Part 2 of my 3 part series ‘Wolverine reading for the Origin film’

Now there are two Wolverine origins; there’s his origin, and then there’s his Weapon X origin. The latter has been rebooted and retconned so many times, I wonder if this trade I read really holds up for modern day Wolverine comics. But what is continuity? All that matter if this is an exceptable use of telling how Logan got his adamantium claws in the first place. Result? Pretty damn good.

Here’s an oddity for you, one person did almost the entire comic for this story. Barry Windsor-Smith is a man I have honestly never heard of. Apparently he’s best known for being one of the original arts for the Conan comic in the 1970’s. But even then I am for certain I have never read nor saw artwork of this man before. Yes he does do everything for this comic; writing, pencils, coloring, and even lettering (with help of Jim Novak). So this is all of his baby right here.

Let’s get the formalities out of the way and let me state that I was shocked on how great this was. I was expecting just a standard Weapon X origin; no big meaning to it all and lots of blood being spilled. But that’s not what I got out of this at all. I got a well written and more deep look into the feral side of Wolverine and of his makers. This book pretty much focuses on the scientists who created the anti-hero and each one has a distinct voice and arent just mindless villains. When we do get the bloody deaths in here, it’s handled pretty well and still not really the focus of the story. The focus is how scientifically Wolverine was created and how he is trying to get rid of the beast inside him.

When I stated earlier I never saw artwork of Windsor I really wish I had. The art for this, especially considering the time frame (1991) is just gorgeous. Not a single panel or page wasted; it has so much detail. The computers and wires you see everywhere all look like they have a purpose and are connected to something. The people all have good body designs and their faces are never closely resembled. Even when we get to the bloody bits of the book, it’s all gravy. You know what this reminds me of? Frank Miller….It totally does look like Frank Miller style of art, which is ironic since this title originally came out exactley ten years after that famous run.

You get a lot of bang for you buck with this trade. Smartly written story and some beautiful art to match. Again it’s not hard to imagine this entire story has either been rebooted or retconned like hell. I mean the basics I’m sure are still there; but are these three main scientists even around for today’s Weapon X stories? Probably not. But again with continuity aside, there is nothing more exciting then reading a good Wolverine story. These last two trades have shown me there are more good Wolverine stories out there…..and the writer doesnt have to be Mark Miller to prove it.