Finally for this week, X-Men Unlimited #5.

This is a book which has trouble justifying its existence at the best of times.  In theory the idea appears to be "novice writers take a crack at X-Men characters."  With my industry commentator hat on, I can vaguely see the point of having a vehicle for new creators.  With my reader's hat on, I wonder why it's meant to be my problem.

In all its incarnations, X-Men Unlimited has had desperate problems keeping up the quality.  On no view is it a book that we need.  Moreover, it must be very doubtful whether it is a book that anyone but completists and aspiring creators truly wants, save on those rare occasions when a short-form gem slips through.  This is not one of those occasions.

As if the book wasn't redundant enough, this issue's theme is stories about Wolverine.  Well, thank goodness for that.  After all, the character only appears each month in Wolverine, Uncanny X-Men, X-Men, Astonishing X-Men, Ultimate X-Men and (shortly) New Avengers.  Hell, he was in both of last issue's stories as well.  He's clearly desperately under-exposed.  There's an urgent need to devote an issue of X-Men Unlimited to him, in order that this criminally underused character can be explored to his full potential.

Sarcasm aside, you have to wonder: with the sheer volume of Wolverine-related crap that floods the market these days, can there really be anyone out there so desperate for more Wolverine stories that they actually want this issue, as opposed to feeling a desultory obligation to buy it?

Those who did actually pick it up will get two stories, neither of which is anything to write home about.  Scott Killinger and Rael Lyra's "Follow the Leader" has Wolverine in a Danger Room re-enactment of Henry V, from which the character is apparently meant to learn something or other about leadership.  Points for at least trying to have the character learn something in one of these stories, but the story strikes me as fundamentally misreading the character.  Wolverine might well not care about being a leader himself, but that doesn't mean he doesn't understand why leadership is important.  He starts off absolutely clueless in this story, and I just don't buy him being that dumb on a subject that he ought to have plenty of experience with.

Vito Delsante and Lee Ferguson do one of those stories where Wolverine goes to a bar and trouble ensues.  The angle is that he's fending off advances from a civilian girl because he's too dangerous for her.  It's almost instantaneously forgettable.

Neither story is horrible, but with so much Wolverine product on the market already, it's difficult to conceive of why anyone other than a fanatical completist or a close friend of one of the creators would have an appetite for this.

Rating: C

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