I’ve been up and down on Percy’s Wolverine run. It’s a book I’ve pretty much followed since it launched, but my interest in it has waned a bit throughout, particularly post-X Lives of Wolverine and X Deaths of Wolverine. Still, I’ve found the book to be at a relative height recently, and this crossover launches it into being one of my favorite arcs of the run, maybe even convincing me to read Ghost Rider.
Percy’s great skill with Logan has been his ability to lean into the bizarre without compromising a serious tone. This is a book featuring Wolverine transforming into “Hellverine” where a demon is also hunting mutants who are refusing to be rounded up into concentration camps. A book where Wolverine is a contractor for both the United States and also the devil, and he is hunting a serial killer who is making sculptures out of people’s bodies. All of it lands as hard as it should, against all odds.
I think the mutant stuff in this volume should be pointed to specifically, because I think it’s my favorite use of the Fall of X status quo. The danger mutants are facing by staying on Earth instead of going to Arakko hasn’t felt very real because of the many X-Men (including Wolverine) who stayed out of the obligation Marvel has to ship ten X-Men books every month. Here, though, it’s painted as a real danger, and even if the mutants killed are NPCs, it made the whole status quo feel more lived in, and the world more interesting.
The guy who needs to be given all the flowers here is Geoff Shaw, though. He put up work that was easy to follow, dynamic, and just so sick. Having him on all four issue of the series was a big reason this all works too, both because the vibe across the series gets to really sing, but also because I’m not sure anyone else could have matched his style and energy here.
My favorite choice here was what Shaw did with the transformations, and it seems like he really got into doing them, which of course, isn’t that a big part of why you would want to draw Ghost Rider? It seems like he found more opportunities than were absolutely necessary, and it was an excellent decision. Every transformation sequence is a big moment, and looks so sick.
Shaw also makes the best choices in layouts all throughout. It’s always readable—they never get too complex—but they also aren’t just tiers stacked on top of each other. The dynamism of the layouts affect the story in the best way.
Also gotta shout out how messed up the sculptures are in this story. Ghost Rider has gone to the same kind of messed up places as this, but Shaw leans into it and makes them really work here. It really points to him and Percy being able to bring out the best in each other, and also make me want way more horror stuff from the two of them in the future.
Against all odds, this Ghost Rider/Wolverine crossover will probably end up being one of my favorite superhero stories I’ve read this year. It does a lot of things that some will unfairly criticize as being juvenile or unserious, but to me, it balances everything perfectly. It’s a little demon hunt smothered in a serial killer yarn, and Wolverine and Ghost Rider heighten everything in a way that only they can. I hope Percy keeps bringing this heat to Wolverine, because this is the kind of story that makes me want his to never stop writing Logan.
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