Rick Remender begs the question of what makes Wolverine any better than the villains he faces? When you’re known for being a hero, both an Avenger and X-Man, who isn’t averse to killing when he has to, what makes you better than the murderous villains who get demonized for the same sin? We’re given this food for thought, as well as more revelations, as to what the goal of the new Brotherhood of Evil Mutants is in this issue, which starts our decent towards the series’ grand finale.

Read on for my review!

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One of the [only] weaker aspects of this arc so far is the fact that we haven’t yet known exactly what the Brotherhood’s goals were. They wanted to tear the X-Force apart and kidnap Genesis to make him realize his destiny as the next Apocalypse, but it’s always seemed that something wasn’t there. On top of that, it never seemed obvious why Daken would be leading this team. In this issue Rick Remender begins to show us their motivation. 

Tired of being decided as monsters by humanity, the Brotherhood thinks it’s about time the world saw Wolverine for just who he is: a murderer. The revelation shows us a bit of why they are doing what they’re doing, and let’s the reader question why Logan gets to be a hero when he kills just as much as these villains do; why does he get to be an Avenger and an X-Man but they have to join the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants? Throughout the rest of the issues, Remender shows us a bit of what the difference is between these characters, and begins to give tease of the fact that this Brotherhood might fall apart at its seams before they get to accomplish their goals. 

It’s this type of character work that shows why Remender is one of the best writers in comics right now. He has the ability to humanize villains and dehumanize heroes, and then flip things back on their heads before showing us that these final five issues would be about exactly what anyone could assume: Father vs. Son - Wolverine vs. Daken. Although, our hero has a bit of hesitance to do what he knows he needs to, which makes sense considering everything he went through back in Jason Aaron’s run on Wolverine, and his hesitance doesn’t exactly make a certain other member of X-Force happy given that she recently had to kill her own brother. 

Phil Noto returns to the interior artwork, and once again, I’m happy to see him working on this book. He’s got a clean style that ends itself well to these characters and settings. His character work is what really pops to me, except for Deathlok, who, for whatever reason, seems like he has a bit of a dog face to me. Other than that, Noto captures emotion perfectly, and you can see the despair and the anger in these characters’ eyes. 

It’s sad to know that this series will indeed be ending with #35, but it’s better to see something end while it’s still this great than to see it spiral downward in quality. Remender gives a tease as to what happens in the finale to this arc that proves to us there’s going to be plenty of action and heartbreak, as well as some death, before we say goodbye to this book. 

GO Rating: 4.5/5

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