The more and more I look back on the 2017 Weapon X series, and the more and more information that we've been getting about Omega Red's past, the more I start to feel like one of those old guys who complains about the neighborhood kids running around on his lawn.
Because I keep looking back at it and seeing so many missed opportunities to explore some deep themes and parallels between Sabretooth and Omega Red that we don't get because there's this really strange avoidance of the two of them actually talking about their past and the very real grievances Arkady has with Victor. And not getting a crumb of any of that potential reconciliation in a deep and moving way during that story just frustrates me to no end.
This is a phenomenon that I see with every single member of Team X. Wolverine, Maverick, Sabretooth, there isn't any on-page acknowledgement of how they treated him, nor any apologies given for their actions against him over the years. With Logan, we got teases of them making peace with each other during the Krakoa era, so at the very least we did get a few crumbs with those two mending things at least. But I am selfish and greedy and am always looking for more. (I'm still upset that we didn't get a proper one-on-one team-up between the two of them at all during that series. The one time they were on a team, we barely got any interaction between the two of them. But I digress, I'm getting off track).
Back to Victor. I know I have explained the complex history between these two characters here before. I will sum it up again though, so a person doesn't have to dig through months of old posts. Even though Victor didn't team up the way Logan and Maverick did in later years to play keep-away with the C-Synthesizer, he was there Day 1 of screwing Arkady over. He went "to wish Ivan there a big ol' 'Happy Birthday,'" the day of the Team X raid, the day that irrevocably changed Arkady's life. In the years that followed, the two of them had various conflicts and even team-ups that ended in betrayals and backstabbing. Victor was always looking for an opportunity to screw him over just because he thought it was funny. He was not good to Arkady, and Omega Red hated him just as much as he hated Logan.
All of this past between them is bizarrely ignored during Weapon X. There are moments that the dialogue suggests that Victor doesn't remember Omega Red much at all -- and definitely not in a personal way, which doesn't sit right with me. Why does Logan need to remind Victor about who Arkady is?
This panel right here is literally the only time during that whole series where Victor even sounds like he remembers Omega Red. Arkady himself doesn't even act like he remembers Victor either during this series, since he never once talks to him in a way that makes it seem like he knows Sabretooth, referring to him as "an X-man" when Arkady wouldn't have had a reason to know or suspect that Victor was allied with Logan at the time. To me, it is odd that the two of them act like complete strangers. You two have known each other for decades!!! Act like it!!!
Now, I have a feeling why their history was ignored. Probably the biggest one is that after a while, there was this shift in who Omega Red was allowed to fight and be angry with. At first, it was all of Team X. Then Maverick got a focus. Then all the focus of the conflict went to Logan, and the rest of Team X was forgotten. When Omega Red first appeared on the scene, it was interesting because here was an enemy that both Wolverine and Sabretooth had in common. He had reason to hate both. He fought both and Logan and Victor could and the two of them would team up to fight him.
During a time period where it seemed like Marvel truly was trying to give "Good Guy Victor" a real shot in 616 (before they shot any chance of that happening in the foot), Omega Red was kind of being introduced and given a conflict that would have made him Sabretooth's replacement and would have allowed him to fight both characters without needing a complex explanation. But in the end, that didn't play out because the Logan vs. Victor conflict was just too iconic for Wolverine writers to ever get rid of and Victor stayed bad. And gradually, because Victor was kept as Logan's #1 baddie, having conflicts between members of Logan's rogue's gallery and them all having grievances with each other just wasn't something that writers were interested in giving page time. So it just was never touched on, even though it was never resolved.
Then Weapon X eventually came along more than a decade after Omega Red and Sabretooth were last together on page. Here was the perfect opportunity to bring it all up again -- the last time Arkady had even seen Victor he had been betrayed and left with nothing -- and.... crickets. Why didn't Greg Pak (as much as I love what he did for Arkady's story) touch it? Really, the only reason I can come up with is so that the story could happen. Plain and simple. It was too much work, too much to easily overcome in a few issues for their history to be touched on when Pak had an interest in other subjects. If he ignored it, he could have Omega Red join the team without an issue, give Victor a few "good guy points" by having Victor say a few nice words, have him give Arkady a chance, and call it a day.
Which is all well and good, but dammit all if I didn't want to see some real depth between these two!!! There is meat on this bone and it's being ignored constantly. There's parallels, themes to dive into and history they have that could have been touched on. But it wasn't. And given how Omega Red is really just kind of there serving as wallpaper after his introductory arc in Weapon X and not given anything to do or any growth of his own once he's on the team, I feel like it's such a wasted opportunity.
This extends beyond Arkady too. Because Weapon X takes place when Sabretooth still has inverted morality from the AXIS event. So many of Victor's stories during that time were really about diving into his experiences in looking on his past, his connections to others, and even what he himself believed in, with fresh eyes. He could see the horrible things that he did and actually realize the harm that he caused. And try to make amends.
