The man named Logan lives numerous lifetimes as a result of his regenerative mutation before losing his memories during a cruel experiment. But he finds a new home when he joins the ranks of the X-Men as Wolverine. With his brooding demeanor and brawling behavior, he becomes a force of good.
A Long History
James Howlett is born to wealthy parents John and Elizabeth Howlett in Alberta, Canada, and grows up in the late 19th century. As a child, he’s frail and unhealthy due to his overactive mutant immune system and neglected by his mother, who’s institutionalized following the death of her first son, John Jr., in 1897. James’s mutant abilities are triggered when his father is shot by the Howlett groundskeeper Thomas Logan, whom he did not know was his real father. James kills Logan, slashes the face of Logan’s son and his friend Dog, and leaves Alberta with a childhood friend, Rose O’Hara.
His healing abilities drive trauma from his memories, leaving him partially amnesiac. He and Rose find refuge at a British Columbia stone quarry, where Rose, claiming James is her cousin, gives his name as “Logan.” Within months, Logan’s powers due to the environment around him. He becomes healthier and gains senses to rival those of an animal, but also becomes more violent. To divert some of this pent-up rage, Logan partakes in cage fights where his prowess earns him the nickname “Wolverine.” Though he accidentally killing Rose with his claws, and retreats into the woods where he lives as a feral beast, losing all of his former memories.
He later reenters society and travels the world, partaking in every major conflict of the 20th century (WWI, WWII, the Spanish Civil War, the Vietnam War) as a soldier, criminal, or mercenary for hire. This causes him to coin the phrase, "I'm the best there is at what I do, but what I do best isn't very nice.”
While on the run from the law, he’s abducted by the Canadian super-soldier program known as Weapon X, a program he had previously been a willing participant in during the early 1960s as an international operative of Team X. Logan is a prime candidate for this new iteration of Weapon X due to his incredibly fast healing and endurance, which allows Doctor Cornelius and his team to fuse adamantium to his skeleton. The experiment is successful and gives Logan more control over his berserker nature, but also wipes him of any residual memories lingering in his head.
When Bruce Banner, AKA Hulk, blunders his way into Canadian territory, Logan is mobilized against the green gargantuan. He’s also used to kill the entire population of a small town in a field test, but eventually breaks loose from his captors, slaying almost everyone at the Weapon X facility. Despite this, they retain his DNA and use it to create new mutants like Avery Connor and the clawed clone Laura Kinney, AKA X-23.
His real sense of belonging arrives when he joins the X-Men.
Slashing Skills
Wolverine’s rapid regeneration powers allow him to bounce back from almost every type of bodily wound on the condition that his head remains firmly attached to his shoulders. Nevertheless, the time of each healing is understandably proportionate to the severity of the injury. His body is also immune to most poisons, drugs, and diseases; his agility, reflexes, and senses are similarly enhanced. Wolverine sees and hears things at distances far greater than those of ordinary humans. His sense of smell is even more magnified and he can recognize people and objects by scent alone, which, combined with combat and stealth training, makes him one of the world’s foremost trackers.
The most iconic of his natural weapons are six retractable, slightly curved, foot-long bone claws, three in each arm, beneath the skin and muscle of his forearms. He can, at will, release these claws through the skin beneath his knuckles. The claws are naturally sharp and tougher than normal human bone, allowing them to penetrate most types of flesh and natural materials.
He has an extra defense from the Weapon X program, where his skeleton is coated in the near-indestructible steel alloy known as adamantium. This alloy adds an extra 105 pounds to his frame—or 47.6 kilograms in Wolverine’s native metric system. This procedure slows his healing factor so that it might take weeks to recover from multiple wounds, but eventually the factor returns to full strength and speed. The adamantium renders his bones virtually unbreakable and his claws capable of penetrating almost any substance depending on its thickness and the force he exerts. His reinforced skeleton also enables him to withstand heavy physical pressure, giving his muscles sufficient force to briefly lift 800 pounds or more.
To top things off, Wolverine is trained in hand-to-hand combat, computer systems, vehicles, weapons, and is fluent in Cheyenne, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Lakota, Russian and Spanish, with some French, Thai, and Vietnamese.
The Snikt List
Wolverine’s enemies are numerous and it is often hard not to blame them. After all, he is a hard guy to get along with. However, an adversary, with abilities to match Logan’s, is Victor Creed, AKA Sabertooth, who also has retractable claws and a healing factor. The two first clash in Japan with Logan coming out on top and leaving Creed for dead, unaware that he had regenerative powers as well. Creed is an operative of the mastermind Romulus, ruler of the wolf-like Lupine and a worldwide criminal empire. Two of Wolverine’s maternal uncles, Elias and Frederick Hudson, work for him, although he is unaware of it. Romulus keeps an eye on Logan for a good portion of his life and mentally manipulates him at times.
Logan’s Heroes
While a brief member of the Canadian Super Hero team known as Alpha Flight, Wolverine joins the X-Men at the behest of Professor Charles Xavier, AKA Professor X. This is his most iconic home and the place where he enters into an on-again, off-again relationship with telepath Jean Grey. Her existing relationship with Scott Summers, AKA Cyclops, however, creates a complex love triangle between all three.
For all his brooding nature and solitary preferences, Wolverine is a big softy. Not literally, though, because remember, every bone in his body is covered in an unbreakable material. Figuratively speaking, Logan is a very good guy, willing to stick his invincible neck out for those in desperate need of help. Over the years, he becomes a mentor or father figure to X-Men members like Kitty Pryde and Jubilation Lee, AKA Jubilee, and both learn much while at his side.
Wolverine becomes close friends with the kind genius and feral-looking mutant Dr. Hank McCoy, AKA Beast. But their long friendship ends in betrayal by Beast who uses Logan against his will for his own ends.
While the X-Men are certainly Wolverine’s number one team, he becomes a prominent member of X-Force, often operating from the shadows, and joins the likes of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, the Avengers, and the Secret Defenders. At times, he’s affiliated with the Fantastic Four, Clan Yashida, the Horsemen of the Apocalypse and X-Treme Sanctions Executive (XSE).