review

today we are looking at wolverine: xisle, written by bruce jones with art by jorge lucas. the blurb for this trade paperback reads:
intending to spend a rare carefree moment at a carnival with his beloved stepdaughter amiko, wolverine unleashes a violent side of himself that sends the young girl running in fear. unable to face what he’s done, wolverine is propelled into a soul searching adventure he may not be able to escape.
what did he do?
and what did young amiko see?

sounds exciting doesn’t it, and graphic novels have the capacity to thrill and entertain in a way that books and films just can’t. sadly this is not one of those times.

wolverine, known to many as that nice sexy (he sings in musical’s you know) hugh jackman, is a hard nut, a mean lean fighting machine who would gut you rather than look at you. well that’s what he is some of the times in the comics, sometimes he is a samurai warrior filled with honour and passion, other times he is a pussy who my dead granny could whip the snot out of.
the classic wolverine character was defined by the works of chris claremont and john byrne in their run on the x-men. once wolverine became one of the key characters of the marvel universe it was only a matter of time before the character became diluted with writers always seeking a new approach to what make wolverine tick (characterisation dontcha know!)

so here we have bruce jones’ attempt to tell a in-depth psychological wolverine tale. wolverine’s day out with his stepdaughter all goes pear shaped when they visit a carnival. there wolverine becomes unstable, getting a little bit peeved that people think he is a mutant (he is – and in the marvel universe mutants are hated, when done well this works fine as an analogy for racism, sometimes it gets over done) of course this is a character who has faced down aliens, gone toe to toe with some badass mofo’s but in wolvies cases sticks and stones don’t hurt but names do.
later in a moment of teenage stupidity amiko wants to take her mutant stepdad (feared and hated) into the carnival freak show (ooh get the symbolism?) wolverine gets a little annoyed at that, throws a hissy fit (as befits the star of musicals, mm breaking down the fourth wall here…) which results in him striking out at amiko and others in the carnival. she runs, he follows, he loses her, he gets drunk. wakes up on a mysterious island.
there in short he is confronted by his internal demons (ho hum). this boils down to him wandering around the island, discovering a mysterious bar and a very hairy beastie to fight. and fight he does. in the end all he had to do was accept that he had spent years thinking he was a freak. job done, mysterious island turns in to a normal island and right on cue a helicopter comes and picks him.
the problem with comics like these is that they pretend to be so much more than they are. they wrap the fighty bits up with cod psychology that is supposed to make them seem profound, always made worse when (as in this case) poorly told. i was surprised at how slight and unappealing the story was, generally i have liked bruce jones’ work, on this he missed the mark.
jorge lucas’ art is detailed without being overly fussy (a trait all too many of today’s comic creators have). his style is one that appears to have been influenced by people such as jim lee rob leifeld, scott kolins and geoff darrow. he tells the tale as well as the source material allows.
all in all not a great read.