In celebration of the final Wolverine movie, Logan, which comes out this weekend, I thought it would be fun to take a look back at Wolverine’s history in comics.

Wolverine originally had his first appearance as a throw away character in Incredible Hulk # 181. Called both Weapon X and Wolverine in this issue, he was sent by the Canadian government to put an end to both the Hulk and the Wendigo. This was not uncommon at the time to introduce minor new characters into a title as a test for its popularity before investing in further development by a creative team.

Developed by Len Wein and John Romita, who was then the art director, the character borrowed his name and some pre-concept work from an earlier fan submission to Foom Magazine #2 published by Marvel in 1973 and edited by Roy Thomas. The fan submission by Andy Olsen featured a spandex clad super hero with tiger strip that had been subjected to experimentation leading to either a metal body or a cyborg. Credit for Wolverine’s creation is a little murky as Roy Thomas was responsible for Wolverine’s namesake and as Hulk editor, also tasked Len Wein with creating a backstory for the character. Wein’s backstory for Wolverine had no mention of Wolverine’s adamantium body, which was later added to his backstory. Wolverine was teased at the end of Hulk #180 with a full page illustration that continued to a full appearance in #181 and wrapping up in the two pages of Hulk #182. While longtime Hulk artist, Herb Trimpe, drew the issue featuring the first Wolverine, he followed the character model laid out by John Romita. Trimpe is nowadays credited as a co-creator as well.

Wolverine went unused for a half year until Len Wein incorporated the character into the newly reformed international themed New X-Men in Giant Size X-Men # 1 (May/1975) as the Canadian component. Wolverine then became a regular appearing character beginning in X-Men # 94.

Chris Claremont became the head writer for X-Men and continued to develop Wolverine’s history and backstory for the next 15 years. He introduced the idea of Wolverine’s adamantium skeleton, which was a shock to some readers who thought that Wolverine’s claws were a feature of his gloves and not himself. Dave Cockrum revealed his unmasked likeness which was based on DC’s silver age character, Timber Wolf. Timber Wolf, created in 1964, also served as the basis for Wolverine’s brown costume introduced by John Byrne later on.

Being a part of a team book, Wolverine’s personal story was rarely explored until Jim Shooter allowed for the development of 4 part Mini-Series at Marvel. Chris Claremont and Frank Miller used the series to introduce a samurai aspect to the character and offered a more complex look at the rugged persona. The series also tied a number of Japanese Marvel characters to the Wolverine story, including the Yakuza gangsters, the ninja clan known as the Hand, and the Silver Samurai. It also provided a new love interest in Mariko Yashida.

Wolverine’s next major turning point was the final revelation of his Weapon X origin written and illustrated by Barry Windsor-Smith (known for Conan). This story ran in the anthology series Marvel Comics Presents #72-84, and details the experimentation that lead to his skeleton merging with adamantium.

In the late 1980’s, Wolverine was given his own ongoing series that centered on his adventures in southeast Asia under the alias, Patch. His relationship with Sabertooth was further developed, as Sabertooth became a more prominent antagonist.

With a change of writers in the early 1990’s, Wolverine was revised again in major ways. His backstory was further complicated and taken from a rustic background, to government brainwashing and hidden memories. This ultimately lead to the revelation that Sabertooth was not Wolverine’s father, a story that had been developed by Claremont for over 10 years. The storyline, Fatal Attractions, countered established history as Wolverine was re-written to have always had claws. This was revealed to fans in the aftermath of his battle with Magneto who completely separated him from his adamantium skeleton (X-Men Vol. 2 # 25 and Wolverine # 75). The successful X-Men cartoon and later movie franchise would draw on these elements. Wolverine’s anti-hero persona proved so popular in the 1990’s it became a phenomenom. His prominence rivaled Marvel’s traditional mascot, Spider-Man, as the character was repeatedly used as a guest star in failing or newly introduced titles to boost sales.

In 2001, Wolverine’s history was again further explored, edited, and re-written to reveal a new identity as James Howlett as well as a re-introduction of Sabertooth as a half-brother and further explanation to his “Logan” namesake.

Interest in Wolverine by comic fans waned in 2000’s with the rise in popularity of Deadpool. Comic creators introduced Wolverine’s offspring to help re-ignite the character. Laura Kinney as X-23 was first introduced in 2004, while his son, Daken was introduced later in 2007. During this period, Wolverine’s origins were further tinkered with to reveal his mutant origin as a feline/human sub species. This aspect derived from an old joke by co-creator, Len Wein. Wein had claimed the character was an actual Wolverine animal that had been mutated by the High Evolutionary. The conclusion of this feral storyline featured the beheading and death of Sabertooth.

In recent times, Wolverine was eventually killed off and replaced by X-23 to help garner a female reading audience in Marvel’s company wide effort to diversify its core characters. In a bid to regain readership, the Old Man Logan storyline restored a time-traveled Wolverine to the current comics.

The current Logan movie borrows from many elements of Wolverine’s history and it will be fun to see how the director builds this new story for the X-Men’s most popular superhero.

By Joshua H. Stulman

Owner, BrooklynComicShop.com