Nerd Movie Reviews

Origins of Wolverine

Wolverine is quite an old character. I’m not talking about the fictional character’s age. I’m talking about when the character was created. Wolverine first appeared in a comic book way back in 1974, nearly fifty years ago! Most people today know who the character is, and learned about him when they were growing up. It has often been said that superheroes are the modern equivalent of ancient Greek heroes, and their place in culture seems to support that idea. While we all know the real-world origins of the fictional character, the idea of Wolverine,  many people don’t know about his in-universe origins.

Wolverine, as a character, was created in 1974, but the creators did not give him an origin story until 2001. So the character had already existed for twenty seven years before he was given an origin story. His origin story appeared in a comic book series from Marvel called Origins. How… original. This was exciting for a lot of fans because Wolverine had hitherto been very mysterious in terms of where he came from and what his character’s background was. It was known that he was some sort of military or ex-soldier, but he was mostly an enigma.

Origins cleared up a lot of that by telling us where the character was born. It was explained that Wolverine was born in the 19th century, making him one of the older mutants. He is originally Canadian. It is also explained that he spent much of his time fighting in wars: Wolverine was known to have fought in the American Civil War, World War One, World War Two, and the Vietnam War. This explains the origins of his fighting skills. He was also “executed” once (under false pretenses) by firing squad, but survived thanks to his ability to regenerate.

The Origins story was then made into a movie eight years later. In 2009, X-Men Origins: Wolverine was added to the long list of X-Men films made around that time, starring Hugh Jackman as Wolverine. The X-Men Origins: Wolverine movie is heavily based on the events of the Origins comics. The movie was fraught during filming with a number of problems. The screenplay was still being written while the movie was being filmed. It was also filmed in three different countries, and an incomplete workprint wound up being leaked onto the Internet before the theatrical release of the film.

Wolverine is one of, if not the, most popular of the X-Men. He is frequently featured in comic books, and when you see someone in an X-Men t shirt, it’s usually one that involves Wolverine. A superhero’s origin story is a big part of their character. Some heroes, like Batman, have their backstory built in from the beginning, while others, like Wolverine, had to wait some time for their origin story to finally be filled in.