Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) (2024)

James Howlett, known as Logan and by his codename Wolverine, is a fictional character who originated as the main protagonist and central figure of 20th Century Fox's X-Men film series, having appeared in nine films since his introduction in X-Men (2000), including both ensemble and solo films. He is portrayed by Hugh Jackman and is based on the Marvel Comics character Wolverine, created by Len Wein and John Romita Sr. Jackman later portrayed multiple alternate "variants" of Logan from the multiverse in Deadpool & Wolverine (2024), produced by Marvel Studios and set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), with Troye Sivan portraying a young Logan in X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009), and Henry Cavill portraying a variant dubbed "Cavillrine" in the former film.

Role in the Films

Early life

James Howlett was born in the North-Western Territory, Canada (then part of British North America), Earth-10005[a] in 1832. His mutant powers are awakened when, at 13, he stabs his family's groundskeeper, Thomas Logan, for killing his father, a wealthy landowner. Discovering that Logan was in fact his biological father and seeing the revulsion in his mother's eyes over James killing him, he flees. With his half-brother Victor Creed, Howlett spends the next century fighting in numerous wars including the American Civil War, the Great War, and the Second World War. While being held in a Japanese POW camp in 1945, he saves the life of Japanese officer Ichirō Yashida from the bombing of Nagasaki. In 1962, Howlett is approached by Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr, who are recruiting mutants, but Howlett simply responds "Go fuck yourself".[54]

Original timeline

Team X and becoming the Wolverine

During the Vietnam War, Creed kills a superior officer for preventing Creed from raping a Vietnamese woman. Howlett defends Creed when he sees angry soldiers surround him, and they are both sentenced to execution, but survive and are imprisoned. After the war, Howlett becomes a member of a black-ops strike team, "Team X," which is led by Colonel William Stryker and includes Creed as well as Wade Wilson. Howlett leaves due to the group's disregard for human life. He starts a new life in Canada under the name "James Logan" with Kayla Silverfox. In 1979, Logan's past catches up to him when Stryker assigns him to the Weapon X project, in which he has adamantium grafted to his bones. Taking the name "Wolverine" after the Algonquian spirit, Kuekuatsheu, Logan works together with Creed to fight and kill Wilson, who has been designated Weapon XI. Stryker shoots Logan in the brain with an adamantium bullet before being arrested. Though Logan survives, his memory is lost, with his only identifying personal effects being his dog tags engraved with "LOGAN."

Member of the X-Men

In the 2000s, Logan is an amateur cage fighter in Laughlin City, Alberta.[55] There Logan meets Marie "Rogue" D'Ancanto, a mutant teenage girl who has run away from home. They are attacked on the road by Victor Creed, now known as Sabretooth and a minion of Magneto. Two of Xavier's students – Cyclops and Storm – arrive and save them. Logan and Rogue are brought to Xavier's mansion and school for mutants in Westchester County, New York. Xavier tells Logan that Magneto appears to have taken an interest in him and asks him to stay while Xavier's mutants, the X-Men, investigate. Rogue enrolls in the school, and visits Logan while he is having a nightmare. Startled, he accidentally stabs her, but she is able to absorb his healing ability to recover. Disturbed by this event, Rogue leaves the school, and Logan finds her on a train and convinces her to return. Before they can leave, Magneto arrives, knocks out Logan and subdues Rogue, revealing it was Rogue who he wants rather than Logan. Learning that Magneto plans to use a machine to "mutate" world leaders meeting at a summit on nearby Ellis Island, Logan and the other X-Men scale the Statue of Liberty, battling and overpowering the Brotherhood of Mutants, with Logan throwing Sabretooth off of the building into the ocean. After helping stop Magneto's plan, Logan is directed by Professor X to an abandoned military base around Alkali Lake that might contain information about his past, taking Cyclops' motorcycle.

Four days later, while stopping on his way to Alkali Lake to refill his gas tank, Logan notices that Sabretooth has been tracking him and attacks him, stopping after noticing he has similar dog tags to his own, and that Sabretooth is not trying to kill him.[56] Offering him a drink, the two drink in a nearby bar, with Sabretooth revealing his fall from the Statue of Liberty to have restored some of his own erased memories, such as of his name being "Victor", of killing babies and old men, and of Logan. They are interrupted by soldiers searching for Victor, who recognizes Logan as "Weapon X". Fighting the soldiers, Logan and Victor are surprised that they show instinctive teamwork side-by-side, but they are eventually brought down. The two wake up restrained on a helicopter, and after apologizing to Logan for their past, having remembered them to be brothers, Victor throws Logan out of it, sacrificing himself to save him. William Stryker then has adamantium bonded to Victor's bones, which fails as he had originally expected, although he is content with one new success story, Lady Deathstrike. Learning of Logan's survival, Stryker expects to see "Wolverine" again.

