Return of the Native

• Writer - Greg Rucka
• Penciler - Darick Robertson
• Inker - Tom Palmer
• Colorist - Studio F
• Lettering - Virtual Calligraphy
• Lettering - Rus Wooton
• Editor - Axel Alonso
• Editor - Warren Simons
• Executive Editor - Joe Quesada

Last Rites

Summary

  Wolverine #19 wraps up not only "Return of the Native", but also Greg Rucka and Darick Robertson's run on the title.

  It would be fair to say that this run has not been an unqualified success. Of course, there's been plenty to like. Rucka has a good handle on the character, and Robertson's rendition of Wolverine (even after he was forced to prettify him) gets his essence.

  But we've been faced with a particularly egregious example of decompressed comics over the last year and a half. Even leaving aside the relatively low-key nature of the threats Wolverine's been given (some of whom didn't seem like much of a threat to him at all), the pace has been glacial. "Return of the Native" clocks in at seven issues, an extremely protracted arc even by today's standards. It has about enough plot for half that time.

  To be fair, if you sit down and read the thing in its entirety, it works much better. It will make a much more effective trade paperback. But it's far, far too slow to work in monthly format. So long as publishers insist on serialising rather than going straight to trade paperback (which would be a welcome development, by the way), some allowance has to be made for the fact that readers are not reading the book in one go. They're reading it in instalments, and this rather slight story has been stretched past breaking point - it may have the legs for seven issues' worth of pages, but it doesn't have enough to hold attention over a period of six months from start to finish.

  The ending of this arc is unlikely to come as an enormous surprise to anyone. While the atmospherics and art on this run certainly deserve applause, the glacial pace has dragged the book down tremendously. It's Wolverine, for god's sake. It needs to move.

  Rating: B-

Summary

  In New York, a priest walks into the Box bar (see iss. 6); it's closed, but the priest reveals himself to be Kurt, so Jo the bartender lets him wait for Logan to meet him; he wants last rites.

  Two days ago: Creed chases Logan and the Native till nightfall; the Native catches a fish with her bare hand for dinner. She confirms to Logan she's really pregnant; he's dismayed but says he won't abandon her. She can't stay in the woods, or they'll send more men to catch her, so he wants to take her to New York; she says she doesn't belong there; he says she can. They continue running; when his back is turned, she flees.

  He tracks her but is interrupted by Creed. It's claws vs. nails, and Creed is able to put Logan down. He says Logan will never settle down with the Native to raise a brood, and there's no place for her. They both know what she needs, but Logan's too weak to do it.

  Logan wakes the next morning and starts tracking again. The Native goes to the burned-down cabin (iss. 16) and sits overlooking the cliff. Creed finds her and says if she jumps, it'll make it easy on him, but that won't do. He can't let her live, or they'll catch her and use her up, making the rest of them obsolete. They fight. Creed wins. Logan finds her body, with a message written on the rock in blood: "I did you a favor runt -- you can thank me later."

  Kurt drinks his beer and tells Jo the secret about Logan: his bones and claws are hard, but the rest of him is a man trying to do the right thing. Logan enters carrying the Native's body and says she needs a priest.

  Note: last rites are given before death, but then again, Kurt's not a priest.