Issue(s): Alpha Flight #33, Alpha Flight #34
Cover Date: Apr-May 86
Title: "A friend in need" / "Honor"
Credits:
Bill Mantlo - Writer
Sal Buscema - Penciler
Gerry Talaoc - Inker
Rosemary McCormick-Lowy - Assistant Editor
Carl Potts - Editor

Review/plot:
Since Puck wouldn't train her last issue, Heather Hudson takes her new Guardian suit to Wolverine to ask him for help instead. The X-Men happen to all be leaving their mansion to take in an opera when she arrives...

...and they mistake her approach for an attack.

As Wolverine says, "She's new at this game... didn't understand that divin' at mutants 'round nightfall" isn't a good idea. But Wolverine takes her off into the wilderness around Xavier's mansion and they reminisce about how Wolverine was first found by Heather and her husband.

It's more detail about Wolverine's backstory than we've seen in X-Men or his mini-series to date, which is fairly surprising considering this is Bill Mantlo writing Alpha Flight. Granted, Alpha Flight have a claim on Wolverine thanks to their first appearances in the X-Men series and the idea that he was originally intended to be part of their group. But you'd still think this kind of information would be coming out in a book written by Claremont, or at least during Byrne's Alpha Flight period. Although considering the Claremont/Byrne rivalry, this story may have been less likely to have been allowed while Byrne was writing.

Still, it's some critical information regarding Wolverine, including the fact that Wolverine has blanks in his memory, something that we haven't explicitly heard before. Although we did see in Daredevil #196 that Wolverine was hunting down a lead on where his adamantium came from, and that's picked up in this story.

The dialogue also makes it sound like Wolverine quit Department H and went to the Canadian Secret Service before joining the X-Men.

I always get this a little muddled, but i didn't think that was the case; i thought Wolverine was still with Department H until he quit to join the X-Men. Not that it makes much of a difference.

We also start to see the pattern of Wolverine's interest in redheads.

In any event, after the origin discussion, Wolverine doesn't get to actually train Heather, because he and Heather find themselves surrounded by ninjas.

The ninjas are led by Lady Deathstrike...

...previously known as Yuriko, the daughter of Dark Wind from the aforementioned Daredevil story, and who is now following in her father's footsteps. She was actually trying to track Bullseye, to get back the adamantium that her father gave him, but her instruments led her to Wolverine instead.

My subscription to Alpha Flight ran out after issue #33, and i didn't get to pick up #34 right away. By the time i was able to seek it out, the prices of these issue had skyrocketed thanks to the information about Wolverine's origin and the first appearance of Yuriko as Lady Deathstrike. Things eventually settled down, though, and thanks to an endless amount of revisions to Wolverine's backstory i'm not even sure if the information here is still considered accurate (although the MCP does list the flashback sequences as part of Wolverine's chronology, so i guess it is). But i've always liked that you could draw a straight line from the end of Barry Windsor-Smith's Weapon X story to the flashback here.

Issue #33 is pretty strong for a Mantlo-era Alpha Flight story. Sal Buscema's art is pretty nice, and the focus on Wolverine's origin and his relationship with Heather is interesting (even though we're subjected to the usual Mantlo hysterical screaming sessions from Heather). Unfortunately for issue #34, Buscema is only "storyteller" with inker Gerry Talaoc getting credit as "finisher", and the art is a little rougher. And the issue begins with Puck having left the rest of Alpha Flight behind to go after Heather alone, and making the really dumb mistake of ramming Alpha's Omniship into Wolverine because he got Lady Deathstrike's electro-magnetic sword confused with Heather's battle-suit and thought that Wolverine was actually fighting Heather.

There's also some real nonsense about Japanese "honor". Lady Deathstrike, who was a reasonable and sympathetic character in the Daredevil story, has decided that the father she rebelled against was right after all, and so now she has to kill Wolverine and take his adamantium, even though she was really looking for Bullseye, because Wolverine's adamantium might also have come from her father. Wolverine accepts this with a "Yeah! Honor! I can understand!" comment, but honor here really just means "the characters have to act stupidly".

Heather also gets increasingly annoying, barraging Wolverine with questions. His response here really should've been, "Heather, shh!".

One interesting idea is that Heather's husband Guardian actually knew about Dark Wind's adamantium bonding process and that Department H might have been responsible for Wolverine's transformation.

Heather becomes more sure that that's the case as the issue goes on, and it's because of this that she takes on the name Vindicator. James MacDonald changed his name from Vindicator to Guardian because he felt that Canada had nothing to vindicate, but Heather now wants to vindicate her husband's actions (i guess? that's not really what vindicate means...).

