WOLVERINE vol 8 #15
“Alpha Flight”
Writer: Saladin Ahmed
Artist: Mike Henderson
Colour artist: Jesus Aburtov
Letterer: Cory Petit
Editor: Mark Basso

COVER: Wolverine, surrounded by headshots of the members of Alpha Flight. Given the signature (“Panosian with respect to Byrne”), I assume it’s a homage, but I can’t place it. (As pointed out in the comments, it’s Alpha Flight vol 1 #12.)

WOLVERINE: 

He’s continuing to train the Morlocks and bond/flirt with Silver Sable. The main difference between the two seems to be that she has a “life’s too short” worldview; his extended lifespan doesn’t fit that approach, but she may not be picking up on that. Sable claims to be impressed by his training techniques, saying that he’s done much better with the Morlocks than she ever did – of course, he has much more experience in training complete rookies who’d rather be noncombatants.

SUPPORTING CAST:

Silver Sable. She’s also stuck around to train the Morlocks (which is what she’s being paid for, after all), and seems keen to liven things by sparring and flirting with Wolverine.

Vindicator raises the obvious question of how anyone involved with the New Morlocks can afford to hire Silver Sable for this job, but doesn’t pursue the point beyond flagging it for the readers’ attention.

The New Morlocks. Wolverine and Silver Sable have been training them to defend themselves – the training is obviously directed at Department H, although Wolverine refers to “what the mutant hunters and bigots and super villains’ll do if they find this little squatter camp”, which wouldn’t apply to Department H because they already know where it is. Silver Sable implied in the previous issue that there were a couple of original Morlocks in here, and two of them do indeed show up. Two issues in, we’ve still only seen four of them, but presumably by this point Wolverine has seen a community that matches what was described to him, or else he’d be saying something about it.

Chowdown. He doesn’t seem particularly enthusiastic about Wolverine’s survival training, and would clearly rather be a non-combatant.

The art still doesn’t convey very clearly how his powers work – he’s able to “eat” Ape, but we saw last issue that this seemed to involve sucking the target into a hole in his stomach. Presumably he just lets Ape go harmlessly, since nobody seems especially panicked by this.

He “doesn’t see so well” and takes “medicinal herbs” for it.

Deepfake. Wolverine does refer to her as “she” this issue. Her power, which was only hinted at last issue, is to make “energy clones” of other mutants which copy their powers. As suggested last issue, this is exhausting and she can’t keep it up for long before fainting. Wolverine thinks she just needs practice.

Ape and Erg. Two actual original Morlocks, both of whom debuted in Power Pack #12 (1985). Ape is a shapechanger, and Erg fires electric blasts from his eye. Both of them were survivors of the original Mutant Massacre. Erg was last seen on Krakoa during Way of X. Ape hasn’t been seen in a present-day story since Weapon X vol 2 #5, when he died in the Neverland concentration camp. Presumably he was resurrected off panel on Krakoa.

They emphasise that their experience proves the need for training to be ready in the event of an attack, but don’t go into details about what they’re talking about – either the Mutant Massacre is too painful to talk about, or they think it’s just going to panic the newbies.

VILLAINS:

Department H. The usual bunch of anonymous soldiers in masks, plus the following…

Agent Mehta. Whether she’s technically a villain or not, she certainly serves as the lead antagonist here. As in the previous issue, she regards Wolverine as having crossed a line by teaming up with Silver Sable to fight her men. She insists that the camp is illegal (which is probably true, and the likes of Ape and Erg may well also be illegal immigrants), and claims that Department H are bringing these families into the fold in order to prove them with social services and the like. Wolverine believes that she’s sincere but naive.

Alpha Flight. As in X-Men #11-12, most of the team are prisoners on work release after the events of the last Alpha Flight miniseries during “Fall of X”. So the angle we’re doing here, let’s be clear, is that the fascist takeover of North America during “Fall of X” has persisted the most in… Canada. I’m not honestly prepared to stomach that from Americans right now, but that’s where we are.

The new Vindicator, Agent Arsenault, is still their field leader. X-Men presented her as basically competent if obnoxious, but here Mehta describes her as “a bit overzealous”, and she’s willing to use live fire against the Morlocks, describing them as “criminals”, which is probably true, “a public safety threat”, which is only true in the sense that they might have god-knows-what powers, and “terrorists”, which is ludicrous. Marrina, Puck and Snowbird show up for this mission, and are trying to handle things in a more conventional way. Wolverine is evidently aware of their status quo and doesn’t take their involvement personally; Vindicator believes (with some justification) that they’re holding back against him.

We’re told that Guardian and Shaman has refused this mission and are “in solitary confinement”. This doesn’t fit with the way the team were portrayed in X-Men, where we were told that they had been persuaded to sign up for the scheme. Guardian did participate in the last mission, but Shaman was said to have refused to join the scheme at all, and they were trying to find leverage to win him over.

The Adamantine. It shows up in a subplot to kill an apparently famous retired boxer called Joe. It seems to be hunting for a great warrior, and to be baffled by the idea that this is just an ordinary man well past his prime. It concludes that it needs to kill more people.

CONTINUITY REFERENCES:

• Ape and Erg allude to terrible things that could befall the Morlocks if they aren’t prepared, obviously referencing the Mutant Massacre crossover from 1987.
• Wolverine and Silver Sable’s first encounter with the Department H troops was in the previous issue.
• Heather Hudson is mentioned as being in a coma; that’s been the case since the last Alpha Flight miniseries.
• The Adamantine refers to its “champion-guide Romulus” – the two were bonded in issues #7 and #8.