On December 2nd, Marvel Comics will release WOLVERINE: UNDER THE BOARDWALK, a one-shot by me and Tomm Coker, the multitalented artist of the recent DAREDEVIL NOIR.
Wolverine's been around for a long time, and as I conceived this story, I started wondering what would happen if he met up again with a woman he'd been involved with, say, forty years ago. She's older; so is he, but it doesn't show as much. I also barely remember visiting Atlantic City when I was very young, before the gambling came in, when it was a washed-up beach town whose glory days were immortalized in the game Monopoly, and whose biggest industry at the time was salt-water taffy. Put the two ideas together, and what you get is...well, it's sort of the tale of a long-lived mutant's midlife crisis. With claws, of course.
UNDER THE BOARDWALK is a very "grounded" crime story -- no X-Men or alien menaces from the stars. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.) Tomm Coker absolutely drew the hell out of it. He's developed a mixture of tight figure work and photorealistic backgrounds, and he does it as well as anybody in the business. The action scenes are great, but the quiet panels are the ones I find really haunting. Here's just a small taste.
WOLVERINE: UNDER THE BOARDWALK. Color by Daniel Freedman. $3.99 for 32 pages of story. Soliciting now.
