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After an attempt on her life, Natasha Romanova, the Black Widow, former KGB operative, comes out of retirement. With the help of retired S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Phil Dexter, she learns that she is part of a thread linking several of her Russian former compatriots. The North Institute's Max Hunter and his partner Kestrel are killing them off.

Natasha's past begins unraveling when she comes to the aid of former fellow Russian agent Stefyanya Melnikova, who had to use a mysterious drug called Medusagen to help with her pain during pregnancy. When Natasha finds out what this medicine is for, she learns that she herself is more different than she had imagined.

The trail leads back to her homeland, Russia. She finds her old sponsor Lyudmila Antonovna Kudrin at her corporate headquarters in the Ural Mountains. She learns from Kudrin that her past is not what she thought it was.

Russia has changed in many ways, even if the people hold on to their rose-colored-glasses version of their past — glasses which Natasha has rejected for a clearer view of the world. Kudrin represents that nostalgia for Russia's anti-capitalist days (notwithstanding that she now runs a corporation), when Russians weren't allowed to know how much better the free-market countries were doing economically. Natasha has lived beyond the propaganda, telling Kudrin, concerning her homeland, "We destroyed ourselves." This parallels the destruction of all the agents so that those behind the plan can reach their goals.

The Red Room, meanwhile, is an institute that produces black-ops personnel. It remained after the U.S.S.R. disintegrated and is now tied to the U.S. corporation Gynacon. Natasha finds out the Red Room, besides initially training her, guided a broader secret program during the Cold War. Now everything she thought she knew about her childhood is not true. And Natasha learns another hidden secret — one about her relationship with her former boss and co-spy Nick Fury of S.H.I.E.LD.

The story, written by Philip-K.-Dick-Award-winning science fiction author Richard K. Morgan, has a consistently serious tone. Morgan's outstanding book Altered Carbon deals with the transference of consciousness, and this book caused editor Jenny Lee to seek him to write a series for Marvel. Morgan's approach to female characters is similar to that in Altered Carbon, and Lee gave him free reign in reinventing the Black Widow's past. Natasha is a very dangerous Black Widow in this series and she is ruthless in her pursuit of the truth because so many of her friends have died.

The place names lettered onto the panels (to show you where the action is taking place) still use the tired and irritatingly incorrect use of the backwards "N" and the backwards "R" because the story involves Russia.* This may be letterer Cory Petit's doing, or editor Jennifer Lee's responsibility. Writer Morgan, however, seems to know about Russian naming conventions, such as patronymics and that most female last names end in an "a" or "ya," as in "Romanova" instead of "Romanoff." And he knows the endearing diminutives of names, such as "Natushka." (And that "Natasha" is actually a diminutive of "Nataliya.")

The Greg Land covers are groovy, and though I'm not a fan of Sienkiewicz's scratchy interior presentations, they maintain the weight of the tale (and do make me nostalgic for Moon Knight). And you certainly can't fault his composition.

This series is Morgan's introduction into the world of comicbook writing and it is a seamless transition. Volume 2 is promised to be coming soon, but I suppose that depends on sales. So go out and buy all six issues of this series at your local comicbook shop while you still can! In May, a graphic novel of issues 1-6 is due out, called Black Widow: Homecoming.

In-joke Quote: "I am Vassily Ilyich Ulyanov. No relation, I assure you."