Although Daken isn’t a particularly compelling idea for a character, it’s a credit to Liu’s work on Dark Wolverine that these days, it is actually possible to distinguish him from his father in a way that doesn’t involve using the phrases “mohawk”, “tattoos” or “one claw in the front of his arm”. Daken is smarter, more calculating and far more amoral than Logan is – so when I saw that this issue would be pitting him against everyone’s (well, my) favourite evil psychiatrist, Karla “Moonstone” Sofen, ex of Thunderbolts, currently of the Dark Avengers – that was more than enough to draw me in.

And, in some ways, I got what I wanted. The issue is largely a conversation between the two, with Karla given a prominent role in the story. I should probably be glad that the contents of the issue actually matched the cover and solicitation copy. But as someone reading the issue for Moonstone rather than Daken, maybe it was too much to expect to come out of this story feeling anything other than disappointed.

The problem I have is that Moonstone is traditionally portrayed as someone at least as amoral and calculating as Daken is. When push comes to shove, she’s more overtly motivated by self-interest, but that’s the chief difference between them. The impression this issue gives is that she’s shocked and surprised by Daken’s actions, even to the point of being rather naive about the prospect of a relationship forming between the two of them. To be honest, it does the character a disservice to dumb her down in order to build Daken up, and I can’t help feeling that a more skillful narrative could have avoided that problem.

Now, fanboy whining aside, the issue isn’t entirely rubbish. It does tell a nice, done-in-one story that exemplifies Daken’s personality – but in that sense, it’s nothing we haven’t seen before. Much like the plague of generic Wolverine one-shots Marvel has been releasing over the last year or two, this is a generic Daken story which offers very little new insight into the character. For an issue that’s supposed to be about psychiactric evaluation, that feels like a bit of an omission.

Perhaps Liu is stuck treading water until the climax of Dark Reign, hence a string of stories that continually restate the same basic facts about Daken’s character – but it’s equally likely that she’s attempting to make the point that Daken is very smart, scheming and amoral. In which case: We get it. If you only read one Daken story this year (and providing you’re not particularly obsessive about Moonstone) then you’ll be more than satisfied with what goes on here – but anyone else is going to find themselves feeling like they’ve read this one before.

Every Wednesday we take turns to delve into our trusty longboxes, pluck out a dusty back issue, and give you our thoughts. We’ll also try and place it in the context of the time it was originally published.

Just relaunched for a six-issue run, the original NYX series came at a rather curious time for the X-franchise. With Marvel backing away in horror from the consequences of Grant Morrison’s complex sci-fi take on the concept, most of the X-books regressed to standard super-heroics, with remarkably little overall direction or drive. Joe Quesada’s mature-readers street tale was sharply out of step with the stories told by Joss Whedon or Chris Claremont, and attracted all the more attention because of it.

With the series moving towards its climax, Kiden and her allies are on the run, in a fighting retreat across New York from Zebra Daddy and his enforcers. Filling in for original creator Josh Middleton, Robert Teranishi makes a reasonable fist of the art duties, despite some lazy and obvious recycling. However, as the issue opens, its major difficulty screams from the first page. “@&%$” “#$@?” “#$%@”. In one of its most prudish moments, Marvel’s censorship means that asterisks, mocking the “Mature Readers” tag on the cover, obscure much of the dialogue. That the creatives even tried to tell their story of prostitution and mutilation outside of the MAX line beggars belief, and the book suffers from being repeatedly castrated. There’s a few nods to the label on the issue’s cover, particularly the way that mutant powers manifest with a pool of vomit rather than a crackle of energy, but in general the issue is a remarkably sanitised depiction of its content.

Given the small cast that the story resolves around, the characters are drawn in very broad strokes. Despite her clichéd originals, Kiden is the most compelling, although given her situation, it’s hard to accept her joy in shoving her world in her compatriots’ faces. Former teacher Cameron only serves to provide narration or loud exclamations about the cruelty of the world she’s been drawn into, her own character strand of depression completely discarded. As for X-23, while Quesada can’t be criticised for inconsistency of characterisation with the robotic killer she’s become, it’s hard to believe that this story was intended to launch the TV character into the Marvel Universe. Reading the issue now, Craig Kyle’s comments about being nervous when other writers handle his pet character spring to mind. Issue five’s addition to the cast adds little. Although not without interest, Tatiana’s origin merely pads out the story, and could have been included in any sort of X-Men spin off.

With a better grasp of the subject matter, new writer Marjorie Liu may have more success than Quesada with the concept. However, it’s hard to resist the feeling that this experiment should have been left to rest in piece.