Wolverine #32 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
WOLVERINE vol 7 #32
“Weapons of X, part 2”
Writer: Benjamin Percy
Artist: Juan José Ryp
Colourist: Frank D’Armata
Letterer: Cory Petit
Design: Tom Muller with Jay Bowen
Editor: Mark Basso
COVER / PAGE 1. The real Wolverine amidst an army of Beast’s clones.
PAGES 2-4. Beast’s Wolverine clones kill Lord Stewart.
Lord Stewart is a one-off character. Some publishers try to avoid using the names of real people; Marvel’s legal department is apparently made of sterner stuff.
“Since the UK pulled out of the treaty…” Back at the first Hellfire Gala, thanks to the machinations of Coven Akkaba over in Excalibur.
The Krakoan flowers were sourced via Maverick, as he confirms in passing on page 15. It’s rather odd for Lord Stewart to plant the things here and then express surprise that the local wildlife are eating them (particularly as the stag will be part of a herd that he deliberately keeps for hunting purposes), but then he’s probably not meant to be very bright.
Beast presumably deems this an assassination-worthy event because Stewart is trying to break the monopoly on Krakoan plants, but that’s hardly much of an excuse. And, of course, the poor stalker is there to make sure that we have an unequivocal victim.
The Wolverine clones are all wearing the same control collars that Beast put on the real Wolverine in the previous arc – implying that there would be a real risk of this going very badly wrong for him if one of them happened to get cut free.
PAGE 5. Recap and credits.
PAGES 6-8. The Wolverine clones return home.
Beast’s narrative basically recaps the same points he made next issue. Either he or his writer still seems to be under the impression that utilitarianism is an amoral stance, which is just plain wrong – fundamentally, it’s meant to be a worldview based on the premise that whether something is right or wrong depends on what consequences it has, and something is good if it achieves the greatest good for the greatest number. The classic objections to this theory are that it implies that it would be, for example, morally acceptable to enslave a minority for the good of the majority, which is indeed a problem with the concept in its simplest forms – but it’s still meant to be a moral standard.
Beast specifically frames his notion of utilitarianism as being based on the greatest good for the greatest number of mutants, implying that ordinary humans are outside his moral universe. He also seems to have a zero-sum view of negotiation.
PAGE 9. Data page. This feels a bit going-through-the-motions – it’s really nothing more than a continuation of the monologue in the previous scene, and it barely fills a quarter of the page.
Einstein. The full quote is “All religions, arts and sciences are branches of the same tree.” It comes from a 1937 essay entitled “Moral Decay”, and Einstein’s point was that all three were united by the fact that they were routes towards enriching human life and benefitting the cause of freedom. Clearly, Beast has missed the point completely.
Vitruvian Man is the drawing of a man in two different poses in a circle and square, to illustrate some comments about human body proportions by the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius.
PAGES 10-11. Wolverine brings the Beast’s body to the Quiet Council.
This is (not very prominently) labelled as a flashback to “yesterday”. Wolverine killed this body in issue #30 and dealt with its booby trap in issue #31, so presumably we’re on the same day as that.
The Quiet Council. The two empty seats belong to Nightcrawler and Mr Sinister. The absence of those two characters avoids the need to be explicit about when this story is taking place vis-a-vis Immortal X-Men or Legion of X.
An obvious question now is whether the Quiet Council decide to resurrect Beast given that Wolverine has apparently killed him. If so, the most recent back-up would reset his memories to his time in the Avengers (as established last issue, Beast wiped the more recent records).
PAGES 12-13. Beast continues to monologue.
The Cerebro Sword was created from the wreckage of the Cerebro helmet that Professor X was wearing when he was assassinated in X-Force #1, and apparently still has some connection to the wider Cerebro system; it was used to access the Cerebro network, in some vaguely defined way, during X Lives of Wolverine. His possession of the Sword might have something to do with his ability to create clones without access to the Five – though note that these are presumably just regular old clones. Beast isn’t explicit here about why the Sword is his “greatest vulnerability”, but perhaps it’s because it could be used to track him.
PAGE 14. Data page. Beast’s monologue continues. He views the Beast clones as purely instrumental creations and fears that they could be encouraged to overthrow him if they figure out that they’re basically identical to him. In describing them as “sycophantic and covetous”, he’s either incredibly lacking in self-awareness or full of self-loathing, and the former seems rather more likely to be the intention.
