You should buy this comic for a very good reason: I don’t want Fred Van Lente to be out of a job. 

I don’t say this because I love his work on Wolverine: First Class — though I do.  I say this because Fred Van Lente is obviously an evil genius, and, were he not applying his considerable resources to composing all-ages comics for Marvel, I shudder to think what he would be getting up to.

As evidence of my hypothesis, I point to a moment in Wolverine First Class #2, during a fight between Logan and Sabretooth.  At a pivotal moment, Sabes disables Wolvie with a maneuver that I am pretty sure has not been attempted — or even conceived — in the last 30+ years of Wolverine comics.  I don’t want to give anything away, but it involves condiments at a Japanese restaurant.  For real, y’all, I do not want the guy who could come up with that move to feel compelled to seek employment in a field where he could do actual damage.

In all seriousness, W:FC fills a niche that’s been sorely lacking, for me, since the demise of ‘Cable & Deadpool’ — a genuinely funny funny-book.  And while the storylines may be lightweight — here, Kitty Pryde goes to great lengths to get Logan to drive her to a Dazzler concert, and hijinks ensue — they’re crafted with an intelligence, and an obvious affection for these iconic characters, that often seems lacking in ‘serious’ books.  Van Lente and crew have come on like (evil genius) gangbusters in the first two issues, and I can’t wait to see what they think of next.