SKRULLS versus WOLVERINE

Eve of Destruction (Marvel)
Where: X-Men #90 When: July 1999
Why: Alan Davis & Terry Kavanagh How: Alan Davis

The Story So Far...
When a trans-dimensional being called Ejulp recruits the X-Men to defend his domain from the unstoppable Juggernaut -- he inadvertently flings them through time & space to a long time ago on a distant planet!

Confusion abounds as the X-Men encounter fallen comrades, erstwhile allies, and even versions of themselves -- but this is no ordinary product of time travel. They are in the domain of the shape-shifting Skrulls -- and the lost world of Tarnax IV!

They are inadvertently deposited on a training moon orbiting the Skrull Throneworld as the great Devourer of Worlds Galactus approaches! Now the X-Men race to change history to save the lives of untold Skrulls -- and themselves! They just have to convince the Skrulls to stop trying to kill them!

Tale of the Tape...
Strength: Abomination 6 (Invincible)
Intelligence: Green Goblin 5 (Professor)
Speed: Captain Britain 4 (Olympian)
Stamina: Wolverine 6 (Generator)
Agility: Wolverine 3 (Acrobat)
Fighting: Wolverine 6 (Warrior)
Energy: Havok 5 (Lasers)
Total: Captain Britain 29 (Super)

Skrulls specialize in covert infiltration and subterfuge, but what good is a disguise when your opponent can sniff a fake out from a mile away?

Wolverine already knows he's knee-deep in shape-shifters, so he's on alert to suspect even the most convincing doppelganger, but these particular Skrulls aren't just copying the appearance of other powerful figures!

Skrull science is capable of bestowing copied super-powers, technology, and specialist training upon their agents. There are several well-known super-powered Skrulls, chief among them: Kl'rt the Super-Skrull and Paibok the Power Skrull.

Wolverine's up against engineered spies in training, so he at least won't have to worry about seasoned, multi-powered super-heavyweights like Super-Skrull. He does, however, have some powerful imitators to contend with.

The Skrull spies are patterned after: Captain Britain, Havok, Green Goblin, Medusa, and Abomination.

This is the Captain Britain who stands toe-to-toe with Juggernaut, and we all know Abomination as the arch-nemesis of Hulk. Wolverine is no stranger to tangling with those adversaries as well, but usually he only has to contend with one of them. This pairing of powerhouses alone poses a significant challenge!

Add the abilities/arsenal of Havok and Green Goblin for some extra ranged fire power, while Medusa's Inhuman prehensile hair locks down the mutant's mobility, and he's running out of options real fast!

Wolverine's best bet may be immediate surrender to a berzerker barrage to mercilessly wield his adamantium claws against the alien menace.

Animalistic ruthlessness has been the equalizer in his outnumbered battles against The Hellfire Club, Lady Deathstrike and her cyborg Reavers, The Hand, and even The Fantastic Four! Will it make the difference again? Let's find out...

The Tape: Skrulls Ranking: Wolverine (#5)

What Went Down...

Familiar faces surround, but he isn't amongst friends. Wolverine, claws out, fights for his life in an arena designated "Stage-Earth". Only it has nothing to do with Earth. It's just another lie. A testing ground for Skrull spies to hone the skills they've stolen from Earth's heroes and villains.

He throws himself through the crowd -- leading claws on his left hand slashing at a face imitating the mask of the Green Goblin, while his right hand trails behind, having already raked against an imitation Captain Britain.

They might not be the genuine articles, but each of these doppelgangers shares the might of the people they imitate. They're still training, but they're dangerous.

His mutant healing factor is already working to stitch pierced flesh back together when a thick shock of hair wraps around Wolverine's torso!

His instincts are almost as sharp as his claws. A single slash is all that's needed to separate the attacking Skrull from her living, prehensile Medusa hair!

One threat quelled gives way to another. A Skrull with the rampaging strength of The Abomination puts an end to Wolverine's stand -- driving him into the ground!

The crushing slam of Abomination's fist leaves the X-Man dazed & confused!

He can hardly process what he's seeing as another hand grabs Abomination by the wrist and hoists him over head.

A head with another familiar face. One that hits a little too close to home.

John Proudstar -- a comrade at arms who perished by Wolverine's side. A short-lived X-Man, accompanied by Shadowcat. Reinforcements!