PAGES 15-22. The Wolverine clones attack Maverick’s ship.
Maverick is, of course, correct that the flowers are a replaceable resource. The issue here (so far as Krakoa is concerned) is that their national security depends on maintaining their monopoly, since that’s their main economic leverage over the rest of the world.
Despite his lack of interest in serving the mutant nation, Maverick still has no time for anti-mutant sentiment in his men – or maybe he just sees it as insubordination, given that he’s a mutant himself.
“Not after all we’ve been through.” Maverick and Wolverine’s shared back story has been covered extensively in this series. While Percy’s version of Maverick is vastly more cynical and corrupt than any previous interpretation, he and Wolverine are still former colleagues who apparently helped each other to hold on to their core identities while being manipulated through memory alteration by their employers.
PAGES 23-24. Beast is satisfied.
“After what happened in our space laboratory…” In X-Force #34-35, Beast hired Maverick to abduct criminals for his hidden space prison, and Maverick abandoned him when the prisoners rioted.
Naturally, Beast has got it wrong again: Maverick has not only escaped, but he’s got a spare Wolverine with him. The obvious question is what happens when Maverick removes the clone’s control collar.
PAGE 25. Trailer.
I really don’t think much of Benjamin Percy as a writer, and yet I can’t write him off completely, and this issue is a good example.
On the one hand, I’m more emotionally invested in Wolverine getting his revenge on Beast than I usually am in a “Wolverine hunts a guy down to get revenge” story.
On the other hand, the pacing is interminable. Having Beast blather on issue after issue about his worldview, which was already pretty well solidified a few dozen issues ago and hasn’t changed, is excruciating. Seeing the lengths to which he’ll go is gratuitious, he’s already well into past-redemption villainy for any sensible reader.
And the one aspect of the issue that COULD have been genuinely interesting…Gillen or Ewing really could have made a meal out of Wolverine confronting the Quiet Council with the Beast’s crimes…was quickly glossed over.
I agree with Sean. I wanted to see more of what happened when Logan dumped Beast’s corpse at the QC meeting and went “Beast bad.”
I mean, hasn’t ANYONE noticed or cared that Beast fired X-Force and wandered off into the ocean with a giant skull base? Or was it all “huh, that was weird, what’s for dinner?”
I like how Beast is all “yeah, I can only trust myself to do what needs to be done, also I can’t trust myself.” Like that’ll end well.
I really like the art by Ryp & co., it reminds me a little of Frank Quitely and Geoff Darrow without copying either.
But the story… this issue felt lazy. I’m tired of this plot and can’t understand why Beast wasn’t thrown in the Pit or something when his secret prison was discovered. *Then* his failsafe activates and he escapes Krakoa, captures Wolverine and brings him to the auction, whatever else is part of Percy’s overall plot. The data pages being a handful of sentences made them even more pointless than usual. The Cerebro sword is stupid- do you get information off of it by stabbing a computer? If not for the visuals, this issue would be a total waste.
Well obviously Beast is trying to convince himself that he is trying to do the right thing. All the betrayals, all the sacrifices, all of his intelligence, yet deep down he is still having an issue with what he is do, even though he believes he is doing for the greater good.
Is the Cerebro Sword, which was in Mikhail’s possession for sometime IIRC, going to somehow tie this Beast storyline into the long dormant Chronicler subplot?
Did anyone else think that Lord Stewart looked a whole lot like GK Chesterton? I’m about 90% sure that Ryp used photos of him for reference. (Which is fine – I just thought it was funny when I “recognized” him.)
Aren’t the flowers of Krakoa and won’t grow anywhere without it’s permission, which is why people were stealing petals in the early issues?
Why does Beast act like killing Maverick will get rid of him? If Beast had succeeded, wouldn’t the Quiet Council have just resurrected Maverick and sent him to capture Beast or something?
What is the point of having a text page if the text takes up at most 20% of the page?
@Michael: Does Maverick have a backup on Krakoa? I can’t remember from his previous appearances whether this came up, hell, I’ve done such a good job of trying to forget this run that an earlier issue might have started with him coming out of an egg and I genuinely forgot. But even if that were the case how likely is it that he’s backed up so he’ll remember why he died?
I’ll say one thing for issue: Beast’s plant giant having Wolverine claws made of actual Wolverines is so dumb it’s hilarious.