Wolverine #26 annotations
WOLVERINE vol 8 #26
“Savage Journey”
Writer: Saladin Ahmed
Artist: Julius Ohta
Colour artist: Jesus Aburtov
Letterer: Cory Petit
Editor: Mark Basso
COVER: Wolverine, with the three “savage champions” from issue #20. Only two of them actually appear in this story, Red Hare and Boneclaw. The one on the left is Wolf With a Gun, and presumably we’ll see him in due course.
There’s not a great deal to be said about this issue, but let’s run through it.
WOLVERINE:
Last issue, he regained his healing factor and the bone claws on his right-hand grew back. As this story begins, he’s uncertain whether to call in some favours and get them coated in adamantium again. On the one hand, his adamantium was originally foisted on him against his will and he’s uncomfortable with the idea that it defines him. But at the same time he clearly does think of it as his default setting, and seems to worry that he’s being self-indulgent in not making himself the strongest Wolverine he can be.
His narration lists a string of other recent failures: “failing the New Morlocks, Silver Sable cutting things off, bumping heads with Alpha Flight, watching Mor die”. The New Morlocks rejected Wolverine in issue #20, with Silver Sable choosing to stay with them and fulfil her contract. Alpha Flight and Mor were last issue.
Somehow, he gets transported to the home world of Red Hare, one of the “savage champions” that he previously met in issue #20. In issue #19, we were told that each world has a “savage champion” who embodies “man”, “beast” and “metal” in a single soul, and who is uniquely capable of defeating the Adamantine, apparently as some kind of predestined event that plays out on each world. In issue #20, three other savage champions – all obvious Wolverine counterparts – show up to help against the Adamantine, but they were shown waiting in a limbo location for the point where they were able to enter. Here, Wolverine just gets transported to Red Hare’s world. It’s not clear why this happens – Red Hare denies having actively done anything to bring Wolverine there, beyond pray for aid. Nonetheless, Wolverine decides to help out, since he owed Red Hare a favour anyway.
He still hasn’t adjusted to fighting with bone claws, and shatters them anew while fighting the Adamantine.
SUPPORTING CAST:
Nightcrawler. He encourages Wolverine to make a decision about whether to restore his adamantium, but he’s neutral about what that decision should be. He’s going on a date with MacKenzie DeNeer, his girlfriend from current issues of Uncanny X-Men, though she doesn’t appear.
Red Hare. Last seen in issue #20, but this is the first time we’ve seen his homeworld. His home appears to be a version of China at some vaguely medieval point in history. (There was an actual Gao Wei in the sixth century, but Red Hare’s armour looks far too modern for that.) He refers to a “threefold kingdom”, which doesn’t seem to be a real-world term.
Despite his “savage champion” billing, he seems like quite a cheerful fellow, and the locals regard him as a hero and protector of the people.
Boneclaw. The “neanderthal” Wolverine from issue #20. His world seems to be a frozen wasteland complete with giant sabretooths (literal sabretooths, not Sabretooth counterparts).
VILLAINS:
The Adamantine. This is the Adamantine’s counterpart from Red Hare’s world – or at least, presumably it is, because it seems to be able to move between worlds. As indicated in issue #20, it can be defeated but not permanently eradicated. Red Hare has evidently defeated his world’s Adamantine in the past, but it’s returned with the warlord Gao Wei as its host. According to Red Hare, when active, the Adamantine feels compelled to destroy any savage champions.
Perhaps because it’s already been defeated in Red Hare’s world, the Adamantine seems to be relatively easy to defeat by killing its host. At this point it turns into a giant metal sword and cuts a portal into Boneclaw’s world; Red Hare concludes that it’s fleeing there, which seems reasonable enough. On arrival, it selects a mammoth as its new host.
Gao Wei. Described by Red Hare as a warlord who has ravaged “the threefold kingdom”, and who has apparently rallied an army of killers to his banner after allowing the Adamantine to host him.
