The first issue of this brand-new Deadpool miniseries — drawn and inked entirely in black and red — is a bloody, funny scream.
Deadpool: Black, White And Blood #1
Ed Brisson (Writing); Kyle Hotz (Variant Cover); Adam Kubert And Frank Martin (Cover); Phil Noto (Art); Whilce Portacio (Art); Rachelle Rosenberg (Colors and Variant Cover); VC’s Joe Sabino (Letters); Ryan Stegman & Jason Keith (Variant Cover); James Stokoe (Art/Writing/Letters/Variant Cover); Tom Taylor (Writer)
August 4, 2021
Marvel Comics
Deadpool: Black, White and Blood #1 delivers just what the title promises: stories about Wade Wilson entirely shaded in black, white, and red. The naturally striking combination of colors highlights incredible art and witty scripts.
The issue opens with a bang — literally for Wade — with “Red All Over” (Taylor/Noto/Sabino). We find Deadpool slumped on a blood-soaked floor, surrounded by dead, formerly zombified lab animals with his intestines hanging out of his torso. Tired of his shenanigans, Peter Parker lets Deadpool’s call for help go to voicemail, and Logan tosses his cell phone over his shoulder and continues puttering along on his motorcycle at the sound of Wade’s voice on the line. Wade thus turns to another partner in crime – Honey Badger, AKA Gabby Kinney.
Gabby and Wade are tasked with bringing down a zombified zebra, and the adventure becomes predictably bloody. But there’s a great heart to the story. Gabby looks at this animal which has been experimented upon and sees a reflection of herself. Wade stands up for her and delivers a great speech before killing the guy who started the mess in the first place – kudos to Taylor for making that work well. The incredible art by Phil Noto sets this apart with his typically photorealistic style – We get some lovely, gory action but also tender scenes in which Wade, in his way, comforts Gabby. We get a great meta-gag involving a word-balloon picture that’s marvelous and eye-catching. Taylor’s writing captures both the funny-meta and the serious-dark sides of Wade’s character handily.
In the next tale, “Hotline to Heaven,” (Brisson/Portacio/Rosenberg/Sabino) Deadpool goes on an epic quest to get his hands on his favorite Bea Arthur comfort movie when he learns the titular Hotline to Heaven (which sadly is not real) is unavailable to stream. He saves a man from a robbery and learns that the video store where he used to rent it has closed. The tapes from the rental chain have been quarantined in a gulag-like fortress, which provides a fun excuse for more bloodshed. Wade’s Bea Arthur obsession will never not be fun, and this, in typical Deadpool fashion, takes everything to wild extremes. When his nostalgia turns out to be just a false paradise, his folly becomes almost painfully relatable to the reader.
The last story, Stokoe’s “Born in the USZORSUSR,” gives Wade another chance to do some traveling — to Omega Red’s new settlement. The warm and fond reunion between the two men soon becomes a war when a rival challenges Omega Red for his territory. It’s a Deadpool story — things go boom.
If you like Deadpool at all this issue will appeal to you. It captures his sarcastic but still (sometimes) kind core, his propensity for messy violence, and his sense of humor. With all of that in mind, Deadpool: Black, White, and Blood #1 is the only ‘Pool comic you’re going to need this year.
