I’ve been hearing about this Deadpool guy for a while, but I didn’t really know where to start. I’ve been dithering on this for a year. Finally, Amazon had SDCC inspired Daily Deals on comics and a generous friend gave me a gift certificate and said, “go forth and purchase.” I bought 3 Deadpool volumes, a Guardians of the Galaxy, a Hawkeye, and a Captain Marvel. I decided to start with the superhero with whom I’m least familiar.
I have no idea what people who already love Deadpool think of Posehn and Duggan’s Marvel Now run. As it is the only Deadpool volume I have ever read, I love it and now understand the rabid following.
In this particular adventure, a rouge S.H.I.E.L.D. necromancer brings dead presidents back to life so that they can save the USA. Unfortunately, our deceased statesman come back evil and want to save America by destroying it. Obviously, you can’t have S.H.I.E.L.D. or Earth’s Mightiest Heroes running around re-killing presidents, so S.H.I.E.L.D. must call in Canada’s mightiest hero – Deadpool. Nobody cares if Deadpool kills George Washington. They don’t expect any better of him. Agent Preston is given the responsibility of making sure the ex-presidents are dispatched with discretion, and she knows that she just got handed a flaming bag of poop.
Meanwhile, the merc with the mouth is taking out a kaiju in Manhattan, having accidentally teamed up with Thor. Thor is not happy about it. Nobody appreciates Deadpool. Nobody even asks about that chunk taken out of his upper arm. Deadpool, you see, can heal from anything. In this volume, he heals from being shot in the head, gored by an elephant, losing various limbs, and several other gruesome injuries.
Fans of Presidential history will especially enjoy this volume. There are little winks and nods along the way to various presidential eccentricities. I like my superheroes irreverent and funny. Wade Wilson/Deadpool takes nothing but killing dead presidents seriously. And even then he’s got a smart remark for the occasion. Deadpool teams up with ghost of Ben Franklin and briefly with another Marvel hero. Nothing goes as planned (was it planned? I can’t tell), and nothing happens discretely. He saves the day, of course, but ends up with something he didn’t expect. The Avengers diss him and S.H.I.E.L.D. betrays him, of course. Volume 2 is loaded on my Kindle waiting for me to find out how Deadpool responds.
