Weapon X #21 is up next, and to be honest, I already know the big revelation in this issue - Agent Zero is the original Maverick, and the impostor Maverick is actually Bolt from the New Warriors.  The first has been pretty obvious from the start, and the second wasn't too much of a stretch, particularly considering that Bolt used to be a supporting character in the shortlived Maverick solo series.  (Though I bet he doesn't have that on his CV).

Roger Robinson is our fill-in artist, which isn't something you often see on the final chapter of a storyline these days.  Then again, I suppose they want to get the decks cleared and get this book out of the way in time for Reload, when it will be making a shameless grab for attention by using Wolverine a lot.  Anyway, it's not a bad looking issue.  Solid enough.

As for the story... well, it's an issue of Weapon X.  Not exactly one of Tieri's better efforts, at that.  Subtlety seems to be going out of the window once again.  The irritating thing about this book is that it has passable ideas, but somehow manages to make them unbelievably drab by the time they reach the page.  Partly it does this by having characters change personality at the drop of the hat, and partly by using excessively broad strokes that reduce everything to inadvertantly comic melodrama.

For example, Bolt is supposed to be very upset about Maverick's reputed death, and therefore tries to become the new Maverick to replace him.  This is, in principle, not a bad idea.  But since Tieri characters can only hold one thought or emotion in their minds at any given time, Bolt ends up as a monomaniacal revenge-driven loony, which takes him way beyond the character's established parameters.

Meanwhile, Agent Zero goes off on a rampage and slaughters all of Gene Nation on his own, which is just fucking stupid.  If you want to establish Agent Zero as a hugely effective and dangerous soldier, that's fine, as long as it's positioned as a matter of stealth and skill.  But at the end of the day, he's a bloke with a gun and some generic powers, and the idea of him standing on a stage and having a one-man firefight with a hundred villains - and winning - is laughable.

Then, in a fit of badly-thought-out "depth", Agent Zero lets Marrow go.  Two panels earlier he was outraged at the deaths caused by Marrow, but now he's decided that if he killed her, she'd become a martyr.  Well, arrest her, then.  Don't just let her go.  Make up your bloody mind - do you want her to stop blowing people up, or don't you?

This book is backsliding alarmingly.  There is a story in here which could have been hammered into acceptable shape with the help of a decent editor.  But the published version is just a slapdash mess, as Tieri can't seem to make those ideas work on the page.

Incidentally, I can't help noticing that all of Marrow's henchmen appear to bleed in green, rather undermining Robinson's attempt to draw a scene of bloody carnage.  I can only assume that this script was approved under the previous regime and the art has had to be emasculated in colouring to meet new editorial requirements.  God, but it's going to be a grim couple of years until Marvel gets this nonsense out of their system again.

Cover Watch: Well, it's got Agent Zero on the cover, so points for that.  On the other hand, he's in a sewer, and this issue contains no sewers.  Still, I suppose I'll let them away with that one, since it really is his issue.  Three out of four, then.

Rating: C-

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