Written by Jason Aaron
Illustrated by Jefte PaloSTART READING with this Point One issue! CELEBRATE the most dangerous birthday in the Marvel Universe when Wolverine’s new girlfriend invites X-Men and Avengers alike to a surprise party for everyone’s favorite mutant. Logan’s birthdays has never been his favorite time of the year, but not even he could anticipate just how bad it could get. One thing is for sure–one way or another, blood will be drawn! Thrill to this stunning beginning of a whole new era for Logan…if he can survive the night!
There may not be a bigger skeptic of Marvel’s Point One program out there than me. Based on everything thats been heard and said, I still don’t buy it as either a cost effective measure or a means to draw new readers to books. I mean, lets be honest…Wolverine had a new #1 five issues ago…are there really going to be THAT many new readers interested in the character that have developed over the last five months that a new reader friendly self-contained story is needed? Or is this just a way to get me to pay 7 bucks for Wolverine this month as opposed to the usual four Either way this time I had to bite since after hearing rumors of awesomeness about Aaron’s Wolverine: Weapon X run, his still young run on the main title has risen from a non-buy, to an impulse buy, to a must buy, to a must read first at the top of the pile book in a stunningly short span of time…so anything starring Logan with Aaron’s name it was gonna get my hard earned dollars. Click below for my lowdown.
The first thing that must be said is that this book is unquestionably chronologically dubious. Issue 5 ended with Wolverine in a delirious, feral state following the returning of his soul to his body and we know that issue 6 begins the altercation between Logan and the X-Men while still in that state, which makes the fact that this issue very much an interlude which, if I had to guess, takes place sometime between the end of Weapon X and the beginning of Wolverine Goes to Hell, though that isn’t specified in the story (might’ve been nice if it was, but so it goes.)
As implied in the solicitation, Logan’s new(ish) girlfriend Melita has arranged a surprise party for him with some of the Marvel Universe’s heaviest hitters on the guest list. It’s this mixture of characters that give the book some of its best moments as they reflect on Logan, their time with him and, in a perfectly crafted two panel sequence, his relationship with Melita and her inability to fully comprehend exactly what she’s getting into by being with him. In a lot of ways, this issue is a tribute to Logan’s overall place in the Marvel Universe, and Aaron’s spot-on characterization of the assembled heroes (plus one very familiar hero that was not invited) made these scenes that much stronger. Plus, who would have thought Deadpool was a Neil Diamond fan?
Of course, the issue did not just show off Aaron’s comfortability with the Marvel U, as there was also plenty of sniktity snikt action to be had as Logan makes his way into the dark, unidentified forest in search of a kidnapped truck driver. What he finds in there is too gruesomely entertaining that I can’t even dream of spoiling it here, but needless to say Aaron’s knack for creating memorable villains is still working at top efficiency. Probably more jarring though, is the way in which Logan dispatches these ne’er-do-wells. This break from character convention for him is more than enough evidence to show Aaron definitely plans to inject some humanity into Logan and it may very well be as a result of Melita being in his life (that was my read anyway.) While I do love me some bloody-action Wolverine stories, these heavily substantive ones that Aaron is churning out work even better for me.
On the art end of things, Palo coming off of his grand slam work on the recently completed and much beloved Taskmaster mini-series with Fred Van Lente showed no dip in quality from that job to this one. His rough, angular compositions work perfectly for the story being told, and his just slightly distorted pencil work accurately the conveys both the admittedly grim subject matter on display, but also the fun, “aww” moments as well. Skirting the line between Chris Bachalo and Jeff Lemire, I should hope we see a lot more from Palo moving forward.
Overall, if this issue continued to prove what I’ve known for a few months now (and others may have known for longer): that Jason Aaron is absolutely the best person to be writing Logan right now, and one of the best to pen everyone’s favorite surly fictional Canadian in recent years not only because he excels at writing beautifully crafted disturbia, but because he recognizes the inherent humanity of the character that few really tend to these days, and us fans are the better off for it.
Final Verdict: 9.0 – Buy