Despite Puck's bungling, the heroes never really seem to be in danger, and the real effort is in making sure that they don't accidentally kill any of the ninjas (while the art sure makes it look like they are).

The battle ends when Lady Deathstrike's sword shatters against Vindicator's forcefield.

It's not shown what happens to Lady Deathstrike.

Also in these issues we find Marrina, who has gone totally feral, being pursued by the forces of Attuma...

...and she's captured at the end of #34.

And Snowbird has been having terrible pains, so she shows up at Alpha Flight's headquarters hoping that Shaman is there (he isn't; he's still off with the spirit of his grandfather trying to restore his confidence and get his powers back).

The rest of Alpha Flight let Roger Bochs, in his wheelchair, not his Box armor, respond to their HQ's alarm all by himself. Luckily it just turned out to be Snowbird, but it seems like a dumb idea to let him rely on the headquarters' automated defenses when you've got a bunch of people with super-powers in the house and the alarm's going off.

These issues are definitely interesting despite some of the usual Mantlo flaws.

Quality Rating: C+

Historical Significance Rating: 4 - first Lady Deathstrike. Background for Wolverine.

Chronological Placement Considerations: The X-Men appear here between Uncanny X-Men #201-202.

References:

• Guardian, Heather's husband, died in Alpha Flight #12 and his battle-suit was destroyed, but it was recreated from the remains of "Dark Guardian" after Alpha Flight #28.
  
• Marrina has been struggling to retain her humanity after the confrontation with her "mate" in Alpha Flight #15, and from the looks of these issues, she's been failing.
  
• A reference to Lady Mariko has a footnote for "past issues of the X-Men and the Wolverine miniseries". For the X-Men, i guess i'll link to Uncanny X-Men #172.
  
• The story of Lady Deathstrike's father Dark Wind was in Daredevil #196-200.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

When the X-Men first show up, their introductory panel is crammed with clunky dialogue spouting out their names. A subsequent letters column asked something like "Would it have killed any of the X-Men to keep quiet in that panel, Bill?"

I've added that panel. I didn't think it was that bad. ;-)

The idea was supposed to be that Bullseye had been killed in the Elektra Graphic Novel, and that's why Lady Deathstrike couldn't find him. Unfortunately, that graphic novel didn't come out until 1990(!) and by then it contradicted other stories and was decided to be out of continuity.
It's extremely difficult to figure out where in Alpha Flight's chronology Secret Wars II 9 takes place, and a big part of the problem is that the X-Men appear here while they're in New York, which suggests that it's before Uncanny 202. More on that when you get to Secret Wars II 9.

Magneto's taking them to see "The Magic Flute"? Probably thinks Papageino was a mutant bird-man, my guess.

It's maybe not so odd that Claremont allowed Wolverine revelations to be made in AF. He was reasonably generous about sharing concepts with Louise Simonson, too: Nanny was apparently his idea (she was going to be the missing Sarah Grey at one point) and Claremont added Apocalypse to Moses Magnum's backstory and would have added him to Wolverine's. Claremont and Mantlo had worked together on X-Men/Micronauts and Uncanny 96, of course, and Mantlo seemingly got to advance Rogue's development a bit in Rom.

What's more, Claremont and Mantlo must have coordinated plans for Deathstrike, who turns up revamped in Uncanny about a month after this.

Walter, I'm curious- where did you hear that Nanny was supposed to be Sarah Grey? Because Nanny was usually drawn as considerably shorter than Jean, and Sarah was usually drawn as about the same height as Jean.

It's something I've seen mentioned a few times on forums (from "Dread" here, for example, http://forums.superherohype.com/showthread.php?p=20475607 ), and I feel like I must have seen something from a more authoritative source, but I don't recall ever seeing many details. The impression I got was that the idea for a character named Nanny, maybe with the eventual Nanny's MO, was Claremont's, but this was before the character visually debuted, and the Simonsons seem to have taken the character in a non-Sara Grey direction from her first appearance. We do eventually get a Simonson origin for Nanny that she she was a scientist who developed cyborgs for the Right and was betrayed when they found out she was a mutant.

Claremont has said elsewhere, I believe, that he wanted Sara to have Caliban-like mutant tracking/identifying powers--at one point he proposed Sara as a substitute for Jean in X-Factor. He seems to have had a couple of potential plans for her.

