NULL-MYTHS: DEADPOOL TEAM-UP #1-5 (2024)

 

This five-issue mini-series is one of the most entertaining null-myths I've reviewed here-- and it's purportedly a complete project by Rob Liefled!

I've only read bits and pieces of Liefeld's oeuvre, but the Image star always churned out lots of big splashy panels with minimal narrative content. But here, Liefeld's placing in his co-creation Deadpool into a comics-form that really needs minimal narrative content: the "team-up book." 

Most team-up books exist just to juxtapose the brief interaction of two or more icons, who have little to no effect on one another's lives. Liefeld starts TEAM-UP off like most such crossover-stories, whipping up some paper-thin reason for main star Deadpool to interact with his first co-star: Ral Dorn, a super-obscure support-character from a 1980s FANTASTIC FOUR ANNUAL (though Ral was also associated in that story with ongoing FF-monster Dragon Man). But once that shaky framework has been established, Liefeld throws continuity-consistency out the window and bombards "the Merc with a Mouth" with guest-stars who pop in and out of the narrative so readily, the effect is slightly surrealistic. There is, for instance, no attention to matters like, "what was Cable doing before he decided to involve himself in Deadpool's affairs?" Characters like the now obscure Shatterstar get no explanation of who they are or what they're about, and a few better-known types, like Hercules and Doc Samson, only appear for a page or two.

That said, Liefeld did pick some oddball continuities from which to draw. When I saw that the guest list included Crystar-- a character from a failed toy line, one of many who got his own Marvel comic during Jim Shooter's editorial tenure-- I thought Liefeld might be unearthing the crystal warrior, having determined that his copyright from the Remco Toys had lapsed. But it turns out that Crystar returned to Marvel Comics in a 2015 series, based loosely on the 1970s magical-fantasy concept WEIRDWORLD. Consider me educated.

No one will find any stunning examples of graphic art; it's just lots of panels of fantasy-icons slugging each other. The two-page fight between Wolverine and Lady Deadpool is probably the best battle, as well as satisfying fans who want *A* Wolverine-Deadpool fight any time the two characters share panel-space.