Three days later after that, Logan returns to Professor X's school for mutants where he encounters Stryker, to which he and the X-Men teams up with Magneto and Mystique to stop him. During a confrontation with Stryker and Lady Deathstrike, Logan regains some of his memory but opts to remain with the X-Men over Stryker's objections, while Stryker is killed when Alkali's base floods after sustaining damage.

A few years later, Xavier sends Logan and Storm to investigate the disappearance of Scott Summers at Alkali Lake, but they find only telekinetically floating rocks, Summers' glasses, and an unconscious Jean. Xavier explains to Logan that when Jean sacrificed herself to save them, she freed the "Phoenix", a dark and extremely powerful alternate personality which Xavier had telepathically repressed. Logan is disgusted to learn of this psychic tampering with Jean's mind. When she awakens, she starts seducing him aggressively, but he notes this behaviour as the Phoenix. Logan discovers that she killed Summers and is not the Jean Grey he once knew. Jean kills Xavier and joins Magneto, who plans to have mutants loyal to him storm a Worthington Labs facility housed in Alcatraz to destroy a supposed "cure" for mutants. Logan, Storm, and Beast lead the remaining X-Men in challenging the attack, and Logan has Colossus throw him at Magneto to distract him long enough for Hank McCoy to inject Magneto with the "cure" and thus nullify his powers. Army reinforcements arrive and shoot at Jean just as Logan had calmed her down. The Phoenix is awakened by the attack and disintegrates the troops, and begins to destroy Alcatraz and anyone within range of her powers. Logan realizes that only he can stop the Phoenix due to his healing factor and adamantium skeleton. When Logan approaches her, Jean momentarily gains control and begs him to save her, and everyone else, by killing her. Logan fatally stabs Jean, killing the Phoenix, but mourns her death.

Isolation

Years later, the guilt-ridden Logan lives in isolation in the Yukon. He is located by Yukio, a mutant with the ability to foresee people's deaths, sent by an elderly Ichirō Yashida wanting to repay Logan for being saved during World War II, but Logan refuses to have his healing powers transferred into Yashida. With Yukio as his side, this leads to a series of events where Wolverine protects Ichirō's granddaughter, Mariko Yashida from Ichirō's son, Shingen Yashida. In the course of these events, Logan's healing powers are damaged, his adamantium claws are severed, and he is finally able to let go of his guilt over Jean's death. After finally returning to the United States two years later, Logan finds himself approached by Magneto and a resurrected Professor X while learning of a new threat to all mutants. A deleted scene shows the titular character's yellow costume from the source material in a suitcase.

Going back in time

By 2023, the world is controlled by Sentinels, where Wolverine has teamed up with surviving mutants and the X-Men. Kitty Pryde uses her phasing powers to transfer Logan's mind back in time into his 1973 body to help the younger Xavier and Lehnsherr, as well as Hank McCoy, deter Mystique from assassinating Bolivar Trask, preventing the apocalyptic future from occurring. Once his mission is fulfilled, events from 1973 onward are changed.

Revised timeline

Captured by Weapon X

In the revised timeline, although rescued by Mystique in 1973, Logan is eventually captured by Stryker, given an adamantium skeleton and subjected to brutal mental conditioning, leaving him more feral than human. When some of the X-Men are captured by Stryker's men in 1983, Jean, Scott, and Nightcrawler infiltrate Stryker's base and find a cage. Jean senses the human mind inside and releases him so that he can help. After he tears through Stryker's forces,[57] the three mutants find him and Jean telepathically restores some of Logan's human memories before he runs off through a small side-exit into the snow.[b][58]

A better 2023

After having successfully altered 1973, the consciousness of the original timeline's Logan awakes in his body in a new 2023 but with no memory of the new timeline. He is happy to see Jean and Scott alive, as they never died. Over the preceding 40 years, Logan had joined the X-Men, ultimately becoming a history teacher at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters.

