Wolverine finds itself with an issue to kill between the Civil War crossover storyline and the debut of the new creative team.  Since it happens to be December, there's a simple solution - get a bunch of lesser known creators to do a Wolverine Christmas story of the sort that might once have appeared in X-Men Unlimited.

"Better to Give..." has Wolverine doing his Christmas shopping when he stumbles upon an attempt to kidnap a very thinly disguised Paris Hilton.  ("Toulouse Lexington", if you must.)  Quite frankly, it's not really a Wolverine story at all.  Writer Rob Williams has a story he wants to tell, but it's about a kidnapped heiress and her head of security having to prove himself in a crisis.  Wolverine appears to have been included out of a sense of obligation, rather than because he's in any way necessary to the plot.  His healing factor is used quite nicely for the finale, but really, you could do this story without him and it would work just fine.

Of course, it's pretty standard for fill-in stories to focus on minor characters - after all, it's the easiest way to get around the problem of not being able to change anything.  But if you venture too far in that direction, you end up with something where the title character seems to have been added arbitrarily to a story that could have been done anywhere, and that's pretty much what we have here.  They really want to tell a story about the head of security.

But if you can live with the fact that it's a generic story that happens to feature Wolverine, is it any good?  Well, it's not bad.  The plot is fairly generic, but at least it's nicely paced and there are some cute touches in the detail.  Laurence Campbell's art is very good indeed, though - strong, clear, effective storytelling.  It manages to elevate some essentially mundane material into something more striking.

In fact, it's mainly the art that appeals to me here; the story is serviceable, but it gives Campbell something to work with.  Mind you, if you're wanting a straightforward story well told, there's the first issue of Darwyn Cooke's Spirit out this week, which is probably a better example.  But more of that later.

Not the most memorable story in the world, then, but quite well done.

Rating: B

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