1990
by Walt Simonson, Mike Mignola, Bob Wiacek
Wolverine travels to the Savage Land, arrives in a small aircraft, and meets the tribe of Fire. Most of the tribe views him as a god but he is challenged by Gahck. He defeats Gahck who later that night comes to his cave. Gahck’s features were obscured by a mask during the fight but she removes the mask in the cave to reveal her true form. She is much bigger than he but she and Logan become quickly become lovers.
Wolverine tells Gahck about what brought him to the Savage Land. In NYC, he was attacked by what turned out to be a cyborg. It was destroyed during the fight but it’s scent led him to the Savage Land. His tracking abilities led him to the tribe of Fire and a lighter that Nick Fury gave him as a gift.
Logan spends some time with the tribe of Fire. He hunts with them. They are very impressed when he kills a dinosaur with him bare hands. He also helps them defeat a very large dinosaur which has killed a number of tje tribe's warriors. It turns out to be a cyborg. He follows its trail back to a cave.
The cave belongs to Apocalypse. He is the one behind the cyborg dinosaur. He has all the missing men from the tribe and is in the process of converting them into his cyborgs slaves. Apocalypse gets the drop on Wolverine and captures him. Gahck shows up and helps Logan break free. Apocalypse turns out to be a robot version of the real villain. Wolverine chops him to pieces. The story ends with Logan leaving the Savage Land.
I like the framing device. The story opens and closes with one of the tribe’s elders introducing and finishing the story.
On the final page Gahck is shown holding a baby. Presumably, Logan is the father of the child but that is not explicitly clear. According to Comicbook DB this is the only appearance of Gahck and her son. His name is Erista, and Wolverine knows nothing of him. Something doesn’t jive. The boy must have appeared somewhere else.
I listened to a recent episode of the Podcast that Goes Snikt! that was dedicated to this story. Jason Venable and Al Sedano discuss the story for about 1.5 hours. They summarize the story and comment on it in quite a bit of detail. They speculate that Walt Simonson was hinting that Apocalypse had something to do with Wolverine’s origin. That would explain why Wolverine freaked out when he found what looked like an Adamantium skull.
Links: The Podcast That Goes Snikt! : Episode 283
I like the art by Mignola and Wiacek but I’m not crazy about this story as a whole. It is definitely not a must a read, in large part because it feels like it is part of a bigger story. It also feels a bit rushed. I’m not sure how it fits in with other Wolverine stories from this era. By itself it left me feeling as if I only got part of a story. Listening to the episode of The Podcast That Goes Snikt! helped but it wasn't enough to change my mind about this one-shot story.
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