Spider-Man / Deadpool, v. 1: Isn't It Bromantic?

Collects: Spider-Man / Deadpool #1-5 and 8 (2016)

Released: September 2016 (Marvel)

Format: 136 pages / color / $17.99 / ISBN: 9780785197867

What is this?: Deadpool tries to befriend Spider-Man, both because he admires Spider-Man and because he wants to kill Peter Parker.

The culprits: Writer Joe Kelly and penciler Ed McGuinness

A lot has changed since Joe Kelly last set a direction for the character Deadpool; when Kelly left as writer on Deadpool’s first ongoing after 33 issues in 1999, it was the (Bill) Clinton administration, before the millennium turned and the world changed. More relevantly, Deadpool was always on the brink of cancellation, and although the title lasted three years after Kelly left, Deadpool didn’t get another solo book until 2008. Now we have umpteen Deadpool ongoing and limited series per year, a Deadpool movie that improbably was popular and high quality, and a sequel scheduled. 1999 is a long time ago, isn’t it?

Also, Deadpool has changed as a character in the intervening years. Gone is the mercenary wondering if he can be a hero; he still struggles with heroism, but the hero’s journey that Kelly put him on is over. Deadpool has settled down with a demonic wife, so he’s done mooning over Siryn and Copycat. He has a (secret) daughter now, albeit not by his wife. And Deadpool’s rich now! He has a band of mercenaries!

That’s a long introduction just to ask if Kelly can still write Deadpool. It’s not that Kelly can’t write any more — I actually don’t know if his recent work is any good, since I haven’t read any of his 21st century work — but it’s difficult to return to one’s glory days and succeed. Just look at Chris Claremont’s most recent X-Men work, for instance. Fortunately, Spider-Man / Deadpool, v. 1: Isn’t It Bromantic proves Kelly, after all these years, is still able to write a funny Deadpool while giving him more depth than most characters are allowed to have.

For those who aren’t diehard Deadpool fans, Bromantic’s likely appeal will be its humor, which is where Kelly and penciler Ed McGuiness excel. Kelly manages to keep the jokes coming through Deadpool’s signature combination of sorrow, death, and blood. It’s an impressive feat, one that I have trouble fully explaining; on the other hand, no one should explain jokes. By way of example, though, I admire Deadpool’s narration in #8, where he explains to the reader (and his daughter) why the previous two issues are missing from Bromantic: “I feel a great disturbance in continuity … as if there were a massive crossover or just a better creative team for two issues.” (It’s an elegant way to avoid using footnotes as well.)

On the other hand, I have no one other than Kelly to blame for the title of this book / arc. I hate the word “bromantic” and all its associated terms, and causing me to have to type that word several times irritates me beyond all reason.

Someone else who still has the ability they showed last century is McGuiness. The penciler, who drew the first arc of Kelly’s initial Deadpool run (#1-6 and 8), contributes fabulous work to this book. His Spider-Man almost looks like he could jump out of the book. His fight scenes — and there are a lot of them — are outstanding, and he’s shows an equal facility for humor and action. He is a little weak on the horror at some points, but his Patient Zero (the book’s chief villain) looks creepily loose-jointed, and his henchmen are imaginatively distorted by genetic modification. (Although one of them does look like something out of Japanese anime.)

I didn't believe there could be a good reason why Spider-Man and Deadpool would interact, but Kelly manages to find one: Deadpool is offered a contract to kill Peter Parker, and in an attempt to get Spider-Man (whom everyone believe is Parker’s bodyguard) out of the way, Deadpool tries to befriend Spider-Man. It works about as well as you might as imagine, with Spider-Man being simultaneously offput by Deadpool’s ethics and insanity and unwilling to give up on anyone, especially not someone as earnest as Deadpool. Kelly allows Deadpool’s assassination attempt to go farther than I would have imagined, playing it for the trademark combination of pathos and dark humor that marked his initial Deadpool run. It remains to be seen, however, whether the partnership can find a reason to last, other than to hunt down the man who hired Deadpool.

Kelly also has no trouble with Spider-Man’s character; like Deadpool, he’s a wisecracker, although his jokes aren’t as pop-culture saturated, and they lack Deadpool’s darker, more demented edge. Mostly, Spider-Man stands as a moral contrast to Deadpool, with his unbreaking ethical code set as either a goal or unattainable height for his co-star. Kelly seems more willing to play with Spider-Man’s character than Deadpool’s, which is strange given Spider-Man’s iconic status; I don’t think Peter’s darker turn will last or bleed into Dan Slott’s Spider-Man titles, but Peter’s first meeting with Mephisto since he traded away his marriage could be an important point in this series.

Patient Zero was created for this book by Kelly; the scarred, emaciated villain claims both Spider-Man and Deadpool did him a wrong. Kelly also uses Styx and Stone as villains; the pair are throwaway ‘90s villains who disappeared from Spider-Man’s life before the clone nonsense. They are a good choice for this book: visually interesting, with a vague connection to Spider-Man (albeit a connection not really exploited in this book), and they give each hero someone separate to fight. The book’s other villain is Mysterio, beautifully drawn by McGuiness. (I’m a sucker for the fishbowl; sue me.) Mysterio doesn’t do much, but the narration makes it clear he knows Peter’s secret identity. I don’t know if that's what was intended, though, and I have a feeling it will be quietly forgotten.

