X-FORCE SPECIAL: AIN'T NO DOG #1Written by Charlie Huston & Jason Aaron
Art by Jefte Palo & Werther Dell'edera
I think Marvel is overdoing it with these one-shots as of late. It seems like every other book has a random one-shot every other month. It would be fine if they were like the Immortal Iron Fist or X-Factor one-shots that are by the same creative team that does the monthly and actually contribute to the characters or current storyline in some way, such as information on Quicksilver or expanded Orson Randall history, but most are complete fluff pieces.
Ain't No Dog is, sadly, one of those filler stories. There is no story related to the current X-Force title and, in fact, X-Force doesn't even show up in the issue. We get one story with Cyclops asking Wolverine to go kill someone and another about Warpath having a crisis of faith about how he's becoming nothing but a killer and straying from his "proud Indian heritage". No other members show up in this issue and it's pretty much a Wolverine one-shot with absolutely no story, character development or purpose for existing.
Wolverine just kills an army of Purifiers, harps on us about how smoking is bad for you and can cause cancer in the second of two thinnly veiled anti-smoking campaigns we paid for taking up pages in stories. The other being this week's Amazing Spider-Man for those interested. If Joe Quesada doesn't want people to smoke, take it to the streets or donate to those anti-smoking Truth commercials or lobby the government to stop selling the poison in the first place. He doesn't want to show smoking in Marvel comics? Fine, but don't lecture me on it after I already paid for the damn book.
Aside from the smoking and the fact the story is just mindless killing by Wolverine, I actually didn't hate this issue. The art was excellent and really fit the mood of the story. I just don't see a need for this story or issue, though.
On the Warpath side of things, Warpath just goes on about how his tribe lives off the land and uses everything from the animals it kills, such as sinew for bows, furs for clothing, etc. I live in an area with a lot of Native Americans and they don't hunt with sticks and bows. They live in heated homes, overfish with nets and traps, hunt animals with high powered rifles and shotguns and, in general, are no different than everyone else living in Canada. I don't see any of them making anything out of caribou carcasses or dressing in bear pelts like he's going on about here, but maybe they do that in his fictional tribe.
In the end, the whole point of his tirade was that he doesn't like killing Purifers because he can't make Purifer themed clothing out of them, I guess. Okay, that's a bit harsh, but if he has a problem killing people, I don't see why he needs to bemoan how his tribe used everything from their kills and try to relate it to his killing of Purifiers. It just doesn't make any sense to me.
Verdict - Avoid It. I enjoyed this for what it was, but, if I had it over again, I'd probably just avoid this altogether. Aaron's backup story was way too short to get anything done and I was hoping for more from it, too. Great art and some nice fight scenes in Wolverine's half to help distract from the lack of story, though.
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