Wolverine #48

Released: November 22, 2006

Publisher: Marvel

Writer: Marc Guggenheim

Penciler: Humberto Ramos

Cover: Humberto Ramos

 

This ‘epilogue’ to the past six-part ‘Vendetta’ series, a Civil War tie-in, is given the second tier tie-in status ‘Casualties of War’. The connection to Civil War however is as loose as you can get, sporting flashbacks to the ‘Vendetta’ series as examples of Logan’s near-death experiences, and that’s it.

 

Maybe the banner is alluding to Logan’s character credibility, in which it certainly was a casualty of the Civil War tie-in. Guggenheim has had Wolverine go through some ridiculous scrapes, only to pop back up minutes later. It certainly looked cool to see an all metal skeleton with claws but if there is no tissue left then how can any grow back? Leaving aside the basic principles of science, or just common sense, this rise in power for Wolverine bodes ill for the long term.

 

It is an unfortunately common problem that superheroes’ powers grow and grow over the years as writers simply tack on strength to have the character overcome ever greater obstacles, thus creating drama. It takes a lot more creativity and work to have the character overcome the same obstacle using their original powers in a new or innovative way. So we have here, that a character who used to take months to heal from massive casualties is now able to stand up, looking healthy, in a matter of minutes after having his entire body literally burned to the bone. I remember the FOX morning cartoon show even had Wolverine taking a day to heal some broken ribs and internal trauma.

 

Even Marvel editors were noticing this latest power spike in Logan, billing this issue as the explanation for all the crazy shenanigans. What that really means is that Marvel wanted to cash in on some more Civil War tie-in business (even if there really isn’t one) and asked Guggenheim to clean up his mess a bit. So Guggenheim is forced to take seriously events that he had treated as pure camp, an attitude that let him get away with it at the time. His solution is a spiritual/supernatural answer to why Logan’s soul is denied peace. The ending alludes to a World War I story that supposedly explains it all, but I really can’t imagine it would be a good development to ever go through with this.

 

He’s been turned into an invincible character and much less interesting because of it—similar problems have arisen with Rogue. Ramos art is gorgeous so this isn’t a total waste of an issue. Next month promises to kill Santa, because that’s all the rage these days (look at Blade’s next issue), but Lobo did it a while back and that’s gonna be hard to ever top.

 

Rating - 4