Wolverine: Origins #36 Review: Weapon XI Ends

Hey, everyone… I am going to be very busy doing reviews this week. I have a whole bunch lined up so expect to see them through the weekend to as late as Monday. Next I am going to do Wolverine Origins. Hope you enjoy it.

Fantastic Force #2 cover Wolverine Origins#36
(preview | thread)
Writer: Daniel Way
Pencilers: Doug Braithwaite
Inkers: Bill Reinhold, Andrew Hennessy & Kris Justice

SPOILERS BELOW…

RECAP: The issue starts with Wolverine dreaming of Daken being subjected to the Weapon X testing, by him. He wakes up groggy after being beaten by Victor and immediately starts to track his scent hoping to get to his son before he undergoes the process. In order to do so, Wolverine gives in to his primal side for the hunt.

Next we find Daken and the Tinkerer preparing to coat Daken’s claws with the metal of the Muramasa. The tinkerer has to anchor Daken’s claws to an adamantium sheath and even then they will not be very durable since they are not bonded to him. He begins the surgery.

Wolverine catches up to Victor and is getting tossed around. Just when Wolverine is going in for the kill, a policeman steps in and interrupts them. Logan manages to restrain himself and not kill the man and heads off after Victor again. He catches the other man on a subway train but instead of giving into the rage and fighting, he separates the cars so he can find his son.

But Wolverine arrives too late. Daken has already undergone the procedure and it was a success. Daken’s inside claw on each hand is now coated in the mystical metal. After a brief struggle, Daken reveals that he got the claws with the intention of using them on Romulus who is on the train. Wolverine tells his son that he let Romulus go when he split up the cars. Daken stabs his father through the chest but does not use the new claws allowing Wolverine to heal the damage.

The issue ends with Wolverine vowing to stop at nothing to track Romulus down and Omega Red being transferred to a new Russian prision.

MY TAKE:  I have been hashing this out for a while now. I generally like to start with the good parts of any issue in order to be positive. Unfortunately, there is very little good here to work with so I am going to start with the bad.

First thing is Wolverine is knocked out by a single punch from Victor and has a pretty much pointless filler dream. This is the same guy that has taken full shots from the Hulk, Juggernaut and Thor and gotten back up more mad then hurt. Considering that Victor uses doors rather then walks through the wall, I do not see him as having that level of strength.

Next Wolverine gives into his inner beast in order to track Victor down despite being able to track anyone without doing so. And despite the fact that he spends much of this time controlling the rage, here he does it just to find someone?

When he does catch up to Victor in full rage mode he does not even get one shot in even though we know that when he goes bestial his mind and actions are one and his speed is phenomenal.

Then when he is finally about to attack he is interrupted, coincidentally, by a policeman and he actually listens to the cop? In a full rage he is generally shown to attack his close friends and allies and ignore anything between him and his target.

In the few moments it takes to deal with the policeman, Victor somehow manages to lumber far enough ahead to board a moving train and get into an ambush position so he can slow Wolverine down again.

And of course, even though the whole fight and chase could not have taken too long, by the time Wolverine arrives, the process is complete. So the Tinkerer had time to complete two major operations on a person with a healing factor and then a bonding process. Oh and if adamantium is so rare how come so many people have it?

Then of course there is the major problem with the issue, giving Daken the Muramasa claws. To give a character with almost no development weapons of such caliber is, in my opinion, a monumental mistake. He will never have a chance to be developed or become more then a bad plot device. He is now simply the guy with the claws that can kill anyone. I have no idea why Marvel did this with Daken getting his own title but it make no sense to me personally. I do not believe there is a way to make the character likeable or interesting.

There are a few glimmers of goodness in the issue. I did enjoy that Daken seems to be thinking for himself now and acting more rationally. Some of Wolverine’s conflicted dialogue was good and insightful and the set up for the next arc is promising.

In the end though this was a poorly written chase scene issue with all kinds of plot hole that ended in a change in the status quo that I can not agree with or support. Hopefully they will make some changes to improve the series and redeem Daken as a character.

NOTE FROM DIG: I know that some readers my strongly disagree with this review. So please feel free to cordially share your own thoughts below or on the message boards. I look forward to reading what everyone else thought!

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jrpbsp
14 years ago

Not sure if its fair but I tried to not be overly harsh.

RPG
14 years ago

That is a very fair review. Good work. =)

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