Obsessively putting our comics in chronological order since 1985.
| 1988-04-01 00:08:15 |
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Solo Avengers #7 (Black Widow)
Issue(s): Solo Avengers #7 (Black Widow)
Cover Date: Jun 88
Title: "The token"
Credits:
Bob Layton - Script
Bob Layton & Butch Guice - Plot
Butch Guice - Penciler
Bob Layton - Inker
Gregory Wright - Assistant Editor
Mark Gruenwald - Editor
Review/plot:
Hey, it's Layton and Guice, the team that i find myself missing from their early X-Factor issues! Unfortunately they are on a Black Widow story and using their powers for cheesecake.
The Black Widow learns that her former ballet instructor, Oksana Bolishinko, is being brought to the US for specialized eye surgery. Ivan warns the Widow not to go see her, since the KGB have standing orders to kill the Widow on sight for defecting. But she ignores him and breaks into the Soviet embassy.
Her goal is to return the medallion she earned as a dancer before she "betrayed" her teacher's artistic teachings by joining the KGB.
Bolishinko tells her that she's got nothing to feel guilty about; it wasn't her fault the State Party forced her into the KGB, and the fact that the KGB fears and respects her makes Bolishinko proud. Then Bolishinko's latest student shows up and lets Black Widow get away even though he'll get in trouble for it.
I'll note that it's said to have been "eleven years" since the Widow's ballet training.
Quality Rating: C+
Historical Significance Rating: 1
Chronological Placement Considerations: The Black Widow has been appearing sporadically in Daredevil. The MCP has this appearance between issues #252 and #262. The 1990 Marvel Graphic Novel "The Coldest War" is also (mostly) placed in this gap, but i'll place that book based on its final sequence which takes place circa publication date.
References: N/A
Crossover: N/A
Continuity Insert? N
My Reprint: N/A
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Comments
The Black Widow's memories of being a ballerina are eventually revealed to be memory implants. This was necessitated by an X-Men story depicting Natasha as a child during World War 2. But it makes this story completely nonsensical. Unless the Soviets were dumb enough to implant memories in one of the guards that would make him likely to let Natasha go.
Actually, the memory implant plot kind of clashes with her having been a child in World War 2 - it was created with a younger Black Widow in mind, and the guy who wrote it didn't seem to care much for continuity.
These days, it's sort of accepted that she actually had been a ballerina - the latest version of her origin leaves it vague but possible, and then Black Widow's first ongoing (which tailed that origin pretty closely) said outright that she performed as a ballerina in the Bolshoi as her cover while she was in spy training.
Of course, Ed Brubaker ignored that and more or less accepted the memory implant story as true during his Winter Soldier book, which again is odd considering he helped popularize her WW2 childhood after the X-Men story, and being ageless gives you a lot more time to actually practice ballet instead of spending your whole youth trapped in spy training.
