesus out of #55. However, it also does a good job of explaining why Wolverine is just so damn cool.
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JC

So why can't you see the funny side?
Why aren't you laughing?

[Gloria]

I haven't been following Logan's solo exploits. But I do remember fondly his first mini-series by Claremont and Frank Miller. I think the story defined Wolverine's personality and plights very well.
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Gloria
Devuélveme el rosario de mi madre y quédate con todo lo demás

"Para la cuesta arriba quiero mi burro, que la cuesta abajo yo me la subo"

[Forrest]

Thanks for the post, Neilan. I haven't read much of vol. 1 Wolverine, so this was informative for me.