Blasts of energy stream towards the phony Havok, Green Goblin, and Captain Britain, as Skrulls with the faces of other deceased heroes -- Adam Warlock and Captain Marvel -- come charging to the rescue!

Mar-Vell kicks Green Goblin in the face while blasting Havok with cosmic power, as Adam Warlock directs a full mental energy bolt to subdue Captain Britain!

They're Skrulls. Each and every one of them. Empowered with super-normal abilities taken from well-known counterparts, but there's not much use for infiltrating society with a dead man's face. Spies who can't hide in plain sight.

The genuine Shadowcat helps untangle Wolverine from Medusa's hair. Thunderbird makes sure the Abomination Skrull has been slammed unconscious, while Warlock drops Captain Britain next to the other bodies.

The Hammer...

It looked like Wolverine was on the ropes, but we'll never know if he could've turned it around on his own. Kitty Pryde showed up with Thunderbird, Adam Warlock, and Captain Marvel Skrulls to make the big save!

There's a whole lot more Skrull on Mutant action in this issue, with the rest of the X-Men battling elsewhere, and our unlikely quintet sticking together to fight towards an exit.

I kinda like the idea of deep-cover Skrulls whose imitation is engineered to be so complete and convincing that it's permanent.

Taking away the common ability to shape-shift is a pretty heavy-duty fate for a Skrull, and the predicament it leaves agents in, whose double has very publicly met their demise, is kinda interesting. Not that it stopped later iterations once Marvel Comics truly fulfilled a revolving door of death.

I suppose these permanently altered Skrulls become a mutant caste in a vaguely analogous fashion to our X-Men. Thematic consideration that bridges the gap between these two groups -- even if Wolverine remains guarded as he receives help from his apparent saviors, who are further ostracized by their correct belief that the X-Men are trying to warn the Skrulls of impending doom.

Wolvie's canny enough to know you can never let your guard down when dealing with Skrulls, and indeed, the next time we see him -- on a hijacked Skrull ship as the X-Men are emerging from "cryo-stasis" on the way back to present-day Earth -- he has been replaced by a Skrull doppelganger. Shades of an Alien 3 fast-one.

As I've mentioned in the past: 1999 was the first real down period for my comics reading, but the significance of this story extends in both directions, continuing into the mildly interesting reveal that the real Wolverine has become Apocalypse's Horseman of Death, and backwards to 1983's Fantastic Four #257, when Nova led Galactus to feast upon Tarnax IV - the Skrull Throneworld.

If you really wanted to do some mental gymnastics, you could further weave this episode into the contemporary significance of Secret Invasion, which continued to reckon with the destruction of Tarnax IV, and led to multi-powered Skrulls created after its own retro-active fiction - an encounter with The Illuminati.

We might reason the Secret Invasion super Skrulls are all part of the same program that created the permanently altered spies seen today, destined for obsolescence. It can be debated if a second Mar-Vell Skrull appearing during that event supports this theory, or challenges it. It might've been nice if it were the same Skrull, but this one appears to die later this issue, and they went with a more recognized blonde version of Mar-Vell for the 2007 "return".

Thinking this much about Skrulls in relation to the X-Men is kind of an odd fit, and I wonder how it all came about. Even taking previous space adventures into account - returning to a then-sixteen year old issue of FF is quite a leap.

Maybe it speaks to the slight chaos of Marvel at the turn of the millennium. A time that sometimes felt like creative freefall as the content of comics negotiated a transition from familiar styles and subject matter, to slightly new approaches.

X-Men #90 feels more consistent with the slightly old-fashioned vein that ran through Marvel into 2001 and the space-centric Maximum Security event. It butts up against a grounding of the X-Men, with deeper investment in their natural habitat of frictious co-existence between mutants & humans, and the coming of Grant Morrison's New X-Men. Both fuelled by the X-Men movie in 2000.

Amusing that the next most prominent X/ET encounter that comes to mind is the Shi'ar Imperial conflict in New X-Men, 2002. Something about that Great British diet of sci-fi keeping the space classics in the minds of Morrison, and Alan Davis?

The presence of Captain Britain feels like a quirk of Davis' dual role as plotter & penciler. I wonder if he may also be the key to the entire Skrull affair. I certainly enjoyed his brief time on the first three issues of Fantastic Four (Vol.3), introducing the Kirby-inspired Iconoclast, and revisiting the classic Super-Apes & Red Ghost. Perhaps Galactus and Skrulls were unfinished business.

