Savage Wolverine 8
Zeb Wells, Joe Madureira
Spoiler alert! You have been warned!
The three-part Wolverine extravaganza doesn’t quite go out with a bang, so to speak, but more of a whimper. I’m not complaining, it just seemed a little bit, I don’t know… Rushed. That being said, who doesn’t love seeing Wolverine, Elektra, the Kingpin, Spider-Man, and a bunch of ninjas and undead monsters fighting one another? And to top it all off, who doesn’t love seeing that scenario written by Zeb Wells and Joe Madureira? No one I want to associate with, that’s for sure.
The issue rushes through what should be a perfect (but still remains a near-perfect) ending as we get Wolverine being judged free to go after the new big bad guys deem him a human, rather than an animal, and that his punishment is that his every waking moment is hell. Elektra then callously “breaks up” with him, which visibly hurts him more than I expected. It was a nice touch showing the Kingpin truly lose the last shred of his humanity as he is forced to kill his beloved wife, Vanessa, but I honestly thought that could have been an entire issue in of itself. But before I could even react to the events of the issue (which were so action-packed that I didn’t even realize that it took me a minute to read), I got the gut-punch ending that secured Wells as my current favorite Marvel writer. The scene between Wolverine and Spider-Man is absolutely heart-breaking in its realization. That’s characterization done right. I honestly cannot remember the last time I read a Marvel comic where I closed the book and went, “Yeah. That totally works for me.” So other than the fact that this storyline probably should have been a year-long epic, it, for lack of a better way to wrap things up, totally works for me.
This series has singlehandedly restored my faith in the higher-ups at Marvel. It may not have been the best seller on the stands. And it may not have been as long as the hardcore Joe Mad fans wanted it to be, but it successfully brought this lapsed reader back to the House of Ideas. Now the trick is to keep me here. I’ll follow Madureira to the pages of Inhumans and I’m currently enjoying Charles Soule’s Thunderbolts, but I’m going to be giving Savage Wolverine a rest after seeing the previews for the next few issues. Here’s to hoping that we get more creators like these two writing books that appeal to each and every comic fan out there. I know I’ll be picking up whatever they put out from this point forward.
My Rating: 4.5/5
