Daredevil Villains #88: Lifeform
DAREDEVIL ANNUAL #6 (1990)
“Predator”
Writer, colourist: Gregory Wright
Artist: Cam Kennedy
Letterer: Richard Starkings
Editor: Ralph Macchio
We may have finished Ann Nocenti’s run, but we aren’t moving on to DG Chichester just yet. It’s time to check in on Daredevil Annual.
The last character that we covered from a Daredevil Annual was the Mind-Master, who debuted in Annual #4, way back in 1976. After that, Daredevil didn’t get another annual for over a decade. But in 1989, the book got another annual. Daredevil Annual #5 was a tie-in to the line-wide “Atlantis Attacks” event, with Tyrannus and Viper as the guest villains, and as such, it doesn’t concern us. It may be most notable for being misnumbered as a second Daredevil Annual #4. (The version on Marvel Unlimited has corrected the number.) But it must have done okay, since further Daredevil Annuals continued to appear through to 1994, all of them written by Gregory Wright.
For 1990, instead of a single line-wide event across the annuals, Marvel opted for crossovers among smaller groups of titles. Most of those groupings made sense. “Days of Futures Present” had the X-Men, the New Mutants, X-Factor and the Fantastic Four, in a story about Franklin Richards from the Days of Future Past timeline. “Terminus Factor” had Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Avengers and West Coast Avengers. The three Spider-Man annuals did their own story. And that left…
Um. Well, it left Daredevil, Punisher, Incredible Hulk and Silver Surfer. Natural bedfellows, I think you’ll agree.
Charts – 18 September 2026
Well, we do have a couple of new entries for actual new releases…
1. Sienna Spiro – “Great Expectations”
Two weeks, although if the ACR rule wasn’t a thing, “Rein Me In” would still be way ahead of it. She still has three tracks in the top 40 – “Die On This Hill” climbs back to number 10 in its 36th week on the top 40, while “Pure” is clinging on at number 39. By current chart standards, “Great Expectations” is a relative newcomer at a mere eleven weeks on chart.
15. Adéla – “Nicole Kidman”
This is her second hit, following on from “Ain’t In LA”, which is currently at number 13. The parent album also got to number 2 last week. So Adéla seems to have managed a legitimate breakthrough in the 2026 market, and that’s tough. The video above is not remotely subtle, but the track’s actually pretty good, and I do think there’s more going on here than with someone like Tate McRae – though Adela tracks do also have a slight tendency to lapse into generic you-go-girl lyrics in verse 2.
The X-Axis – 16 September 2026
DNX #1. (Annotations here.) I’m really not sure how Cyclops’ jaw is meant to work on that cover. Or where the light’s coming from if it’s glistening on both sides of his visor at once, come to think of it. But anyway. This event seems to be the climax of the 3K storyline that’s been running throughout Jed MacKay’s X-Men run. And I’m rather relieved to see it being kept to just X-Men and a couple of issues of Fantastic Four – DNX, after all, seems to be basically just extra issues of X-Men. But where “Age of Revelation” went wrong was in trying to turn the middle act of an X-Men storyline into a linewide event. By all means let’s keep it focussed.
This first issue is basically the X-Men showing up to stop 3K from releasing the X-virus in Philadelphia, while 3K continue to squabble amongst themselves, and the Alaskan Beast tries to get the Fantastic Four to help out with the plot. It’s fairly straightforward stuff, but I enjoy Federico Vicentini’s art, particularly on the Chairman. There’s a nice angle here with the way he can’t seem to understand why a bunch of people he only enlisted as an alliance of convenience to get this point are looking over their shoulders now that they’re about to become expendable. Despite being openly manipulative with them, he can’t understand why they aren’t true believers.
X-Men #37 annotations
X-MEN vol 7 #37
“Psi-War”
Writer: Jed MacKay
Penciller: Netho Diaz
Inker: Sean Parsons
Colourist: Arthur Hesli
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Editor: Tom Brevoort
COVER: Kid Omega and Cassandra Nova fight in the mindscape.
This is a DNX tie-in issue.
PAGE 1. Kid Omega prepares to fight Cassandra.
This is technically a flashback to “three minutes ago” – i.e., immediately before Kid Omega attacks Cassandra during the scene in pages 11-13 of DNX #1. Page 16 of DNX #1 (where Kid Omega confronts Cassandra in the mindscape) takes place between pages 1-2 of this story, and the rest of the issue picks up from there.
He’s speaking telepathically with someone who isn’t identified at this stage, but since she goes on to say that “you’ve got backup” at the start of page 2, we can take it that this is the character he calls in as back-up later in the issue.
DNX #1 annotations
DNX #1
Writer: Jed MacKay
Artist: Federico Vicentini
Colour artist: David Curiel
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Editor: Tom Brevoort
COVER: The X-Men and the Fantastic Four facing the camera, basically. The art is by Kaare Andrews.
