Deathstroke #40: They’re Coming to Take Me Away Ha Ha

I could use this space to talk about the gorgeous art or the exceptional jabs at Marvel Comics that have permeated this five-issue arc. We could sit here and discuss the philosophical conundrums of reality and the duality of humankind. We could do that, for sure. But I’m going to level with you here, dear readers. I’ve read this entire arc three times now. This review is now late (and I would know… I set the due dates around here) because I still have so many questions that I am no longer sure if I just simply missed something or if this narrative is simply too complex for my feeble mind.

I submit the following two pages as evidence.

Is Slade Wilson insane? We see that “Wintergreen” cannot see the Pulorian Guard, which still fails to explain whether or not “Wintergreen” actually exists. Either Slade just killed six dangerous aliens or six homeless men. Said homeless men disappeared from the morgue. Strange, but still not fully convincing. Robin’s inspection reveals the entry into the Halon system from Slade’s first escape which was subsequently “not there” and notes that the door hinges are new, indicating that the first escape must have occurred. During that missing two weeks, Deathstroke reaches out to the Justice League, if you recall. He is in costume during the broadcast, thus seemingly to verify that he was, indeed, outside of the Asylum. Yet nobody remembers fighting the Pulorians except Dev and Slade. Were they somehow immune to a mindwipe or were they never there at all? With so many moving parts, all I can say for certain is that Slade is now free and will certainly have to deal with psychic effect of having been the hand that killed Candace during Strange’s manipulations.