2.106(471) Wolverine Weapon X #1 ... Marvel ... #x-men

There was originally a title called Weapon X that explores the mysterious ongoings of this project facility where Wolverine was subjected to in his younger days ... a process that laced adamantium to his bones and making him even more savage

Now you may be wondering why less than a few months have passed before we are talking about Wolverine again. Well, the reason is that while this particular spin off title is obviously trying to cash in on his popularity, what this does (in less than 2 years) is give us a Wolverine who is actually savage and shows us him killing others i.e. happening here and not off panel which is brilliant

Unfortunately the artwork by Ron Garney who has his own following is not to my taste

The title for this arc is adamantium men and you know writer Jason Aaron is just going to rock this like no other. In fact, it is such a great opener that the first pages without Logan making an appearance is fine as we get introduced to a scene in the jungles where the villains met an even worse group of villains

And where is our star character? Well if you wade through a bit further, he is sleeping off a drunken bout in a train. How cool is that?

Naturally it will not be long before he is summoned and dragged down into the mess that is the Weapon X program only to discover that someone has yet again activated the program and this time as the title suggests SPOILER ALERT there is potentially more than one chap besides him running around with adamantium within or a variation thereof!

Ratings: 7/10 (would have been higher if not for the art)

2.105 (470) Hulk vol 2 #50 ... Marvel ... #hulk

Firstly for those who remembered Deodato during the heydays of comics boom in the early 90s, he disappeared for a while before returning to Marvel comics and upon his return, his entire style of artwork has changed substantially to the point that you cannot tell it is the same man. I kid you not. This version is restrained and realistic, none of the cheesecake posturing and growling with spittle flying every which way!

And when he was teamed with Bruce Jones, apparently a long time writer of comics (sorry I didn't know him before this run), it is just plain incredible (no pun intended). You get a feel of intrigue wondering as each issue progresses what is really going on and what is the end game. We see Bruce being led and perhaps in cahoots with someone and naturally there is also the journeyman stuff from the 70s tv show feel here too which is just right. This particular run is also adapted into the 2nd Hulk movie starring Ed Norton which I loved and thought it great except for the special effects on the villain which was quite eeeeuuuuurgh!

Okay

The issue itself - we see once more members of the mysterious organization coming out to the dessert and trying to awaken and coerce a semi-dormant Abomination back to life and activity and initially, he merely laughed at them until they came back with something near and dear to his heart ... and then all hell finally broke loose ... but hey even before the Abomination comes free, the agents themselves proof to be equally nasty the way they infiltrated the base

And as for our star Bruce, well, he is walking through desserts unknowingly being led to a place near where the Abomination is ... and he stopped by a café for a break SPOILER ALERT ... never knowing that the café has food, clothing and even a hot chick for sex we kid you not ... and o yes a new version of Hulk Smash ... something colder, more eerie ... and the way characters are so intensely focus on each other is creepy

You never know from the words, the actions and the facial emotions of what else is hidden behind the surface

Ratings: 7/10 (would have been higher if we had a hulked out sequence)

2.104 (469) Captain America vol 5 #32 ... Marvel ... #marvel

Wow - that's the only word I can give to describe this issue if I were to be pressed for a one-word summary. Artwork, storyline, character development, plot complexity, action sequences - everything works so well here in this issue

For those who read the last review or issue SPOILE ALERT or haven't, the first opening page is great as it doesn't waste time forcing us to read a few pages before we come to the conclusion from last issue's cliffhanger where Dr Faustus wanted to test if Bucky is now back to his old mind conditioning or not by giving Bucky a gun and ordering him to shoot Agent 13!

Anyway, here we see the Widow and Falcon trying to track and rescue Agent 13 and Bucky and finally hitting pay dirt. So they go in hard and fast and we are shown how people with guns like the goons of Faustus are so easily laid to rest by folks like Falcon and Widow. Real cannon fodder there, mates!

And on the more exciting angle, we also see Dr Faustus trying to flee but in a dignified manner. He got everything and everyone in place just as Bucky broke free from his restrains and then we see a conflicting Agent 13 trying to determine if she should follow him, let him go or take him into custody. BANG she was awesome ... and if you thought the scenes of her putting him down was great ... wait a few more pages and see what she does while airborne. A complete switch around!

This is one awesome story!

Ratings: 8/10

2.103 (468) Captain America vol 5 #31 ... Marvel ... #captainamerica

One of the best run of comics in the last decade to come out from the house of ideas, for me, is Captain America. From his first issue right up to the point he moved on more than 5 years later, Ed Brubaker showed distinctly what a great writer can do for a man wearing the flag on his chest without the tales being crummy and cheesy ... and if you think I am wrong, well, the second Captain A movie has a story from his run, so there!

In this issue, if you are reading it from trade paperback, it is volume 2 under the banner THE DEATH OF CAPTAIN AMERICA. Yup. They renumbered the TPB from that storyline onwards. Ah well ...