Interesting -- the hero of The Magic Flute is initially led to believe he must rescue a kidnapped young woman from an evil sorcerer. He quickly comes to realize the "evil sorcerer" is the wise and benevolent leader of a "brotherhood" that promotes tolerance, understanding, and enlightenment. Parallels with Magneto? With Professor X?

Maybe I'm overthinking, and it's just an opera Mantlo knew.

Mantlo did a lot of that bit with the characters saying each other's names for the reader's benefit...or saying their own ("Suit yourself, Guardian! I, Snowbird, like the cold!"). The first Alpha Flight panel in Contest of Champions was much worse than the one above.

Incidentally, on adamantium; I wonder if during World War II, Kempeitai (the State Shinto Imperialist Militarist intelligence service) or Captain Okada (of the Dragon of Death) managed to capture Captain America a few times, study his shield, and thus started to independently develop Adamantium. That could explain Darkwind's process.

http://marvel.wikia.com/Imperial_Japan_(Earth-616)/Expanded_History

http://marvel.wikia.com/Imperial_Japan_(Earth-616)/Members

"Lady Deathstrike......has decided that the [State Shinto Imperialist Militarist] father she rebelled against was right after all".

Lady Deathstrike may want to join forces with other Yamato imperialists such as:

Dragon Lord

Sunrise Society

Anyone recall any others?

(Lest anyone accuse me of the limited thinking of a dunce by drawing so much attention in this post to Japanese militarism, I stand well aware of the flaws of the Biblical Moses, Jesus, U.S. southerners, etc. See the post at

http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/entries/captain_america_312.shtml )

Later on, Lady Deathstrike will have Logan san crucified. As a State Shinto Militarist Imperialist, she may have done this in reference to the martyrs of Japan (e.g. Saint Paul Miki) crucified to prevent Japan from turning into a Hispanic nation.

Darkwind's codename stands appropriate, as the kaze in Kamikaze refers to wind. See Savage Tales#7.

1281
========================
A storm saves Japan from a Mongol fleet. These winds
gain the name "Kamikaze". [Savage Tales #7]

http://newsgroups.derkeiler.com/Archive/Rec/rec.arts.comics.marvel.universe/2006-05/msg01083.html

Sal Buscema's Wolverine looks freshly waxed. Usually when he's running around nearly naked (far too often), the artist doesn't skimp on body hair.

A recent Comics Should Be Good article reminded me of the major problem with this story- Avengers 66 implied that Adamantium had been created recently but this story suggests Adamantium had been created decades ago.

I'll suffice to say that I hate these issues and save my real enmity for when I get to X-Men #205.

"Would it have killed any of the X-Men to keep quiet in that panel, Bill?"

You could just as easily ask that question of Roy Thomas and The (West Coast) Avengers. (And Infinity Inc. And the Zoo Crew. And...)

There was never a follow-up for this suggestion that Jimmy was involved in Wolverine's origin, was there?

Sort of nearly in the godawful Daniel Way run. Better ignored.

X-Men: The Animated Series however ran with the idea that James Hudson was involved in Wolverine's origin though. Season 2 episode Repo Men. Good ep.

Also in Alpha Flight 52-53, Bedlam- a telepath who encountered Mac years ago- reveals that Mac wasn't behind Wolverine's adamantium. Although it's weird that he would have read Mac's mind for that information and remembered it all these years later.

Bill Mantlo decided to have Heather trash Mac's memory by making slightly paranoid conclusions and deciding he was a jerk instead of a loving husband. This freed her up for doing Mr. Jefferies in later issues. It also helped that having a battlesuit made it easier to give extrajudicial kill orders so she could vent her repressed rage because of her perceived wrongs done by her husband. Of course, Badlam's information didn't seem to change her attitude by that point.

What comic issue does "Spiral" infuse Lady Deathstrike with adamantium?

"X-Men" #207, or at least that's her first published appearance, already having the adamantium. We see a glimpse of it during "Wolverine" #31-33 [someone correct me if the specific issues are wrong] but she first appeared with adamantium already in her.

Almost, but it was a couple issues earlier, in Uncanny X-Men 205:
http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/entries/uncanny_x-men_205.shtml

The character intersection search on the advanced search page is great for finding that kind of thing, since Spiral and Lady Deathstrike have only had one appearance together as far as the project covers.

Thank you mighty disciples of the comic cloth! The interaction way back machine might have been handy for Mr. Peabody too!

Perhaps Yuriko suffered some sort of mental collapse in-between appearances and that's what led her to become Lady Deathstrike?