James Howlett, AKA Logan, AKA Patch, AKA whatever aliases I’ve forgotten… this is your life in Life of Wolverine #1.
In Life of Wolverine #1, Jean Grey escorts readers through a complete and semi-thorough reexamination of —you guessed it— the life of Wolverine from his origins to the present day. It’s a tall order for what is only a semi-oversized one-shot of thirty-odd pages, but with the impending release of Deadpool & Wolverine in theaters later this month, there’s not a better time for it.
That being said, Life of Wolverine #1 unfortunately reads like a book report or a wiki entry rather than a proper story. In spite of writer Jim Zub’s valiant efforts to give this one-shot an emotional hook with the Jean narration and trying to tie the disparate threads of Wolverine’s long existence into a coherent throughline, the pacing of the thing is just too fast to really let any of it sink in, regardless of whether the reader is a newbie or seasoned Marvel fan. You may learn a thing or two you didn’t previously know, but on the whole I don’t think anything shown here will be especially groundbreaking or revelatory to most of the audience. It’s a strategic primer for those who want to see Hugh Jackman’s big return to the role on the big screen, but Marvel has never really done a great job of translating the success of the MCU to the comics side of things, and I don’t know if the intended audience for this one-shot is especially big or even interested in seeking it out.
The publisher recently attempted something similar with 2019’s History Of The Marvel Universe, and while that series also suffered from a similar sense of book report-itis, Javier Rodriguez’s art elevated it into something novel and visually gorgeous. Ramón F. Bachs’ art here, while not bad at all, is forced to pack in so many narrative beats and recreate classic moments from Wolverine’s lore that none of it gets to breathe or linger on the page. I can see this one-shot becoming something of a staple in “New to Wolverine?” reading lists once it drops on Marvel Unlimited, but as a standalone comic book priced at $4.99, you could pick up something more substantive than Life of Wolverine #1.
Life of Wolverine #1
4.99
Credits
- Writer: Jim Zub
- Artist: Ramón F. Bachs
- Color Artist: Java Tartaglia
- Letterer: VC's Joe Sabino
- Cover Artists: Ron Lim & Israel Silva
Credits (cont)
- Editor: Mark Basso
- Publisher: Marvel Entertainment