Although I had some worries about Bromantic, the book’s name turned out to be the worst part of it. I have doubts whether McGuiness will be on the book consistently, but he left the original Deadpool early in the run, and that title maintained a high level of quality afterwards. I’m looking forward to the next volume of this book, which should be out sometime in the first quarter of 2017.

And best of all, it won’t have Bromantic in its title.

Rating: (4.5 of 5)

Daredevil: Lone Stranger

Collects: Daredevil #265-273 (1989)

Released: February 2010 (Marvel)

Format: 216 pages / color / $24.99 / ISBN: 9780785144526

What is this?: Reeling from Inferno and Typhoid Mary’s manipulations, Daredevil wanders, exploring his heroic motivations.

The culprits: Writer Ann Nocenti and penciler John Romita Jr.

Sorry this wasn’t up earlier — taxes must be done at some point. It’s the law, after all. So in that spirit, today I’m looking at Daredevil: Lone Stranger, which stars the only lawyer comics readers like.³⁸ Fortunately, it’s a little more interesting than preparing taxes.

On the other hand, there’s nothing in here like the rush of seeing your refund grow (or what you owe go down). It starts out with Inferno and deals with literal demons, Mephisto the most prominent. If you are a connoisseur of the weird and outlandish bits of the Marvel Universe, I’ll say this book has a scene with Daredevil kissing Mephisto and be done with it.³⁹ Neither Inferno, in which machines come alive and start eating people in New York because of off-screen demonic activity, nor Mephisto appeal to me, especially in the adventures of such a street-level hero as Daredevil. (Would you have guessed that superdemon and Ghost Rider villain Blackheart made his first appearance in Daredevil #270? I wouldn’t have, and I’m not sure I will even after reading it.) The supernatural villains don’t quite fit with his milieu, especially since Lone Stranger is just coming off the very grounded, very emotionally charged Typhoid Mary storyline.

That Typhoid storyline is relevant; all that emotion has left Daredevil, and now he’s trying to keep from getting involved. He fails, of course, and his denial of his heroic background gives his adventures in this book an aimless feeling. He wanders into towns, sets things right, and then is off again. There’s almost a Western feel to the book, which makes “Lone Stranger” appropriate. Still, even though we see signs of Daredevil emerging from his heroic stupor at the end of the book, there’s a listless core to writer Ann Nocenti’s work in this one.

The battle against Pyro and the Blob of Freedom Force in #269, for instance, should be more fun or more dramatic, but because the characters lack any energy, it doesn’t make a lot of sense. Why doesn’t their teleporter stick around to help them capture the renegade mutant? Why do they fold so quickly? Why don’t they, you know, show some effort? Why don’t they keep looking for the mutant? Why is Pyro English? Daredevil is uninterested in the legal and moral questions of government mutants hunting down other mutants, and both he and Nocenti seem to be marking time (or serving time) in crossovers from more popular franchises (Spider-Man shows up randomly in #270) until something more interesting comes along.

Once Daredevil picks a fight — with a drug dealer and government stooge against his idealist daughter — things pick up. Nocenti’s never the subtlest of writer, and she makes her point in broad strokes, lumping drug running with the military-industrial complex, human experimentation and brainwashing with inhumane factory farming. I don’t agree with all of her politics, but it’s fun to see Daredevil against some truly villainous villains. It gives Daredevil a direction and someone to protect. (My favorite part involves the man who has developed a Stepford-wife laboratory beneath his factory farm; when pigs start breaking their legs on the grates meant to slough away their excrement under their pens, he orders his geneticists to design a pig without legs.) Still, by the time this storyline starts, two-thirds of the book has gone by, and a seemingly unrelated Inhumans subplot from Nocenti's Inhumans graphic novel takes up space in two issues of this storyline.

Pencils are provided by John Romita, Jr. I really shouldn’t have to say more, except that he’s between his ‘80s Spider-Man / X-Men Marvel house style and the more angular and distinct ‘90s / 21st century style that made him a top artist. This is a good blend of the two, actually. He uses a lot of the shading and crosshatching that marked his later style while still being able to draw a smoother, cleaner figure (like Spider-Man or Pyro) in the midst of the rest of the art. (I really like his all-curved-line Blob — probably my favorite version of the character, although as you might guess, I haven’t really been keeping track.) His Pyro does look a lot like Daredevil — similar masks, and in a fire it’s hard to tell the difference in their color schemes — and I’ve never for the style of drawing demons that he uses here. But those are minor nitpicks, and the demons are mainly Marvel house style (scaly, spiky plates, limited color palette), anyway.

(As a final note, I’d like to give Marvel credit for finally adding page numbers to their TPBs. Thank you. Now, was that so hard?)

This one is just too slow and flat for me. However, Daredevil kissing Mephisto? That does raise it above the bottom of the barrel. (How did Nocenti ever sneak that past the CCA and Marvel?)

Rating: (1.5 of 5)