Issue(s): Wolverine: Inner Fury
Cover Date: 1992
Title: "Inner fury"
Credits:
D.G. Chichester - Writer
Bill Sienkiewicz - Art
Suzanne Gaffney - Editor

Review/plot:
I kind of rolled my eyes when i saw that D.G. Chichester was the writer here, because i had already read Wolverine #58-59, and that was kind of fun but a little too goofy to merit a standalone prestige format book. But to be fair, Chichester was doing fill-in work there. The story here isn't necessarily more "serious", but it's enhanced by the weirdness of Bill Sienkiewicz.

The story features Hydra, because i think Chichester had it in his contract that all stories he did in the early 90s would feature either Hydra or Terror (not that either is a bad thing). But given Sienkiewicz' illustrations, this is a version of Hydra unlike anything we've seen before, and that's before we get to the weird little fish man.

Hydra calls him the Whale, but he thinks of himself as the Shark, and you can see both a whale and a shark in the art depending on whether or not you take the containment suit he's wearing into account.

The story is that he's developed some potent nano-technology. Hydra wants to use it for military purposes. We'll find out at the end that Shark got swept into Hydra in his pursuit of pure science; he really wanted to use the technology to cure cancer or create new alloys. So he steals some nanites for himself and flees.

He's pursued by a co-leader of the project, who we don't get to actually see.

Wolverine gets involved because SHIELD notifies him that Hydra is targeting him for assassination.

Note that Wolverine is addressing Nick Fury even though that picture looks a hecuva lot more like Dum Dum Dugan to me.

Wolverine knows that the Hydra intel is probably a trap, but he's confident about being able to spring it. He's attacked by Hydra goons (told you they look nothing like any Hydra agents you've seen before)...

...and they manage to infect him with the nanites.

Wolverine kills all the Hydra agents except one, who is shot by someone calling himself Mr. Big.

It's easy to assume that Mr. Big is Whale/Shark after he's used the nanites to fix himself up, but we'll learn that it's really the co-leader that is pursuing him. Mr. Big tells Wolverine about the nanite infection, and gets Wolverine to track the Whale for him. But tracking him takes time, and the infection gets worse. It causes Wolverine's healing factor to attack his adamantium bones, causing the adamantium to leak out into his facial scruff...

...and fingernails...

...and then his whole body.

Since Wolverine's healing factor is completely occupied by that, it makes it unavailable for other tasks. Not that it keeps Wolverine out of battle.

They eventually locate the Whale, but Wolverine is able to figure out that Mr. Big is a Hydra agent.

Wolverine is a mess, and is unable to fight Mr. Big.

So he reboots his healing factor by stabbing himself in the head, which causes his cells to prioritize that over rejecting the adamantium.

Wolverine recovers while Mr. Big is trying to carve him up (trying to dispose of the evidence so that other X-people don't come after him), and he kills Mr. Big. Wolverine then promises the Whale that he'll put him in contact with Mr. Fantastic.

It's a strange fun story with cool surreal art from Bill Sienkiewicz. This is from a dream sequence:

Quality Rating: B+

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: SHIELD is said to be "headed up" by Nick Fury, so i'm placing this prior to his stepping down as director in Nick Fury #33-35. This story seems to take place around Christmas, so i'm placing it near Fantastic Four #361. I've listed both Nick Fury and Dum Dum Dugan as characters; i'm assuming that Dugan is depicted in the art but Fury is standing off panel.

References: N/A

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

Maybe Sienkiewicz did not draw Fury or Dugan, maybe that's Garret. Maybe Chichester didn't recognise him and went for the obvious Fury.
After all, Sienkiewicz co-created the carácter along with Miller...