Davis has a pretty safe & soft style, and it's pleasant here in the colourful world of classically-tinged X-Men. I don't particularly love this issue or time period, but it's fairly inoffensive, and I hope to explore more in the future.

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Winners: Thunderbird, Warlock, and Mar-Vell Skrulls (w/ Wolverine & Shadowcat)
#364 (new) Thunderbird (Skrull)
#365 (new) Adam Warlock (Skrull)
#366 (new) Captain Marvel (Skrull)
#5 (--) Wolverine [+1 assist]
#126 (--) Shadowcat [+1 assist]
#1014 (new) Captain Britain (Skrull)
#1015 (new) Havok (Skrull)
#1016 (new) Green Goblin (Skrull)
#1017 (new) Abomination (Skrull)
#1018 (new) Medusa (Skrull)

DOPPELGANGER, SHRIEK & CARNAGE versus SPIDER-MAN, CLOAK & DAGGER

Darklight: Maximum Carnage, Part 2 (Marvel)
Where: Web of Spider-Man #101 When: June 1993 Why: Terry Kavanagh How: Alex Saviuk

The Story So Far...
Incarceration in the Ravencroft Institute's maximum security facility proved a temporary stay when serial killer Cletus Kasady was reunited with his alien symbiote.

Carnage's escape from Ravencroft was a total bloodbath, but not everyone who crossed his path that day was part of the massacre. He found a kindred spirit in the villainess Shriek, forging a homicidal relationship that soon became a family with the adoption of the six-armed, razor-fanged Doppelganger!

News of the escape prompts Spider-Man to take to the New York City skyline, but a chance encounter with Shriek & Doppelganger leaves the web-slinger worse for wear at the bottom of a building! Rescued by Cloak & Dagger, the web-slinger has much needed back-up as the villains close-in for Round 2!

Tale of the Tape...
Strength: Carnage 5 (Super-Human)
Intelligence: Spider-Man 5 (Professor)
Speed: Spider-Man 4 (Olympian)
Stamina: Carnage 5 (Marathoner)
Agility: Cloak 7 (Intangible)
Fighting: Doppelganger 3 (Street Wise)
Energy: Shriek 5 (Lasers)
Total: Spider-Man 29 (Metahuman)

The sides may be even at three-on-three, but the differences separating today's two forces makes this a match-up with many sides to consider!

Our Tape rates Spider-Man the strongest player thanks to his versatile skill set of strength, speed, agility, and intellect. However, he's already done this dance with Doppelganger & Shriek, and come off second-best in Spider-Man Unlimited #1! That means Spidey's coming in with a loss and some busted ribs!

Cloak & Dagger are guardian angels in Spidey's time of need. Old friends to the wallcrawler, they're Tyrone Johnson and Tandy Bowen: Teen runaways who were experimented on by Maggia scientists and gained incredible powers!

Cloak became a conduit for the Darkforce, creating an endless black void within the folds of his cloak. Those caught in its abyss will be drained of life and driven to terror or madness. This dark hunger can also be sated by the equal opposite Lightforce wielded by Dagger! The former dancer can channel her light into daggers for projectiles, purifying, or illumination.

We saw Cloak test his power against Thanos during a moment of hope in Infinity Gauntlet #4. We'll also learn of his history with Shriek through the course of this battle, which drove her insane. Spider-Man, Cloak & Dagger should be able to match the sonic shockwaves and savagery of Shriek & Doppelganger, but the late arriving third part of their trio could cause some problems!

Cletus Kasady is a homicidal maniac who happened to share a cell with Eddie Brock and received the seed of his alien symbiote's offspring. The resulting bond was Carnage: a deadly red counterpart to Venom with a penchant for forming sharp constructs with his suit, such as axes and spear-like tendrils!

Carnage shares a similar super-human strength to Venom, with a more agile frame. This, combined with his taste for serial killing, has made him a deadly enough villain to force Venom and Spider-Man to put their own issues aside. A necessity that will eventually bring Carnage down in Spider-Man Ulimited #2.

Carnage has the same vulnerability to intense sound and heat as Venom, which could make Dagger a difference maker in this battle. Shriek's sonic powers are a risk to Carnage as well, but without an unforeseen incident, her attack range can provide an invaluable defense. Let's jump in and see what happened.

