Posted in: Comics | Tagged: bland design, weapon x, wolverine, x-men, X-ual Healing - The Weekly X-Men Recap Column

X-Men: Bland Design – It's Not a Happy Birthday for Logan in Weapon X #15

Published Mon, 19 Mar 2018 18:30:05 -0500

Welcome, dear readers, to X-Men: Bland Design, the weekly multi-part recap column that strives to answer the question: "What if Ed Piskor had no art skills, a juvenile sense of humor, and less classic material to work with?"

Each week, we aim to recap what happened in all of the X-books that come out that week, praise the things we like about them, and complain about the things we don't. This week, there are seven X-Books in stores, which will make a dent in your wallet. But are these comics worth taking out a second mortgage to read?

Let's look at Weapon X #15 and find out…

WEAPON X #15
GREG PAK & FRED VAN LENTE (W)
ROLAND BOSCHI (A)
Cover by ERIC CANETE
OLD MAN LOGAN marv. SABRETOOTH Part 1
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, OLD MAN LOGAN!
• It's a surprise party for Old Man Logan — and the only thing Sabretooth got him is an ass whuppin'!
• With the rest of their crew on a much needed shore leave, Sabretooth and Old Man Logan are left to their own devices: sixteen Adamantium claws and berserker rage!
• Don't miss Old Man Logan versus Sabretooth in their first knock-down, drag-out fight to the death!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99

It's a new storyline for Weapon X: Happy Birthday, Old Man Logan. The recap page tells us that the Weapon X team: Old Man Logan, Domino, Sabretooth, Lady Deathstrike, and Warpath, have returned to their airship base following the events of the previous storyline, where they got high on nuke drugs and fought Nuke and a team of mini-Nukes in Santo Marco.

Lady Deathstrike, Domino, and Sabretooth want to stop in Mexico for a night on the town. Domino wants her boyfriend Warpath to come along. He says he doesn't drink or dance, so that just leaves @#$%ing. Logan, however, says he plans to stay behind. After they leave, Logan brings up footage on the ship's computer from Santo Marco, where Sabretooth and Lady Deathstrike were happy to eat Nuke pills and slaughter their enemies. Logan thinks they're dangerous and he needs to keep presenting them with even worse monsters to fight lest they turn to harming innocent people. The ship, which was given to the team by Amadeus Cho, says that it was originally designed to hunt monsters. Logan thinks that's a good idea, but suddenly he notices the clock strike midnight. It's his birthday. Traditionally, on his birthday, Sabretooth tries to kill him. He gets a text from Sabretooth to that effect…

And is then greeted by Sabretooth, who busts through a wall to attack him. Sabretooth is surprised Logan wasn't expecting this, but he attributes it to old age. We're treated to a flashback montage to jog Logan's memory.

So it's just a friendly attempted murder. Sabretooth brings up killing Logan's ex, Silver Fox, on a previous birthday. Logan tells Creed he has two seconds to back off, but Creed sniffs the air and says Logan is old and scared. Sabretooth pounces. Logan retreats, grabbing a disintegrator gun from the ship's armory. An announcement from the ship reveals that 6% of its structural integrity has been compromised by the fight so far. Want to bet it gets totaled by the end of the issue?

Logan feels bad about killing Sabretooth, so he looks for a less lethal gun. Sabretooth taunts him, so Logan blasts him. The ship goes from "6% structural integrity compromised" to "structural integrity unknown." That was fast. Logan is about to blast Creed again when the ship initiates "auto-protocols" and shows a location on a map. It's returning to base for repairs. Down below, Lady Deathstrike, Warpath, and Domino notice the ship leave. Deathstrike seems to recall that it's Logan's birthday, but it's too late for them to do anything about it, as the ship is gone, and the other two are having too much fun.

Back on the ship, Creed continues to attack while Logan warns him they need to get off the ship. Creed doesn't care, forcing Logan to recall his backstory to him. Back in the Old Man Logan timeline, Logan slaughtered all the X-Men, tricked into believing they were enemies by Mysterio. It was when Logan killed the fake Sabretooth that he really went berserk and murdered everyone else. Logan needs Creed to prove there's something worse than himself.

As the ship approaches the base, and it's moving too fast by the way, Sabretooth doesn't get it. Logan says he's missing the point, but Creed says the only point is that Logan isn't any better than Creed. The ship crashes, into a monster zoo. Logan is berserk. Creed is having a great time. TO BE CONTINUED!

Weapon X is a book about Wolverines stabbing people and stabbing each other (it's what they do best). It delivers on that every issue. This issue is no different. The callbacks to the past between Logan and Sabretooth tickle that nostalgia bone. It looks like things will get even more violent next issue, with lots of monster-killing. You can't really ask for anything more from this book.

See you next week!

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