After months of buildup, the apparent end is here for everyone’s favorite tiny Canadian mutant, and it’s much more quiet and effective than expected.
As a note, perhaps unavoidably, spoilers are discussed.
Written by Charles Soule
Illustrated by Steve McNivenIT’S THE BEGINNING OF THE END – 3 MONTHS TO DIE ENDS HERE! • The beginning of the end is now here … THE DEATH OF WOLVERINE! • THREE MONTHS TO DIE, the loss of Wolverine’s healing factor–all led to this, the single most important X-Men event of the decade. • Logan has spent over a century being the best there is at what he does…but even the best fade away eventually. • Over the years, Logan has been a warrior, a hero, a renegade, a samurai, a teacher—and so much more. But now, the greatest X-Men hero will play a role he’s never played before in this special weekly event brought to you by industry superstars Charles Soule and Steve McNiven.
It’s been almost two years since a virus caused Wolverine’s healing factor to burn out. The character famous for getting beaten and stabbed on an almost daily basis suddenly had to actually worry about the bad guys for the change. From the moment that Wolverine needed to start using Band-Aids, it seemed like he was heading down a path with a deadly conclusion. Now that moment has arrived, and the creative team of Charles Soule and Steve McNiven have brought Logan’s journey to an end.
Someone is after Logan. After globetrotting from Canada, to Madripoor and Japan, he has followed the trail to the desert of Nevada. There’s a secret facility out there, and Logan sure doesn’t like those. After fighting his way inside, Logan stumbles on a familiar scene: people sedated, strapped to gurneys, being sliced open with scalpels and surrounded by bubbling adamantium, all as Abraham Cornelius watches on. Logan has come full circle, and must face his maker. Well, that, and talk a whole bunch.
When reading the entire “Death of Wolverine” series, it feels surprisingly small in scope. Not to say that there aren’t big themes or that there’s lack of adventure, but the world is not at stake. Logan has saved the world — heck, the universe repeatedly; sometimes in the same costume. This story feels different, and Charles Soule has clearly planned it to be more personal for the character.
Each issue has touched on a different aspect of his past, all while maintaining the theme that Logan is a lone wolf. He’s been an X-Men, an Avenger, a soldier, a brawler, and a samurai. He has kept cycling through lives, feeling alone and angry for most of it. Now instead of saving the world, Wolverine dies saving people from his fate.
It feels like Soule has actively subverted the months and months of promotion by the Marvel hype machine by producing such a low key ending, but he still included plenty of moments for Logan to be the classic badass fans love. This issue has fights, growls, bubs, and a couple of snickts to get the reader pumping their fists. Logan makes his initial attack with SHARPENED REBAR STAPPED TO HIS HANDS. Is it practical? Nope. Is it really cool? Oh yeah.
The first third of the issue is mostly wordless, with the exception of the minimalist word blocks Soule uses to reveal what Logan’s senses detect and list injuries he gradually accumulates. The choice to avoid heavy first person narration was a smart one. Logan’s personal journey is fairly straight forward, and he’s not the type of character to be agonizing over his approaching mortality. In fact, the low point of the issue comes when Logan and Cornelius start talking, and the pages get filled with dialog. Despite his pivotal role in the creation of Wolverine, the two characters just don’t have the hundreds and hundreds of issues behind them to lend their conversation quite enough weight. Soule side steps the deep exposition trap he fell into at the end of issue #3, but it just seems like that the scene could have been trimmed down.
While the art was the principle reason for the slight delay of “Death of Wolverine”, Steve McNiven really delivers the goods. Wolverine has always been one of the most grounded and gritty characters at Marvel, and McNiven’s realistic style is a great fit for the character. His Wolverine maintains the character’s classic shortness and abundance of hair, but what really stands out is the way McNiven’s heavily ink-lined style accentuates the character’s new vulnerability. Logan has always been grizzled, but here it seems like his face has become little more than scars on top of scars. McNiven even makes the SHARPENED REBAR STAPPED TO HIS HANDS look so cool that readers can overlook the sheer impracticality of the setup.
Continued belowDr Cornelius has been the unseen mastermind behind the whole plot, and McNiven does something interesting with the character design. From the moment he is revealed, Cornelius’ face is hidden behind large round glasses, like a classic mad scientist. This lends an air of menace to him, and makes him seem far more dangerous than he really is. When things turn against Cornelius, the opaqueness of the glasses vanish, and the feeble old man that has made Logan’s life hell is exposed.While verbal confrontation between the two goes on for a little too long, McNiven art really saves the scene. The procedures being performed on Cornelius test subjects are horrifying, and McNiven lets the reader feel their terror without becoming too gory.
Logan’s big hero moment starts off slow, before it explodes. One of the best sequences in the issue is three panels when Logan slices his hand open to reveal his lack of a healing factor. The images are almost identical, but the growing trail of blood oddly worked as a small victory for Logan against his maker. Logan’s last fight is over pretty quickly, but that’s to make room for the last time he pops his claws and saves the test subjects from an adamantium filled future.
Of course, slicing open the machines and getting covered in a layer of nearly indestructible metal is a pretty dramatic way to go about it. McNiven makes a scene that could be very silly seem borderline not silly instead. Artists are often praised for avoiding statuesque poses in their art, but here McNiven uses that to his advantage, and it makes Logan’s every step look like a heroic struggle.
The closing three pages features only two words, as Soule wisely steps back to allow the art to carry the story. The montage of Logan’s life hits all the highlights, and effectively gives real emotional weight to what could cynically dismissed as just another comic book death. There’s a reason that Wolverine is one of the most popular characters ever created, and seeing some of his greatest hits should stimulate an emotional response in the even the most cynical of us.
It is a bit silly at moments, but in the pantheon of comic book deaths, Charles Soule and Steve McNiven have created a fitting end* for Wolverine by subverting expectations and crafting a much more personal story. And the rebar claws were pretty cool.
Final Verdict: 7.0 – An effective, if uneven issue that is bolstered by great art and good use of nostalgic moments a beloved character.
