Bit Of A Climax To End The Volume On

Deadpool #8 is an interesting choice to end Deadpool Classic Volume 2 on. Wade's spent the prior issues trying to change his ways, whether it's taking jobs that don't require killing (such as being hired by Typhoid Mary to bust her out of the mental ward Daredevil got her committed to, rather than the job by Mary Walker to kill her, and by extension, Typhoid), or resisting his desire for revenge against Dr. Killbrew, one of the Weapon X scientists responsible for many, many painful experiments on Wade.

'Course, it hasn't been without it's difficulties. He really only spared Killbrew because Siryn said she couldn't believe he would actually be so heartless as to kill a man who had just helped him*, and she intended to stand there and watch him do it if he really intended to**. And he did bring Weasel along with him on the Mary jobs, so that he could kill Mary and they could collect the money for that job if Typhoid didn't pay them for springing her. But, you know, baby steps.

Anyway, having freed Typhoid, Deadpool embarks on a mission to help Typhoid deal with her various issues, which lead to the Deadpool/Daredevil Annual of 1997, since Typhoid's issues would naturally involve the man who sent her to the looney bin in the first place***. It's pretty ambitious, but Deadpool sees some of himself in her, and figures he knows how to help her. It doesn't quite work out, because she targets more people than just Daredevil, and kills a number of them, and Daredevil won't accept that it's his fault she's killed all these people****. Wade figures this has helped her, and takes her back to San Francisco with him, figuring now that she's confronted her demons, she can move forward.

That's not happening. Typhoid breaks Wade's wrist, steals a sword and leaps out a window, vowing to kill someone every 20 minutes, unless Deadpool, the "hero", stops her. She kills one man, Wade stops her from killing a priest, and saves a 3rd man when she throws his sword at him, but while he's busy quipping with the guy he just saved, she breaks another fella's neck. Whoops. All the while, mocking Deadpool's belief that he can be a good guy, calling him "hero" over and over, until Deadpool loses it and beats her to a bloody pulp. Then he tells some of the bar patrons to call for help, and leaves, asking if any of them want to play hero.

And that's the last issue in the trade. So it's sort of a downer, since it hints Wade might just start backsliding, now that Typhoid has rather forcibily reminded him that his skill lies in the taking of lives, not the saving of them, and he can really only try and deny that for so long before it's going to shine through. On the other hand, it has me eagerly anticipating the next volume, because now I want to see whether he goes into a violent tailspin, or if he can hold steady, maybe learn something from the experience.

* Because Deadpool's healing factor was crapping out, and Killbrew knew it and helped him get it up and running again.

** Which I guess makes Wade a bit of a kindred spirit with Spike, since each of them is trying to be better for a lady. Except Siryn's considerably more supportive of Deadpool than Buffy was of Spike (at least until Season 7) and I'll stop right there before this turns into another rant about all that, and aren't you glad?

*** And apparently knocked her out a window way back in his early vigilante days, even before he had his horrible yellow-and-red costume.

**** Her reasoning being he knocked her out the window when she was just Mary, and that was the trigger that created Typhoid, so everything Typhoid, and I suppose Bloody Mary (the third personality that Ann Nocenti added to the mix in Spectacular Spider-Man #213-214) did is on his head.