Ultimate Wolverine vol. 1: The Winter Soldier

By the time the first Ultimate Universe got around to doing an “Ultimate Wolverine” miniseries, the character was already dead and it focused on his son Jimmy Hudson.  I, and a lot of other people, didn’t bother with it because who the hell cares about Jimmy Hudson?  Marvel isn’t making that mistake this time around and we’re getting a proper Ultimate series about the character as part of the new imprint’s second year.  Though the volume’s “Winter Soldier” subtitle implies that he’s being slotted into a familiar storyline, that’s just one of a couple that are being called back to here.

There are currently two hotspots of mutant activity in the new Ultimate Universe.  The first has been chronicled in “Ultimate X-Men” and the other is here in the Eurasian Republic.  We’re told that a mandate was given by the Maker to its leaders – Colossus, Magik, and Omega Red – to control mutants and they’ve done just that with an iron fist.  That has led a proper Opposition to rise up which they have been struggling against.  Until recently, however, as a survivor from a recent attack has turned out to be the perfect killing machine they’ve been looking for.

“Ultimate Wolverine” comes to us from writer Chris Condon and artist Alessandro Capucchio.  While I’ve been aware that the artist has been working with Jed MacKay on “Moon Knight” this is the first time I’ve seen his work on the page.  It’s quality stuff with the writer forsaking raw detail in favor of a painterly approach that still conveys the action and the story well.  Cappuchio’s style shines best when he gets to bring a more impressionistic approach to things like the Maker leaving a building he’s set on fire, the trip to see the Phoenix Specimen, and the majority of issue #4 which plays out with a wolf and polar bear fighting each other in the snowy wilds.

He doesn’t do the entire volume, though.  Alex Lins handles the final two issues and while his work isn’t as striking, it still gets the job done.  The highlight here is the brutal battle between Wolverine and a familiar frenemy in issue #5 which is appreciably gory, and the dream sequence stuff in the following issue also comes off well.  My only complaint is that the big moment at the end of the volume where the hero says the thing should’ve been a real badass moment on the page.  Instead, it comes off nonchalantly in a way that doesn’t convey the impact it was clearly meant to.

I’m starting by talking about the art because it’s the most distinctive part of this volume.  I don’t think that Condon does a bad job putting this volume together and it certainly comes off as a more recognizable and competent take on the “X-Men” than its current Ultimate counterpart.  Yet the story we get here doesn’t have any real surprises to it and winds up playing out in a pretty straightforward manner.  There’s also no attempt made to flesh out the world any further as anyone looking for insight into how Colossus, Magik, and Omega Red wound up the way they did won’t find it here.

Still, this is a story that features a brainwashed Wolverine in the role of the Winter Soldier.  That’s got to count for something, right?  Well, it’s less impressive than it sounds for a couple reasons.  One is that the character is arguably too suited for the role of a brainwashed assassin produced as part of a shady government program.  The other, and more significant one, is that when you realize that this is a story about a brainwashed Wolverine being turned against his friends it becomes obvious that this is just “Enemy of the State” all over again while the government program bits feel like they came out of “Weapon X.”  If you’ve never read either of those stories… go read those instead.  The former was an energetically nasty bit of superhero fiction (even if I’ve soured on its writer in the years since its publication) and the latter is one of the best “Wolverine” stories ever told.

I’d definitely have a better opinion of “The Winter Soldier” if it wasn’t directly referencing these other and better stories.  Condon demonstrates basic storytelling competence here, which puts it above “Ultimate X-Men,” but doesn’t offer longtime readers anything they haven’t seen before.  I’ve heard that this iteration of the Ultimate Universe is drawing in new readers to comic shops and providing a surprising entry point into superhero comics.  That’s to be appreciated, but it seems that this story is best (only?) appreciated by people that have no familiarity with the character’s older and better adventures.