That was a powerful thing. Eye-opening experiences like that don't happen often to a character, so it opens up a lot of rich ground to explore. When it comes to Omega Red and Sabretooth's history, honestly I feel like it should have been acknowledged. I would have loved to have gotten moments where Victor saw Arkady struggling because he still didn't have the C-Synthesizer. To have him realize that although he didn't try to keep the device away from Arkady, he still caused this. He took part in the raid. He helped Logan and Maverick take the device. And it really would have shown growth for him to have come up to Arkady at some point after he joined the team and said "Hey, let's go get that doohickey for you." Or, if he couldn't do that, offer his life energy to at least give Omega Red a more comfortable state of living.
There should have been distrust from Omega Red's side. He should have been suspicious of anything Victor offered to him because of how many times he was lured in before with honeyed words and then stabbed in the back. He should have had questions on whether or not any of this was genuine. If anything AXIS Victor said and did even counted towards making amends because there would be questions on whether or not Victor would do the same thing if he was acting like his normal self. Questions on what would happen if and when the morality inversion spell ended. It would have been cool to actually see Victor try to address those questions (grappling with his own fears and doubts) while still trying to do the right thing and make amends. To try to build trust and heal the damage that his actions and words caused. Because that was really the whole point of AXIS Victor. He was trying to fix things that he broke. He actually felt guilt for the things that he did and was trying to make it right. Let him recognize that he was the villain of Omega Red's story and try to find a way to make up for that.
Another aspect -- or, rather, theme -- that I would have loved to see, really comes up more as something being reflected on in hindsight than anything that was likely to have been put into the story when Weapon X came out, even though I think it's a great thing that would have been awesome to delve into looking back on the series. Because of the knowledge we have now on Arkady's past, there is one interesting parallel between Arkady and Victor that I have never once seen anyone bring up, most likely because it's not a parallel that looks at them as a ship. And it is the parallel of brothers.
Now, the past few years have shone a lot more of a light on Omega Red's family and on his relationship with his younger brother, Vasily. Vasily was abusive to Arkady during their childhood, and we have seen examples of the physical abuse that Arkady suffered at the hands of his brother, from repeated hand burnings to broken bones.
There were some hints of this kind of dynamic between Vasily and Arkady during Weapon X -- we saw it in how Vasily treated Arkady and was content to use him for his own ends -- but these moments that have come out in more recent years are more concrete proof of Vasily's treatment of Arkady. Their brotherly dynamic was horrible and toxic, and it reminds me of someone else's dynamic with his brothers:
When you look at how Victor treated his younger brother Saul (who was introduced in the Origins II miniseries, which came out in 2013), you can see it. Victor was the Vasily of the Creed family. He hurt his siblings and he did it for fun in much the same way that Vasily hurt Arkady. I think this is a very compelling parallel, with just a few differences. Victor was the older brother instead of the younger brother, whereas Vasily was Arkady's younger brother. Victor hated his parents (pretty much his dad) whereas it seems that Vasily had a much more positive relationship with his parents.
But the abuse is what I think is the real meat here. Because this is yet another example of something AXIS Victor could have struggled with. This comic came out a few years before Weapon X did, so it was something that still would have been fresh in people's minds. Victor hurting Saul throughout their childhood was something that was a part of Victor's past. Is it something that he has ever had to reflect back on? Grapple with? Realize as an atrocity he committed against his own family??
It should have been. The more and more I think about it, the more I see the potential in it and how Arkady and his relationship with Vasily could have been a trigger for so much of this turmoil to have come up for Victor. Victor could have seen Arkady and Vasily -- seen what their dynamic was -- and have been horrified to see himself in Vasily. That he himself was so much like Vasily in how he treated his family. He could -- and should have -- been disgusted with himself and the things he did to his siblings when he sees the parallel that Arkady and Vasily's dynamic brings up. But then realize with incredible sadness and even frustration with himself that he has no way to make it up to them. He can't go back in time and apologize to his siblings. He can't undo what he did to them no matter how much he may now want to.
So then he has to pay it forward. Arkady becomes a stand-in for Saul. Here is someone who had a brother who was physically abusive. Someone who lived through many of the same sorts of things that Victor likely put Saul through. There could have been that moment that Victor realizes he could have -- and often was -- acting "like a Vasily" towards Arkady too. And here again is a moment where he decides he has to try to make it right, both for Arkady and for himself. He needs to actually show that he can be a good brother to someone. That he can have a positive familial relationship with someone that is healing. And Arkady could have had a moment where he could have seen what brothers really could and should be like.
It could have been incredibly healing for the two of them to have such a bond. For Arkady to be able to find "found family" and a brother in someone else who actually tried to behave the way family should have. And for Victor, it would have helped him to be able to put to rest some of those old ghosts with his own family by changing his ways and consciously choosing to be for another person what he was too blind to be for his family.
It's not something that would have been easy, and really, I don't want it to be. I want to see the struggle. The distrust. The push and pull within Arkady between wanting something so badly but being incredibly wary because of the person who is offering it. I want the hurt as the realization dawns on Victor that Arkady doesn't trust him because of the things he's done and then see Victor put in the actual work to prove he's genuine and for once really is being selfless and wants what's best for Omega Red. Looking back on Weapon X, that is what I wanted to see most, for their history to be acknowledged and for there to be steps made to actually heal things between them instead of what we got. I still love the series for what it was, but it really could have been something more.