The Tape: Spider-Man, Cloak & Dagger Ranking: Spider-Man (#2)

What Went Down...
Stars fill the Holy Ghost Church as the pain of two fractured ribs being reset ripples through Spider-Man's body. Cloak and Dagger tend to the webhead's injuries, but it's only a temporary measure. It'll have to do. Suddenly a blaring signal replaces the pain as Spider-Man's senses detect incoming danger!

Spidey springs to his feet, narrowly avoiding a stream of razor-barbed webbing as his Doppelganger smashes through the church window!

The web-slinger gives his allies a quick crash course in his evil duplicate's M.O. before the church is struck with a massive wave of sound! Beams topple around all four occupants as the roof partially collapses and Shriek arrives!

Doppelganger purrs as his surrogate mother strokes his head and plots the demise of the heroes -- but they aren't buried beneath the rubble as she thinks! Cloak was able to teleport them away at the last second thanks to another tip-off from friendly neighbourhood spider-senses!

Doppelganger grapples with Spidey, while Cloak reacquaints himself with the familiar one-time downtown drug dealer Shriek. She thanks him for introducing her to madness by unleashing her sonic powers against his great ebon void!

Dagger does her best to shackles the wild Doppelganger as he slams Spider-Man hard into the ground with his extra limbs, but Cloak's cries draw her attention! The eerie expanse of his cape magnifies Shriek's masterfully fired sonic blasts like an agony-inducing echo chamber!

Spidey takes care of himself, webbing up Doppelganger's slashing talons before socking him in the mouth with a stiff left jab! Meanwhile, Dagger draws Shriek's attention with a spray of light shots. Only one is on target, but Shriek's sound blasting hands absorb the blow. She re-directs her blast at Dagger!

The battle between light and sound stands at an effective stalemate. Cloak uses the opportunity to attack Doppelganger from behind, snaring him in the living folds of fabric that are his impressive namesake as Spidey hits an uppercut!

The momentary advantage pales as the church doors fly open and a nameless gangster's limp body announces the arrival of Carnage!

Jagged streams of alien symbiote extend from his hands in an effort to pull his sick "family" out of harm's way. Dagger persists in her attempts to fire light shards at Shriek, provoking a savage response from Doppelganger, who protectively fires razor-webbing at her. Cloak steps in to effortlessly absorb it.

Spider-Man attempts to pacify the situation by webbing Shriek's hands and her mouth, but it's for naught. Sonic waves blast the web away, while Carnage goes on the offensive once again, sending ever growing tendrils from his fingers to chase the scrambling wall-crawler!

Carnage sends his pointed fingers over Spider-Man and into the church wall,  trapping him against the church wall like a helpless bug in a cage!

Meanwhile, Shriek attacks the ground beneath Dagger's feet, and Doppelganger spews more razor-webbing at Cloak! The situation looks dire for the heroes, but Spider-Man leans into the situation -- plunging directly at Carnage with his fist extended! A devastating missile dive that stuns the symbiote!

Dagger intervenes to cut through Doppelganger's webbing, while Cloak again descends upon Shriek and engulfs her in his cape!

The trap is temporary. Shriek scrambles clear of the fabric-bound abyss, citing her past trip through insanity as a means to walk through it. Cloak never the less puts his impressive folds between the villains and Dagger again, while his soulmate burns away razor-webbing coiled around her ankle. The defense leaves Cloak vulnerable to another devastating blast of sonic energy!

Things soon turn sour for Spider-Man, too. He wails away with unrelenting left and right punches to the downed Carnage's face, but the living costume that covers his body soon comes to the fore. A huge, jagged prong launches from Carnage's torso -- smashing through Spider-Man's injured ribs!

With pain rippling through his body, Spider-Man desperately uses a flying kick to the face to try to put some distance between he and Carnage.

Distance is no barrier for Shriek, whose efforts to finish Cloak are only stopped by Dagger standing in her way. Light shields absorb the powerful stream of targeted sonic energy, but Shriek's madness only fuels her growing power! She aims to repay Cloak for driving her insane. As Dagger begins to weaken, Cloak is too weak to come to her aide. Inevitably, a killing blow is struck!

Dagger screams as unfiltered sonic blasts rip through her body! Spider-Man attempts to shield Cloak as the heroine explodes in a dazzling column of light!