Ah yes, we’re back to the Adamantine and the Savage Champions. Who asked for these concepts to be revisited so soon?
A thousand AU Wolverines already extant, and we get Wild West, Caveman, and Asian Fusion knockoffs. Meh.
Probably due to Ahmed’s run quickly coming to an end, and Ahmed thinking these were some really compelling creations on his part (maybe he did re-read some Michael Moorcock books recently?), rather than the fact that most readers wanted to be able to totally forget about all four components. At this point, this volumn of Wolverine is already cancelled, so it doesn’t matter if the fans are turning out at seeing all of this being brought back immediately.
I can’t believe Brevoort let Ahmed bring back the Adamantine considering how much people hated it. Is he TRYING to tank the book?
@Chris V- Ahmed is listed as the writer for issue 29-30. So he’s still on the book, unfortunately. The book just skipped an issue in October, for some reason.
Red Hare was the famous warhorse of Lü Bu, the strongest fighter in China’s Three Kingdoms era (which I assume “threefold kingdom” is a reference to). In the Romance of the Three Kingdoms he (Lü Bu, not his horse) is usually depicted as a treacherous, selfish bully, but the historical record is kinder to him.
Gao Wei could be a reference to a somewhat villainous emperor of the same name from a few hundred years later, or it could be a modification of Cao Wei, one of the three kingdoms. Or it could just be a random name.
I haven’t read the issue, but given the context wouldn’t the “threefold kingdom” comment likely be a reference to the split of China into three competing empires in Romance of the Three Kingdoms? Particularly since Red Hare’s name is derived from Guan Yu’s horse.
My goodness, was this boring.
@TheOtherMichael
Marvel’s obviously trying to make Wolverine their archetypical EveryMan for All Seasons , All Things to All Men LOL
Considering how Ahmed’s main storyline took roughly twenty some odd issues to complete sorta-kinda in DAREDEVIL, this is par for the course for him–ideas fans hate stretched out to inordinate lengths
If nothing else, the Krakoa era kinda answered the question of whether Wolverine has made peace with his adamantium, right? He clearly has, or he wouldn’t have let the Five and Forge keep giving him new adamantium bones every time they gave him a new body. He could’ve just said, “Default factory settings only, please” at any time. He didn’t.
I can certainly buy the idea that he doesn’t LIKE the adamantium, but recognizes it as a necessary evil to be the most effective adventurer/crime-fighter/mutant rights advocate he can be. Fine. But nothing has changed since the Krakoa era (if anything, things are even worse for mutants), so there shouldn’t really be much debate about whether he should try to get the other claws re-coated. Unless, I guess, his thought is “Maybe I can get along with just ONE set.” Or he thinks it’ll be much more of a pain than it was when the Five magically did it.
It is a pain. First you have to find all those mutant deathwatch beetles…
[…] #26. (Annotations here.) Oh, we’re going back to revisit the alternate timeline Wolverines from issue #20? I guess I […]
Having 616 Wolverine move towards the status quo of Wolverine 2099 was not on my 2026 bingo card.
“If nothing else, the Krakoa era kinda answered the question of whether Wolverine has made peace with his adamantium, right? He clearly has, or he wouldn’t have let the Five and Forge keep giving him new adamantium bones every time they gave him a new body.”
If memory serves, there was an X-Men Annual ages ago that also kind of settled this question. I remember it because of the Alan Davis art. It was some story about the X-Men trying to find some super-cosmic crystal thingy, only all of them except Wolverine got caught in their own dream-delusions.
Wolverine made it to the end, got killed by the big baddie inches before reaching the crystal thingy, but a drop of his blood touched the crystal. This gave him the power to reconstitute his body from scratch, which he did so with all his adamantium upgrades.
This was some time in the post “Fall of the Mutants” era where the X-Men were allegedly invisible and lived in Australia. Anyway, same kind of deal as what you’re talking about here.