DNX is a crossover running through this five-issue miniseries, X-Men #37-41 and Fantastic Four #17-18. X-Men #37 also comes out this week.
This feels like a story more suited to the scene-by-scene format, so let’s go with that. I’ll use the story pages, since Amazon’s reader still persists in listing every comic as starting at page 2.
PAGE 1. Cyclops recaps the Age of Revelation.
This page is essentially a recap of the “Age of Revelation” event, set mostly in a future timeline in which Revelation had released a “X-Virus” that turned some humans into mutants, and killed the rest. The future Cyclops and Beast attempted to swap minds with their present-day counterparts in order to kill Revelation before any of this could happen, but accidentally swapped places with the original Beast – the Chairman of 3K – instead.
House to Astonish Episode 220
We’ve got a tidy little hour of comicsy nattering for you this time, as we discuss Marvel/Star Wars: Hope Assembles, Fugitive X-Force, Origin III, The Snail and the extensions of Fury of Firestorm and Deadman. We’ve also got reviews of Fixation and The Forever Home and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe is getting in a bit of a flap. All this plus The Human Muppet Christmas Carol, the Ed Miliband of the X-Men and the Little Mermaid beating someone up with a crowbar in a car park.
The episode is here, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments, on Bluesky or via email.
Daredevil Villains #87: Shotgun
DAREDEVIL #272-273 (November 1989)
“Liberation” / “The Billion Dollar Ashtray”
Writer: Ann Nocenti
Penciller: John Romita Jr
Inker: Al Williamson
Colourist: Max Scheele
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Editor: Ralph Macchio
There’s still a way to go in the Ann Nocenti run after these issues, but this is where we leave it. While she created a string of new characters in the early part of her run, the later issues feature longer storylines and returning or guest villains, with a couple of one-off stories about everyday bad people along the way.
So, to be specific, issue #274 has Skip Ash as the villain. Issues #275-276 are an Acts of Vengeance tie-in, with guest villain Ultron. Issue #277 is a one-off story about a manipulative psychiatrist. Issues #278-282 feature Mephisto and Blackheart. Issue #283 guest stars Captain America, and the villains are assorted corporations. Issues #284-290 are a Bullseye storyline. And her final issue, issue #291, has Bullet.
Which means that for us, Ann Nocenti’s run draws to a close with the entirely unrepresentative figure of Shotgun. These two issues are part of the Number Nine storyline, which we’ve already looked at in the context of Skip Ash. As you’ll remember, Skip is a factory farmer who’s doing illegal operations for the CIA on the side. But he’s also got a laboratory which is altering women to make them “perfect”, and one of them, Number Nine, has been freed by his semi-estranged daughter Brandy. Since this is still a superhero comic, Skip calls in some favours from his government contacts to try and get Number Nine back. And so they send Shotgun to help out.
Charts – 11 September 2026
At last, turnover!
1. Sienna Spiro – “Great Expectation”
This has taken ten weeks to climb to number 1, which is positively sprightly by 2026 standards. Of course, there’s an asterisk here – if “Rein Me In” wasn’t subject to downweighting, it would be thrashing this track with a margin of more than a third. But you can make a fair case that the aim of that rule isn’t just to speed up the charts, it’s to attach less weight to tracks that are just hanging around on playlists.
The X-Axis – 9 September 2026
WOLVERINE #27. (Annotations here.) Another quiet week, then. Just the two books. It’s been a long time since we were getting this sort of week on a regular basis. It’s quite refreshing, to be honest.
That said, even without much in the way of competition, Wolverine continues to underwhelm. This is a weirdly half-formed story. Saladin Ahmed spent an age setting up the first Adamantine storyline, and presenting the resolution as an epic battle. That story ends with Wolverine somehow losing the adamantium on his right-hand claws. And now, about six issues later, we get the Adamantine coming back for a dashed-off two-parter. There’s no apparent rhyme or reason to this – it really does seem to be Wolverine and some of his counterparts being arbitrarily yanked to another dimension so that they can fight the Adamantine again and summarily dispatch it. There’s nothing apparently at stake, and no real explanation of why we shouldn’t expect him back in another few months.
Inglorious X-Force #9
INGLORIOUS X-FORCE #9
“A Force to be Conflicted”
Writer: Tim Seeley
Artist: Michael Sta. Maria
Colour artist: Romulo Fajardo Jr
Letterer: Joe Caramagna
Editors: Mark Basso & Alanna Smith
COVER: The two X-Force teams fight.
X-FORCE:
Cable. The entity that’s been possessing him throughout this series is named Catharsix. Cable remains oblivious to the fact that he’s possessed; his own dictaphone recordings actually show him talking to himself, but he apparently can’t register the other voice.
The previous issue ended with another time slip, in which Cable’s mind appeared to be transported to the Askani timeline, somewhere amongst the flashbacks in Cable vol 1 #1-2. There’s no direct follow-up on that – Cable’s mind appears to have returned to the present day, and he either doesn’t remember or doesn’t mention what happened.
