Wolverine – 03

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

Kikyo drops from the roof to the parking lot and he and Logan begin to battle.  The fight goes to the street before Logan chases Kikyo to the top of another building where it continues.  The fight is pretty even but Kikyo shows he can do long distance wind attacks with his blade.  Logan shows he can defend against it and is annoyed with these magic tricks that Kikyo and Shigen use.  Yukio attacks Kikyo with one of her chakram, causing Logan to tell her to keep out of the fight.  Logan again presses the attack as riot police gather below.  Kikyo forces Logan off the building twice and the second time, Logan is forced to leap to the building across the street, crashing through an office window. With the police there, Yukio creates a distraction as she and Logan are forced to flee, Logan understanding that Kikyo killed Asano.  Kikyo also flees to hide in the shadow.

Hideki is displeased to hear that Logan escaped even with Kikyo sent after him but tells Mariko that after his delivery from Madripoor arrives, all that will be left is his marriage to Mariko.  Meanwhile, Yukio has Asano’s pocket computer and knows of the shipment coming from Madripoor, which she believes to be drugs. The two of them set off to the harbor while Asano’s team and Hideki with a group of yakuza do the same.  As the suitcases are being unloaded, Logan hurls molotov cocktails down, causing fire on the ship.  Asano’s team arrives and a firefight breaks out between the police and the yakuza.  Hideki spots Logan and attempts to flee in his limo but is stopped.  However, before Logan can deal with him, two metal tentacles emerge from the ship and snare Logan, coming from a person known as Omega Red.

Thoughts/review: 

Last episode, the fights were rather sparse on the animation front and now I know why.  The production team saved up their money for the fight between Logan and Kikyo, which lasted quite some time.  Fight scenes that aren’t properly done can quickly become boring but here, I wasn’t bored at all.  There was a nice sense of balance in the fighting with Logan and Kikyo with Kikyo having a bit of an advantage in terms of reach and his ranged attack but then Logan made up for his weaknesses there.  I liked how the fight came to an end in a realistic manner.  After all, Logan has been framed as a cop killer and needs to get away but now that Kikyo has been seen by the police, he too has to make tracks.  So, I’m sure these two will fight again down the road (hard prediction, eh?).

I almost fell out of my chair when I saw the two tentacles emerge from the fire on the ship and grab Logan.  My first thought was, “they are bringing Doctor Octopus into this?  No way!”  Well, it wasn’t Doctor Octopus but someone I hadn’t heard of — Omega Red.  He was introduced about the time I started getting out of comic books in 1992.  I may have the X-Men that Omega Red first appeared in, but that would require me heading to the basement and going through boxes of comic books, which I don’t have time to do.  Regardless, I did do a bit of research and Omega Red does have a Japanese connection.  At that point I stopped reading lest something come up to spoil the anime.

It looks like Hideki was the one to send Kikyo to attack Logan.  I had asked that last episode because it seemed to me that Shigen might punt on doing something like this for honor’s sake and allow Hideki to do the dirty work for him.  Too bad that Logan wasted time dealing with Hideki before Omega Red came, eh?  Still, that came off as very Wolverine-like from when I used to read the comic book complete with the two claws on either side of the face/neck and the potential for the middle claw to really ruin one’s day.

Through three episodes, I have to say that the Japanese are doing Wolverine right.  The mannerisms and fighting style shown here are exactly what I expect and that’s all good.  I’m rather looking forward to seeing more.