Wolverine: Old Man Logan Review

WOLVERINE: OLD MAN LOGAN

Written By Mark Millar
Pencils by Steve McNiven

The creative team behind Civil War have brought us a new Wolverine story. Set in a "what if?"style future setting, Old Man Logan assumes that the villians of the Marvel universe got organized enough to take down its heroes. Sending the world (or at least the US) into a Mad Max/Fallout/Borderlands style post-apocalypse, new -wild-west type setting. Logan has been living a simple life as a farmer with his wife and kids and, for reasons not explained for a while, is now a pacifist. The country has been divided into 5 or 6 sectors governed over by a villian. Logan's behind on his rent and is visit by his landlords, The inbred, redneck offspring of the Incredible Hulk (yes you read that correctly), who are none to happy about the lack of rent monies. Shortly thereafter, Logan is visited by a blind, old Hawkeye (who somehow is now channeling Tommy Chong), and offered a chance to make that money and then some. Go with him on a cross country trip to drop off a package. Adventure, hilarity, and badassery ensues.

The thing I liked the best about this book is how absurd it can be at times, like the aforementioned redneck hulklings. Millar definately has no qualms about playing around with his characters. The venom symbiote fuses with a goddamn T-REX at one point, which could be the coolest thing ever! The book is full of these little WTF moments, and I can't really talk about all of them without totally blowing the story. The casting of Logan as basically Clint Eastwood's character from Unforgiven is genius. It begs the question "what could happen to make the worlds baddest-ass badass become a farmer who hasn't popped his claws in 50 years?", and the when that question is answered, wow, all I can say is be prepared. This feels a little closer to Kick-Ass or Wanted than Millar's Marvel work, and I'd say that was the right decision. He's really written something special here, and it certainly doesn't hurt that McNiven's in top form. The art in Old Man Logan is a fine progression from his already stellar work in Civil War. I will say this: as carefully as I can tread around spoiler territory, it needs to be said that the book is excessively violent at times, so if that's a problem for you, stay away, but if it is, you're probably not a Wolverine fan anyway.

Bottom line, read it. Whether you like comics or not.