Issue #124

January 15th, 2008

    
I noted in a recent thought about the X-Men that I am what I’d describe a Deadpool fan. The gist was:

He’s one of the survivors of those instances when Marvel finds a villain becoming popular enough to make a hero. He’s a character that’s just popular enough to have a fan base that can keep him in books featuring him, but no so popular that MARVEL would care to keep a close eye on. This allowed a certain amount of room to be rather creative that took Deadpool to some rather interesting places and a tool to poke fun with an audience of insiders who would and could appreciate it.

. . . Deadpool for me remains really an optimal character in Big II comics in that he has high adaptability, in terms of showing up in any corner and not seeming misplaced and always adding to any such occasion.

    
I will give anything related Deadpool a chance, and I’ve been rather interested in how the character would be handled and perhaps forced to (de)evolve as we get closer to a big screen roles in the forthcoming Wolverine film. Six issues into a new series seems like a good sample-period.

I have thus far been rather ambivalent toward the series. Before the series was released, I heard Way speak on the plans for the series via the Comic Geek Speak Podcast, and I have to admit that it had me optimistic as I could see a title or character like this really opening up creative avenues for a writer that I tend to find somewhat stiff in his previous work. He’s incredibly consistent, so much so it tends to reveal – for me – a lack of dynamic to a character that personifies at least a couple different definitions of the very word. I’m not sure if it’s a flaw on the proper book, more than simply being that Way obviously writes stories in a manner he both enjoys and is comfortable with, which makes him a creator that I don’t think is prone to win or lose fans that have already experienced his work and have made a choice.

The 6th issue I think displays the weaknesses and strengths of the series thus far. What could be called ‘filler’ could also be viewed as a solid, self-contained, adventure within the bigger framework of the Dark Reign arc going through the Marvel U. What is essentially a telling of a violent fight between Deadpool and Tigershark combined with an (not so) innocent ‘”impress the girl” dalliance that at times threatens to be both charming and fun.

Threatens. I just can’t help but think that the series thus far can be aptly described as a threat. We see glimpses of that charm and delirious whimsy mixed with high-octane action that makes Deadpool – at his best – this almost impossibly unique character (even more so when considering his origins). Thus far, it is just that though, glimpses and threats – the 6th issue, like the series itself is passable, but as a reader that thinks a Deadpool comic could easily be – and has been in the past – the top of the stack Marvel read, middle of the pack is a disappointment. At the moment it feels like Deadpool playing Deadpool, and nobody can mimic the merc with a mouth.

Not even himself.

    
*The best part of the issue was indeed the preview to Agents of Atlas which is one of the best comics of the last several years. I can’t wait for that!

_{Jan-ken-pon is the time traveling, force-walking, multiverse crossing column of Jay Tomio, owner of 1/3 of everything you see currently on screen and the editor of Heliotrope. He is not a Liefeld creation. Some call him the Bodhisattva.}