If you like gore, action, and covert ops mixed with superheroes, you should be reading X-Force. It’s one of the longest ongoing X-Men titles today, featuring slow-burn developments as Beast becomes more evil, Deadpool put in the work to join the team, and now a villain from nearly the start of this run shows his full self. Benjamin Percy and Robert Gill have been slowly unveiling a story involving the Man with the Peacock Tattoo, and in X-Force #37, we learn his entire backstory.
The backstory of the Man with the Peacock Tattoo is not pleasant, but you could have probably gathered that from his whole vibe and desire to kill mutants. Spinning out of the events of X-Force #36, this latest issue finds the team realizing their plan to find Man with the Peacock Tattoo may not be working. Beast is pointing fingers at others, and Deadpool is bored to tears, but it’s true. The Man with the Peacock Tattoo has the upper hand and now has in his possession a resurrection egg that’ll put him over the top on accurately cloning monstrous mutant-powered weapons.
It’s quite apparent Percy is having the time of his life writing Deadpool, who gets plenty of time to yack it up and be a silly goose in this comic. Omega Red is incredibly creepy, and Domino gets some compelling moments. Her capture by The Man with the Peacock Tattoo might be the key to finding him. It just requires her to reimplant the awful torture she underwent thanks to the backups of everyone’s mind.
Deadpool is pretty great in this issue.
Credit: Marvel
While the heroes figure out how to find The Man with the Peacock Tattoo, much of this issue is devoted to the villain explaining to his child doppelgänger with mind-reading powers what it was like when he grew up. The details are sad and horrific as we learn The Man with the Peacock Tattoo is a victim himself, although lacking even a little bit of empathy. Instead, he tells this tale to his younger cloned self to keep him in line and on board with the plan. This backstory helps explain who he is and how he got to the position he’s in as a leading “genegineer” along with the incredible advancements in science. Given the teasers and solicits of multiple Wolverines running around, one might assume Beast might use his technological advancements in a future issue, but that’s just a guess.
This backstory is well told and interesting in its own right, although it’s interesting that the tale isn’t connected to mutants or his hatred of them. It’s also a little too convenient how the Man with the Peacock Tattoo got away one out of his cell.
Robert Gill gets all sorts of things in this issue, from the Bluebird submarine to plenty of horrors in giant tanks of liquid in the Man with the Peacock Tattoo’s lab. Deadpool’s comedic timing and body language may take the cake as the best visuals in this book, however. He’s funny in all the right ways. The cliffhanger features a monster that’s straight out of a 10-year-old’s drawing pad with some cool details that’ll have you lingering, although it’s a little too simple looking.
X-Force #37 offers some payoff for the years of waiting to find out who the Man with the Peacock Tattoo is while supplying some advancements on this plot. With multiple plots soon to be wrapped up, it’s nice to know one corner of the gene threat towards mutants is a step closer to finalizing.
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