Fall of the X-Men, death and legacy

A few years later, Logan's healing factor is deteriorating (later revealed to have been compromised by a genetically engineered anti-mutant virus, along with the rest of the world), causing him to finally age past his prime and suffer from terminal adamantium poisoning. By 2028, Xavier develops Alzheimer's and inadvertently kills several hundred people, including most of the X-Men, in a seizure-induced psychic attack in Westchester County, leaving Logan among the only survivors. Mutants are hunted down en masse by humans, and Logan and Xavier are then branded international fugitives. Logan asks the assistance of Caliban to help care for Xavier. He and Caliban take Xavier to a place in Mexico near the US border, caring for him over the following year while attempting to raise money to purchase a Sunseeker yacht for the two of them to live on in peace.

In 2029, Logan spends his days working as a chauffeur under his birth name and hustling for prescription drugs along the border between the United States and Mexico. He and Caliban live in an abandoned smelting plant across the border in Mexico and care for the senile Xavier. He is tasked by Transigen's former nurse Gabriela Lopez to escort the 11-year-old Laura to a place in North Dakota called "Eden." Logan, Charles and Laura escape Transigen's hunters led by Donald Pierce and discover that Laura is Logan's daughter bred from his DNA. After accepting shelter from the Munson family they helped on the highway, Xavier is killed by a feral clone of Wolverine from which Logan and Laura escape and bury Xavier's body near a lake.

Eventually, Logan and Laura arrive at Eden, a safe haven run by Rictor and former Transigen test subjects. There, Logan learns that the children will make an eight-mile journey across the forest to the Canadian-American border and entrusts Laura to lead before departing on his own. But when the children are located and captured, Logan uses a mutant serum provided by Rictor to restore his strength and healing factor. He meets Zander Rice, killing the mutant virus' creator. Despite Rice and Pierce being killed, Logan is no match for his clone, who impales Logan with a tree, his healing factor now gone. Laura shoots the clone in the head with an adamantium bullet that Logan had kept with him for years. Logan tells Laura not to become the weapon that she was made to be, and after she tearfully acknowledges him as her father, he dies peacefully in her arms. Laura and the children bury him before continuing the journey across the border. Laura places the cross on his grave on its side to create an "X" to honor him as the last of the X-Men.[59][60]

It is later revealed that Logan was Earth-10005's "anchor being", an entity of extreme importance to the timeline. Once Logan dies in 2029, the universe begins to destabilize. This catches the attention of Paradox, a rogue Time Variance Authority (TVA) agent, who decides to use the "Time Ripper", a machine that mercy kills timelines, on Earth-10005. In an attempt to save his reality, Wade Wilson from the revised timeline time-travels to scour Logan's grave for signs of survival, only to find his adamantium skeleton remains, which he uses to fight off TVA forces.

Alternate Versions

Yellow suit variant

Death of the X-Men

This version of Logan presumably had a similar origin story. At some point in his past, this Logan was offered the chance to join the X-Men. He initially turned them down, though he eventually accepted the offer. While on the team, he was presented with a yellow and blue uniform but refused to wear it as he didn't want the X-Men to think he wanted to be a part of the team.

One night, while Logan was out binge-drinking at a bar, the X-Men were killed by a group of mutant-hunting humans. Following this incident, he fell into a depressive spiral, believing he had let his new family down. Logan went berserk and murdered many people indiscriminately; both those who killed his fellow mutants, and innocent civilians. His actions led to the desecration of the legacy of the X-Men, and to Logan being considered the worst Wolverine in the multiverse. Logan deeply misses his teammates and chooses to memorialize them by wearing the uniform at all times under his normal clothes, spending his days depressed and drinking.

Alliance with Deadpool

Wade Wilson / Deadpool of Earth-10005 is searching for a variant of Wolverine to replace the original version from his timeline, hoping to stop its collapse. He enters Logan's reality and asks him to come back to the Time Variance Authority (TVA) headquarters with him. Logan refuses, prompting Wade to take him by force. When they arrive, Agent Paradox explains that finding a new Logan will not stop the deterioration of Earth-10005, while also revealing this Logan's status in his universe. Paradox then prunes Wade and Logan, sending them to the Void. Wade triggers Logan into a fight by reminding him of what he had done, and their fight ends when Wade promises that the TVA could fix Logan's timeline. Eventually they, along with Johnny Storm / Human Torch, are captured by the forces of Cassandra Nova, who reveals herself to be the twin sister of Charles Xavier.

After Nova demonstrates her ability to manipulate people's minds, and tricks Wade into thinking he doesn't matter, Logan and Wade escape her lair and come into contact with "Nicepool", a variant of Wade. Nicepool gives them a car to travel to the borderlands and meet a small resistance who fight against Nova's forces. On the way there, Logan realizes that Wade lied about his promise, and fights him in the car until they pass out. They are then driven to the borderlands by resistance member Laura / X-23, his Earth-10005 counterpart's daughter.

