Superman is who got me into super heroes, Spider-Man got me reading comics, the X-Men raised me as a young adult comic reader, but it was Wolverine who I connected with the most. You see, when I was 8 years old, I was diagnosed with what is called a prolactinoma. Basically it was a brain tumor, the size of an orange wrapped around my pituitary gland. The pituitary gland is what helps regulate hormones and assists in the development of the human body. Since this tumor was wrapped around the gland, my surgeons could only remove 3/4 of it. I have been experimenting medicine and been a part of a government research program ever since. I'm now 35 years old.
Wolverine's healing factor was the first thing I connected with. The man is able to heal from the most deadly of wounds, and is immune to pretty much any disease out there (until he was injected with a virus that took away his healing factor, which then would eventually lead to his death). But it wasn't just the idea of being able to heal from anything that was intriguing to my young mind. Wolverine was one of the toughest, scrappiest characters that I've ever read about and his attitude towards pain in general is what I connected with the most. I had to toughen myself up in order to deal with the medical procedures, tests, and weird side effects from experimental medicine that was ahead of me. Pain, of varying degrees became just something to get used to. I've since adopted a line that Wolverine has used many times, "pain and I are old friends".
I had that surgery in 1989 when things like going to Disney World were high on my priority list. It was hard to talk to my friends about how I was feeling, and I really did a good job about not making my medical issues part of my daily life. In fact, most of my friends had no idea about my medical history for many years unless it came up randomly in conversation. But there was still a part of me that didn't know how to deal with the pain, discomfort, and overall fear of not knowing what to expect next. And that's how I found a sanctuary in my Wolverine comics.
My first issue of Wolverine was #49, part 2 of a 3 part series. I'll get more into this next week, but this issue started me on a path that I am still following; the complete collection of the 616 Marvel Universe's Wolverine. (Again, more on that another time). Being an inexperienced comic collector at the time, I started buying single issues based solely on the cover art. This is how I was introduced to one of my favorite artists of all time, the great Jim Lee, with his cover of issue #27:
This iconic cover started a 3 part story called The Lazarus Project. The story itself is only ok in my opinion, but it offered another introduction to Wolverine's life, his alias Patch as well as his time spent in Madripoor.
The Lazarus Project was the end of writer Jo Duffy and penciler John Buscema's run of the series, but started my absolute favorite time period in Wolverine's career. The Larry Hama/Marc Silvestri years. And that's what I want to get into today.
#31 brought Logan, again under his "Patch" persona, back to Madripoor and to his favorite dive, The Princess Bar. There we see him in a custom made tux, sampling some "fancy single malt" with his buddy and pilot Archie Corrigan. In walks a gang of Yakuza gangsters, staring daggers into Patch's back. The bar clears out as Patch's narration tells us what's up,
"One o' the advantages o' being a mutant: Heightened senses. I caught a whiff of the gun oil, the squid ink from their tattoos, and the pickled "daikon" radishes on their breaths...
...now I can hear the rapid heartbeats and sense the adrenaline rush of men who are about to commit dangerous and violent deeds."
Hama makes Patch sound like a confident and cocky tough guy right off the bat. Then the dialogue picks up, and Wolverine says a line that describes him to a T.
Yakuza: You at the bar...are you the hairy barbarian sometimes known as "Patch"... and sometimes known as "Ro-Gan"?
Wolverine: "Ro-Gan" huh? That's rich. In your language, "Ro" can mean old age and dissipation and "Gan" can mean cancer...
He finally turns to look at them
Wolverine (continuing): Together, they add up to DEATH--
--And if you're looking for death...you've come to the right place."
Bad Ass right!!!??
Then the bad guys open fire, totally obliterating the bar where Wolverine was sitting. They stop and realize that he must be hiding. He is, and was already shot a bunch of times and is now healing behind the bar while making cracks about how the "fancy single malt" messed with his timing. One dude tries to finish the job by peaking over the bar. Instead of seeing a bleeding and whimpering target, he gets a chest full of adamantium claws that also CUT THROUGH THE BAR! Then Wolverine leaps from behind the bar and takes out the whole squad. Leaving the 3 men who led them in, 2 have dice tattooed to their foreheads and are referred to as 7 and 11, and the 3rd is the defacto leader known as dragonhead. They pop these pills that make them super strong, crazy intense, and resistant to pain. The rest of the issue is just Wolverine being a total bad ass and fighting off these guys plus the rest of the Yakuza gang.
It ends with Wolverine facing off with the Dragonhead guy on a dock, where Dragonhead pulls out a couple of grenades and removes the pins. The fight takes them into the water, where all the blood attracts two sharks. Instead of blowing up himself and Wolverine, there's an explosion and both sharks float to the surface with their heads exploded. It's revealed that Wolverine fed Dragonhead to the sharks, grenades and all.
During that issue we discover that the evil Prince and his General have teamed up with the Yakuza to develop a new drug that makes people behave like the gangsters did at the Princess Bar. They make this serum by removing brain fluid from local monkeys, who they have massacred already. We also meet Goro and Reiko who are working for the Prince. Goro lives his life by a prophecy told to him in his youth. That he can only die by a blade wielded by a dead man. Good note for later.
Issue #32 continues the story, with Logan and his pals discovering the Prince's plan and deciding how to proceed. In this issue Goro stabs Wolverine in the heart with a samurai sword, seemingly killing him. Goro takes a picture of "dead" Wolverine and uses it to gain favor with the Dai Kumo, the boss of the Yakuza. Meanwhile, Wolverine isn't dead and sees a vision of Jean Grey who helps convince him to pull out the "pain in his chest" and get back to work.
Now that the bad guys think he's dead. Wolverine decides to use that to his advantage. Which brings up to issue #33!
Wolverine is injected with a substance that slows his heartrate and convinces that Japanese customs officials that he is, in fact, a corpse. He's even buried in Dai Kumo's personal burial plot because Wolverine is such an honored and respected enemy.
Of course, Wolverine rises from the grave, and fights his way to the bad guys. He has a face off with Goro, who thought he was dead and now the prophecy can be fulfilled. The fight is quick and reminds me of that scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark when the swordsmen is showing off and Indiana Jones just shoots him instead of really getting into it with him. Wolverine and Goro rush at each other, and Wolverine ends it with a single but precise slash of his claws and just walks away, leaving Goro alive with a nasty leg wound. Then we find out that the Prince got away, but Dai Kumo the Yakuza boss has been killed by Reiko (Goro's companion from earlier).
This ends Wolverine's time in Madripoor and Japan for years, and also sends him on a quest to rediscover his roots. Issue # 34 starts a Wolverine quest that makes the Larry Hama stories stick out for me more than any other Wolverine writer. These issues were violent and fun, but also made Wolverine still appear beatable. This was many years before his healing factor would be truly tested, so the idea of him being stabbed in the chest with a samurai sword, or fighting off Sabretooth and Lady Deathstrike at the same time actually made you think he could be killed or at least hurt real bad. He gets cut up real bad in these issues too, especially in #32. There's a humorous moment that shows Logan attempting to enjoy a cigar while he's patched up and healing and the smoke is coming out of his chest through the bandages!
Thanks for reading, make sure you stay right here for the rest of the week, as I get deep into Wolverine, and finish off with the premiere of Logan starring Hugh Jackman! Until then, here's a sneak peek at issue 34! WOLVERINE vs. THE HUNTER IN DARKNESS!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment