Wolverine #51

I tried to like it. I really did.

Loeb's writing was one of the few things that pulled me back to the Superman titles after my departure over the whole Superman Red\Superman Blue debacle.

God. That whole plot line was so derivative.

One Superman, the Red one of course, was an angry hot head who would charge into dangerous situations. While the Blue Superman was calm and collected, more of a thinker than a doer.

The 90's have so much to answer for.

But the start of the B13 virus plot arc right through to Supes big battle with Red Leather Fetishist Zod were high water marks for the Superman titles.

So I'm always willing to give Loeb a little leeway.

....aaaaand he's not doing much with it. When it comes to Wolverine #51 there's no reader more forgiving then I am. Maybe if something had actually happened I'd feel different. Instead it was thirty pages of fighting. Fighting left over from the last ish, flashback fighting with other X-Men, fighting on the Blackbird and then finally fighting in the wreckage when the plane crashes.

Fighting.

I get it.

It's the same thing we've seen Wolverine and Sabertooth do a thousand times before and while I feel like there might be a method to the madness its just taking to long for the story to get to the point. (And for some reason the back story Loeb is trying to weave into the ongoing narrative really grates on my nerves. So much about Wolverine's character is defined by his relationship to his past. I think when you start adding on to that pre-Origins history you're just trying to spin the character into something new rather than explore\examine what makes him great in the first place.)

Sadly I don't think Simone Bianchi's art helped much. I enjoyed seeing her covers on the recent Detective Comics run but I just wasn't warming up to her work in this ish. Maybe I just got tired of seeing the same thing (fighting, fighting, fighting).

Anyway this title is on the bubble. Loeb has to deliever something significant the next time out or I'm afraid I'm going to have to drop it.

No one wants him to suceed more than I do.