The tale covers every which way here as we start in the middle of a huge and busy storyline. We have Tony Stark not Iron Man catching up with a recuperating Falcon trying to figure out how far and how deep are the  Skull's plans while the Winter Soldier is still the Winter Soldier and being trapped by Dr Faustus who is in the employ of the Skull

Alongside them is Sharon, Agent 13 of SHIELD who has been conditioned by the same Dr so that while she is aware of who she is and what she should do, there is yet another persona almost like a second person living inside of her

The good thing about this issue is that it is flashback heavy. By this, we do not mean of the past issues but back to the war days as we see the difference between Cap and Bucky's way of operations. Of course, not everything is what they seemed

But in case you are thinking you can skip this issue, I do suggest you get it because that ending? What a cliffhanger. If you are reading this in floppies, it's guaranteed that you will want to come back for the next issue. SORRY NO SPOILERS

Ratings: 8/10

2.102 (467) Pitt #11 ... Image ... #pitt

Had enough of Marvel? Yeah, we thought so too ... let's move onto something more colourful in the form of early Image comics. I always wish that Dale had let others do more on this series but kept the artwork at the same level then we could have more than two dozen issues of this awesome series

In this issue, the cover is baby Pitt (hehehe) as we finally sees the real origin of Pitt and is told in an innovative manner. The guy who has been coming to Earth hunting for Pitt is named Quagg and he is in the employ of Creed's cruel brother and father and this time, as they finally battled it out with the outcome never in question i.e. Pitt's favour, Quagg did something unexpected ... he injected Pitt with a chemical that gives him a history of what has gone on before

And so we are invited to take a tumble back down to the planet where Creed Hybrid's are created with a glimpse at the scientist eggheads who created a new monster named Pitt. Then we are shown how sibling jealousy nearly destroyed Pitt if not for his own tenacity and his innate super abilities

And ... that's it ... that's the awesome thing about Dale's work. The tales always felt like so short but when you and count the number of pages, there are the same numbers. It is always focused more on pretty story telling panels that actual content. But you will find no argument here because those of us who collect comics do so for both art and story!

Ratings: 7/10

2.101 (466) Rom #2 ... Marvel ... #rom

From all those high of Secret Wars, let's go to a low on another space-faring title except that here the hero is from beyond coming to Earth whereas in Secret Wars, it is heroes from Earth going beyond. Gee how's that for an on-the-spot opening line? Not bad, eh? Heh!

Well, aside from the cover, this issue is average, at best which is a surprise since this is a new series and one would expect a lot to happen in order to capture readers' attention. As it has been a while since our review of this series, a quick recap is as follows:

Rom is a spaceknight - basically a human being from outer space who has sacrificed his humanity by merging into a metal alloy so as to combat a nasty alien race called the Dire Wraiths. Where the Wraiths can shape change and uses magic, Rom and his allies uses technology and after a long war, they managed to kick Wraith butt. However, as the Wraith flees into space, Rom and his team decided not to allow them the chance to ever grow in strength and so chase after them. Rom was the one chosen to come to our fair planet Earth while his brother and sister knights went elsewhere

In issue 2, we see Rom still failing to connect with the human race and making little attempt to do so. Hence as he is so focused on seeking out the Wraith menace and eradicating them, he made a huge mistake here as other humans think he is the alien menace coming to kill humans since the Wraiths are disguised as humans

Unbeknownst to Rom, they not only have civilian guises but have amassed political and law enforcement might as well. And so the Wraiths set others against Rom. Naturally as they used largely human weaponry such as police firearms, nothing does Rom much harm. Still what is apparent in this issue is more the issue of misunderstanding - a point that is repeated three or four times throughout

Well while there is a fair bit of action, when it is Rom against regular people, it is not that entertaining, is it? I mean, it is fine but I can see why in the issues to come this comic needed guest stars to prop it up

Ratings: 5/10

2.100 (465) Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #6 ... Marvel ... #secretwars, #avengers

Wooo-weeeee we hit our 100th review with this post in our second year. So finally we are doing things on a consistent basis. For me, personally, it is an achievement because somehow or other, I have always started and stopped and re-started things. Even this blog is a good example. There is an earlier comic blog that I started but not kept up regularly. So even though I may wish for more followers, what is more important is the sense of achievement and the discipline to finally do something properly

Anyway, for this our 100th issue, we jumped back to the first Secret Wars as it hits issue 6 the middle mark and so far, there is no let up in the formula. Great artwork, character developments all serve to propel  an action driven storyline and this is no exception

Basically, this issue serves as a breather so there is no big action sequences but hey in this series no big action sequences is still full of action. Example: in the opening pages we see the Wasp piloting a ship out of control and crashing in a magnificent explosion only to encounter a mentally deranged Lizard whose strength seems to be increasing and she has to use her charms to calm him down while inside Doom base as he continues to study and understand Galactus, who should intrude but Klaw, the master of sound whose mind is also altered thanks to his body being blown to its essential building blocks in other series? See? Lots of happening

Meanwhile, as Colossus recovers from his earlier beating SPOILER ALERT his dreams started merging between Ezaji the alien healer and Kitty Pryde while the Torch being who he is merely swoops down literally and picks up the woman of his current dreams right in front of an embarrassed Peter

As if that isn't all, we see that Prof X decides to take the initiative to attack the villains and all these came at a price of fighting with Storm who is naturally upset as the Prof has cast her official field leadership role aside at his own convenience. And ... what's up with the intelligent Hulk? He is continuing to show signs of aggression

O and to end this review or rather a review that gives you highlights of what is going on within, if you think the action is not intense, how about Rogue getting whupped? Or Wolvie slashing someone open leaving them near death? Hehehe! Awesome!

Ratings: 8/10