Deadpool MAX #1 (2010)
Writer - David Lapham
Artist - Kyle Baker
Publisher - Marvel Comics. $3.99 USD

In the past year, I found that I kind of like Deadpool. I never got his appeal in Rob Liefeld’s X-Force (or was it still New Mutants?)…just seemed like a typically overly-accessorized, underdeveloped “extreme” Liefeld character. Nor did I pay any attention to Mark Waid, Joe Kelly or any other writer’s attempts. I guess I figured I got my funny with Spider-Man and my ruthless killer with The Punisher, and that was enough.

But, based largely on the Arthur Suydam movie parody covers, I started reading Deadpool: Merc With a Mouth, and that was fun and well-drawn, and the regular Daniel Way series was fine. The team-ups series, the Deadpool Corps with Liefeld art, that Wade Wilson’s War mini — I dropped all of those one issue in. But here we are with a brand-new series, geared for mature readers (or at least 17 year olds), with some pretty good names in Lapham and Baker.

I’m generally not a guy looking for their previously sorta all-ages characters to go all HBO with fewer limitations on violence, swearing, nudity, etc. As with convincing an actress to get naked in a movie, I’m okay if the story calls for it, but really, a lot of the time the story doesn’t really call for it. I think many if not most comics creators do better work with some editorial strictures, as it can encourage them to come up with more clever results than just letting it all hang out.

But getting back to the actual comic, I don’t think either Lapham or Baker signed on expecting this to be a high point in their careers. Still, not only is it a regular monthly gig that saves them from scrambling for the next fill-in or videogame licensed miniseries, and it’s with an already popular character due to maybe get more popular if the movie ever comes out. The bar is set pretty low, but these are both above-average professionals.

Although there’s no indication as yet that Lapham has a handle or any special plans for the character of Deadpool himself, since the story focuses on an undercover agent infiltrating the Maggia (Marvel’s faux-Mafia) and part of the story is about whether Deadpool is dead or not, Lapham does seem to be having a ball trying to outdo Mark Millar in juvenile outrageousness. There’s lots of blood and severed heads, some sexy women, sodomy jokes, and even some of the swear words you don’t hear much these days, like “faggot,” which, if Hammerhead was a real mob boss, you have to admit he’d probably say a lot. And if you ever wanted to see Kyle Baker draw a big, lustrous turd with all the care he puts into drawing his own children, this is the comic for you.

Baker draws his ass off, and a lot of other asses besides. For the most part, he’s well suited to the material, as the issue is mostly comedic, with only a few brief action sequences. His style is, as usual, highly exaggerated, but the storytelling is efficient and not flashy, probably so as to not step on the jokes. I do think, as vibrant as coloring is, at times it’s a little too much, with objects sort of sitting on top of each other like Colorforms, body parts and clothes not quite one with their environments. I wasn’t sure if his giving one character extra pink knees was just his fussiness or an extra sight gag implying the guy had just given an off-panel blowjob. I don’t imagine I’ll ever have this confusion about a comic ever again. Also, his exaggerated facial features backfire a little here, because Hammerhead doesn’t look that much more distorted than some of the other characters. Expectations were low, but they were met.

—Christopher Allen

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