Broken Frontier

Wolverine takes a huge risk by taking on Hydra so soon after his deprogramming, but being the best there is at what he does isn’t always easy.

Former X-Man, Northstar is back from the dead, and he’s leading a team of former second-string superheroes in Hydra’s bid for world domination. More specifically, Northstar’s team gathers to take out his buddy Wolverine. It appears to work, but despite being nigh indestructible, Wolverine is no tactical dummy; he’s got a few tricks up his sleeves—big tricks.

There are a few things that you can bet on when talking about Mark Millar writing superheroes: lots of action, lots of characters and creative plot developments are chief among those. Each of those can be found in spades in this issue (and his run) of Wolverine. Another thing you can bet you won’t find is subtlety, which can sometimes suck the fun out of Mr. Millar’s writings. However, here, Millar has taken enough time to develop the plot and what Wolverine and S.H.I.E.L.D. are up against that any lack of subtlety is welcome. The result is one of the most entertaining issues of Wolverine I’ve read in a long while.

Thanks to Millar’s action-heavy scripting, Romita Jr. is always solid on this book. He is one of the finest pencilers in the business, but when it comes to action few can match his prowess. Jansen has stepped up to elevate Romita’s line work another notch as well. In the past, I’ve found that he can be a bit overbearing with his inks, but he certainly doesn’t have that problem on Wolverine. As for Paul Mounts’ contributions to the color, much like Logan, he is among the best there is at what he does, adding to dynamic action sequences by making the art jump out of the page at the reader. It is also worth noting that Greg Land’s covers are gorgeous, as one would expect. Richard Isanove’s smooth painting gives it a finishing quality that almost begs to have the piece put up in a museum.

I’ve got to hand it to Millar and company: they’ve made me actually enjoy Wolverine again. I’m itching for the moment when Logan and the Gorgon come face to face because I just know it’s going to be a fight for the comic geek in all of us, and this art team is going to bring it to life just the way that geek wants to see it.

-Kert McAfee