Synopsis
Black Panther and the Agents Of Wakanda #6 synopsis by
Rob Johnson
Rating:
Last issue Black Panther led a selection of Agents Of Wakanda (Dr Nemesis, Okoye, Roz Solomon and Wasp) to investigate an old SHIELD base that had suddenly come back to life. They were forced to team up with Deadpool, and inside they found 2 of the reactivated Life-Model-Decoy-based mecha team Livewires (Hollowpoint Ninja and Social Butterfly). Our guys defeated them. And then what looked like Nick Fury (the original 1) popped up with 2 more figures.
Nick introduces the new 2 as Cornfed and Gothic Lolita. There are also more bodies suspended in liquid in containment tubes, including Hollowpoint Ninja and Social Butterfly having their damage repaired. There's also a 'girl' hooked up to all the tubes who Fury calls Stem Cell, the team's 'engineering specialist and networking core'. He describes these new 'SHIELD Agents' as expendable nano-enhanced LMDs that can be churned out to order in this expanded Project Livewire. It's the future of SHIELD to deal with the escalating super-problems of the world. (Obviously no-one's told whoever this 'Nick Fury' is that SHIELD was disbanded after the Secret Empire event.)
T'Challa is suspicious because because this isn't how the Fury he remembers would treat his soldiers, even android ones. (Not to mention Nick Fury's dead (except we know he's now the Unseen confined to the Moon), and (as I mentioned before) SHIELD is too.) Deadpool then asks Fury how he eats his pizza (the relevance of which will become clear later). And when Fury is confused by this he shoots him in the face, exposing him as another LMD (I told you so last issue).
Fury orders Lolita to go on the attack. She slashes Deadpool's throat, presumably with sharp fingernails. (DP comments through the 4th wall that this comic won't show extreme violence clearly.) Then she punches Black Panther but his vibranium-laced costume absorbs the energy and sends it back to her, and she crashes into the containment tubes. But a computer voice reacts to this and sends lots more LMDs into the fight.
Director Okoye orders Solomon and Wasp to shut down the controlling network while she, Nemesis and Panther deal with the LMDs. Dr Nemesis' tranquilizer darts won't be any use but he switches them to deliver electric shocks, very effective against *these* foes. Jan and Roz follow cables to where we saw Stem Cell, but she's gone.
Deadpool has disconnected her, and now he drags her semi-conscious body along a tunnel. But Gothic Lolita catches up with them and attacks him. He reminds her that they were once allies (in his 2016 Annual), but she says that her new programming doesn't allow free choice. But Stem Cell steps between them and GL freezes because she's also not allowed to hurt others of Project Livewire. SC thanks 'Pool for freeing her from the network so her core programming could reassert itself. And now she causes GL to remember how she used to be.
Cue a quick summary of the events of the Livewires series. AIM built them to take down rival organisations. But they overcame their programming and fought *against* AIM and other baddies. (Actually I think the series said that the scientist-with-a-conscience that created them for AIM *programmed* them to reject their programming.) In particular they went up against a bunch of rogue Nick Fury LMDs that formed a hive-mind. Now Stem Cell says says that the nanotech behind the Furys must have infected them, and eventually took them over. So she must now purge the nanobots from the system.
Meanwhile Okoye uses a Kimoyo Bead surge to stun the attacking robots. Fury protrudes a jet pack from his back and attempts to escape to restart the Project elsewhere. Panther leaps to grab his foot and is carried aloft. The LMD says that even if T'Challa destroys this body the Project's programming will recreate him in another 1. There'll be a worldwide network of Livewire bases. BP decapitates him anyway, and the body explodes.
Roz Solomon rescues falling Panther in midair with her glider wings, and they and Wasp head towards Nemesis and Okoye who are surrounded by LMDs again. Okoye orders DrN to save himself while she holds them off. But the point becomes moot as the robots suddenly all announce that they've been taken offline. The computer voice starts a self-destruct countdown, and Deadpool races past to lead the Agents Of Wakanda outside.
Dr Nemesis is worried that when the base goes up it will spread the nanoparticles into the air. DP solves that problem by getting the entrance to seal up. His command is obeyed because he uses the passphrase "Nick Fury eats pizza with a fork". (See, I told you it would be explained. And this is obviously how Wade Wilson got the base to let him in last issue.) There's a ground-shaking explosion but everything is contained.
3 hours later Okoye and T'Challa have a meeting on the Wakandan helicarrier. She reports that Deadpool has deactivated the trace Panther slapped on him during the fight. BP says he didn't arrest DP on the spot because he couldn't risk the chaos that Wade would bring with him to the helicarrier. Okoye completes the debriefing by saying she's sent a crew to make the Livewire site safe.
Then she continues the conversation they had at the beginning of last issue. T'Challa had said that the Agents were expendable, and now she disagrees with him. And he *agrees* with her. Last issue she complained that they weren't as organised as the Wakandan Dora Milaje she also commands. He suggested their expendability because he *knew* she would reject the idea, but that would make her reassess their worth. He knew she would put the lives of her troops before her own, as she did with Dr Nemesis.
In an epilogue a SHIELD satellite receives a signal which it transmits down to a site in Australia. And this kickstarts another Project Livewire which recreates the 5 Livewires.