Dark Wolverine 10: Wolverine Junior Does Tom Cruise Up The Back Door

Writer: Rob Williams

'Art': Matteo Buffagni and Riley Rossmo

The comic forces were working in mysterious ways when I bought Daken: Dark Wolverine 9.1. I didn’t like the character but was very pleasantly surprised by this ‘jumping on’ issue – especially since the action was moved from boring old Madripoor to America. Heroes in Madripoor always end up fighting endless ninjas. It’s like when the League of Assassins pop up in the DC – instant snooze time.

It also featured the best ‘previous on…’ intro page I’ve read in a long time. Who could resist this opener?

“Daken has set out on a quest to lie and murder his way to the top of the international criminal underworld…”

Pithy! And now we all know what’s going on...

With issue 10 Daken’s moved to LA, has started guzzling a drug called Heat and is trying to take over the local crime syndicates. He gives this a stab by attending a flouncy Hollywood party and shagging Marcus Roston ‘star of screen and botox’ who is also ‘surprisingly short in reality.’ Remind you of anyone?

There’s also some stuff going on about a killer being on the loose – the cops think it’s Daken. So it looks like stern blonde FBI lady Agent Donna Kiel will be around for a while.

Daken’s bisexuality may be a bit ‘controversial’ as you could argue it’s used here to convey his amorality and all-round shiftiness. However I’d prefer to see this any day of the week than the way Mikael Starman’s homosexuality is depicted via stereotypical ‘hey girlfriend’ sassy banter in this month’s Supergirl or the cringe-inducing tokenism of Northstar’s gay romance in Alpha Flight and X-Men.

I assumed Daken was a ‘badass’ Wolverine Boy aimed at 16 year olds. I guess he still is to some extent but Williams uses that inherent doucheyness along with Daken’s crap hair do, terrible tattoos and hackneyed anti-hero set-up to good effect. Williams revels in Daken’s cartoon reprehensibility and sets up an entertaining Hollywood satire – so hopefully we’re in for a good black comedy.

This is the first I’ve read of Rob Williams’ work but I’ve been so impressed by this (and his Captain Britain story in Iron Age 1) that I’m even considering getting his new Ghost Rider series – a character who has always bored me to smithereens. Top work!