When it comes to Marvel’s merry mutants, one thing is always true: there’s never going to be just one team of X-Men. Following in the steps of Uncanny X-Men, X-Men, X-Factor, and the other titles launched in the new “From the Ashes” era of the X-Men comes Weapon X-Men. Designed to be a showcase for Wolverine, Deadpool, Cable, Chamber, and Thunderbird, it’s a bit like X-Force, if X-Force was comprised of a bunch of ’90s mega-characters who all kinda hate working with one another. That forced team up is what makes the Joe Casey and ChrisCross book fun, but also frustrating.
After receiving a rendezvous point for a mutant in need of rescue, Cable recruits Wolverine to help him with the reconnaissance and extraction. Since Deadpool was with Wolverine at the time of his arrival, he tags along (much to Cable and Wolverine’s chagrin), and the three make a stop in London on their way to pick up some much needed firepower in the form of Chamber. Once they arrive at their location, the mutants are surprised to learn that Cable has hidden the fact that their target is in Latveria, which is the current center of the Marvel universe. Then they come across Thunderbird, who is making mincemeat out of an army of Doctor Doom’s Doombots for reasons all his own. As the makeshift team of mutants head further into Latveria, they discover the true enemy behind their mission, and face betrayals and redemption within the ranks of their team.
I’ll be the first to admit, the idea of these five characters teaming up for a new team, even one as ridiculously named as “Weapon X-Men”, gave me pause. Putting Wolverine, Cable, and Deadpool onto one team makes sense from a business standpoint, but Chamber and Thunderbird are two strange pulls, despite my love of the former Generation X member without a lower jaw. Unfortunately that seems to be something Joe Casey came up against when writing this miniseries too, as Chamber and Thunderbird are largely just kind of “there” during the action at the beginning of the series. While Thunderbird gets an affecting single issue story in the final issue collected here, it feels a little “too little, too late” for the character, while Chamber is really there just to be the guy who can blow things up, a roster spot that a lot of other mutants could fill as well.
Marvel
Casey’s script feels less like the start of a new team and more like an anniversary special idea for Deadpool and Cable that featured Wolverine, but then he was told to add a few random characters to flesh out the roster. There’s a lot of dangling questions left after the collection ends, and I’m still not entirely sure if the initial rescue mission was for Thunderbird, another mutant, or part of the mystery villain’s plan, because the book ends on a note that implied more was to come until Marvel changed course and ended the series at issue #5. The two strongest issues are the fourth and fifth ones, which are largely done and ones featuring these mutants being forced to work together to fight a giant robot and stop some time travel shenanigans, respectively. If the the rest of the series was like that, instead of strange allusions to the events of One World Under Doom and the previously ended “Fall of the House of X”, the end result of Weapon X-Men would probably be a bigger slam dunk for me.
Marvel
Perhaps the real reason for Joe Casey writing this series was to work with ChrisCross. If that’s the case, it’s good enough for me, as the art is the real standout here. Evoking the best of Ed McGuinness, Joe Madueira, and even Rob Liefeld, ChrisCross took all of the elements of the “most extreme” era of comics and uses it to create fun and lively panels throughout, and Casey gives him plenty to work with. While only five issues, Weapon X-Men features Wolverine LMD androids, Deadpool fighting Wolverine, a trip through the time stream, AND a giant robot fight. It’s a bit overwhelming at times, but it’s damn cool to look at, especially when it’s paired with solid inking from Mark Morales and fantastic coloring from Yen Nitro.
In the end, I’m not quite sure what to make of Weapon X-Men. It’s a fun and breezy action comic featuring characters I like (and Deadpool), but I also struggle to see what was the exact point of the series was. It’s not integral enough to the overall One World Under Doom storyline to be a true tie-in, but it’s also not fleshed out enough to serve as a new team of mutants, especially with the abrupt ending. If Joe Casey had a little bit more time to figure out exactly what he wanted Weapon X-Men to be, this collection would probably have a “Vol. 1” on it. But as it stands right now it’s just a perfectly serviceable action comic with fantastic art and not much else.
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