The explosion of light is enough to knock Shriek and the heroes mutually off their feet, but Carnage still stands!

Unsympathetic, he slaps his would-be bride for daring to finish-off his nemesis Spider-Man. Forgiveness comes as soon as anger. The pair collect Doppelganger and make their exit through the roof to spread more murder across New York.

In the rubble of the church, Spider-Man slowly comes to. Cloak is already up, searching for Dagger when Spider-Man illuminates the devastating truth: Dagger is dead.

The Hammer...
There's good news, and there's bad news...

The good news is: Dagger isn't really dead! She was merely rattled so severely her body dissipated into pure particles of light. She'll pull herself together just in time to make a triumphant return towards the end of Maximum Carnage. Yay!

The bad news is: It doesn't much matter for the heroes in Part 2!

Shriek, Carnage, and Doppelganger gave the good guys a whooping that will keep 'em hurting throughout most of the 14-part crossover. A hurtin' that actually began with Part 1, in Spider-Man Unlimited #1, where Doppelganger kicked Spidey clean off a rooftop, and into a gang-infested alley!

For Cloak: the real pain is psychological. His anguish over Dagger's apparent death made Part 2 one of the most resonant for me over the intervening years. A lot of characters will come and go throughout this saga, but I would speculate none of them is as convincingly affected by events as Cloak (and Dagger).

At some point I hope to double-back to the start of the issue to highlight Cloak & Dagger's big entrance, as well. It's a pretty straight forward fight with the gang descending on injured Spidey, but it participates in a nice pair of bookends that make Web of Spider-Man #101 a memorable Cloak & Dagger read.

Artist Alex Saviuk deserves credit for getting the emotional core across with his pencils. Cloak howling his partner's name is a lasting image from the time. Right up there with the first time Wolverine popped his bone claws in Wolverine #75. There are quite a few iconic images in this issue. Some of them are included above, and you might remember a couple from the popular 16-bit video game.

Because Maximum Carnage was a crossover with the various Spider-Man titles of the time, there were several artists involved. Guys like Mark Bagley, Ron Lim, and the inimitable Sal Buscema contributed some very memorable scenes. Because of their varying legacies I think Saviuk is actually a little underrated.

I'm tempted to say an early issue like this is more essential than reading the entirety of  the Maximum Carnage saga. I'm aware that some of that might be downplaying the spectacle of it all, and come from the luxury of having lived with the story without examining its finer details in quite a while.

I have to admit to absorbing a little bit of the culture cringe that built up around Venom and Carnage, too. Their function can become base and uninspired, but I was certainly all-in when Maximum Carnage hit shelves back in 1993!

This was actually one of the first crossover events I made any real effort to acquire in its entirety as it was released. This was a time when comic purchases were made on a whim, grabbed from whatever assortment a nearby newsagent was carrying while out and about. Trips to the comic store proper were more infrequent, and with no real purpose, making assembling significant numbers of issues from a single run something of a feat of divining.

The lure of a Spider-Man event on stands was an easy sell. It was already a front runner for a casual pickup. The eventual accumulation of unusual allies proved an effective novelty worth pursuing.

Black Cat and Venom had history as friends & foes of Spidey, but it wasn't often you'd see the likes of Captain America, Morbius, Deathlok, and Iron Fist working together. It had a similar appeal to Acts of Vengeance a few years earlier, with a more pointed story like the similarly grim mini-crossover of Spirits of Venom.

I guess it was a renewed period for oddball crossovers at Marvel. That same year they would further challenge the notion of rigid divides with the cult series Secret Defenders. Slapdash team-ups can be a lot of fun, but go to that well too many times and it all starts to feel a little bit meaningless. Maximum Carnage walked a fine line of natural storytelling and weird mash-ups.

If you want to dive in and experience the entire story for yourself you can pick up the collected Amazing Spider-Man Epic: Maximum Carnage! By shopping using the Amazon link provided [embedded right] you'll help the site achieve symbiosis with Amazon's support program at no extra cost to you!

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Winners: Shriek, Carnage & Doppelganger
#176 (+286) Shriek
#105 (+99) Doppelganger
#380 (+269) Carnage (Cletus Kasady)
#2 (--) Spider-Man
#902 (-285) Dagger
#930 (-24) Cloak