Logan wakes up at the resistance base and starts raiding the stash of alcohol. When Wade wakes up, they meet the resistance: Elektra Natchios, Eric Brooks / Blade, Remy LeBeau / Gambit, and Laura. Wade convinces the resistance to help him fight Nova and escape the Void, but Logan refuses to cooperate. However, he eventually relents after a conversation with Laura about his inability to save the X-Men in his universe. Logan and Wade, along with the resistance, confront Nova and her forces. Nova mentally incapacitates Logan, learning about his past, but eventually gets her powers blocked by Wade using Juggernaut's helmet. Logan convinces Wade to remove the helmet, and Nova allows Logan and Wade to escape the Void via a sling ring she acquired from a variant of Doctor Strange and opens a portal back to Earth-10005.

Upon arriving, Logan and Wade find that the "Time Ripper" device is nearly ready, and Paradox is preparing to use it on Wade's timeline without permission from his superior, Hunter B-15. Nova learns of this and arrives to use the Time Ripper to destroy all timelines. Wade and Logan, who is now donning the cowl of his suit, battle the Deadpool Corps, an army of Deadpool variants. The Corps stands down when Wade's friend Peter Wisdom arrives to help. Paradox tells Logan and Wade that to stop Nova, one can disrupt the power flow of the Time Ripper, but at the cost of their life. Using their bodies as conductors, they both join hands and destroy the Time Ripper, killing Nova in the process. Because they did it together, they manage to survive the blast.

As Paradox is arrested, B-15 tells Logan that he can remain on Earth-10005, but instead is asked if his past can be changed. B-15 explains that his past is what made him the hero needed to save the multiverse, and that there is no need to change it. Wade takes him and Laura to meet his friends, where he encourages Wade to reconcile with his ex-girlfriend, Vanessa Carlysle.

Here is the revised list without periods:

Other versions

• A gambler variant of Logan, who wears an eyepatch and a white tux, dubbed Patch
• A variant of Logan being crucified on a giant X, reminiscent of the cover of Uncanny X-Men (1981) #251
• A variant of Logan fighting the Hulk, who is wearing the original brown and tan suit designed by John Byrne
• A variant of Logan portrayed by Henry Cavill dubbed Cavillrine, referring to a popular Internet fancast on which actor could succeed Jackman
• A variant of Logan, whose height is closer to the character's comics-accurate 5 feet 3 inches (160 cm)
• An Age of Apocalypse variant of Logan with "glam rock-like" hair, one hand, and a black and red costume, named Weapon X in the comics
• An elderly variant of Logan, based upon Old Man Logan

Appearances

• X-Men - Huge Jackman
• X2 - Huge Jackman
• X-Men: The Last Stand - Huge Jackman
• X-Men Origins: Wolverine - Huge Jackman and Troye Sivan
• X-Men: First Class - Huge Jackman
• The Wolverine - Huge Jackman
• X-Men: Days of Future Past - Huge Jackman
• X-Men: Apocalypse - Huge Jackman
• Logan - Huge Jackman
• Deadpool 2 - Huge Jackman
• - Huge Jackman

References in Popular Culture

Other Films

• In an "Extended Cut" of Fantastic Four (2005), Reed Richards changes his face to resemble Jackman's portrayal of Wolverine in an attempt to woo Sue Storm.
• In Flushed Away (2006), Roddy (voiced by Jackman) has a Wolverine costume in his wardrobe.
• Vince Vieluf portrays a jock version of Jackman's Logan in the parody film Epic Movie (2007), spoofing elements of X-Men: The Last Stand (2006).
• Jackman parodies the Logan role in films such as Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb (2014) and Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (2015), in addition to playing himself.
• When "The Farmer" is in his "Mr. X" persona in Shaun the Sheep Movie (2015), the poster in which he poses with a hair clipper in each hand is based on the poster for The Wolverine (2013).
• While Logan does not appear in Deadpool (2016), Deadpool refers to both the character and Jackman multiple times, with a mask made from a magazine photograph of Jackman being worn by Deadpool in the film's denouement.
• The opening scene of The Greatest Showman (2017), also starring Jackman, features an Easter egg reference to Logan; in the credits, a character appears with arms crossed and claws extended in each corner of the border.[65]
• The opening scene of Deadpool 2 (2018) features Deadpool holding a music box that depicts Logan's death in Logan. Jackman's image also appears on a cereal box that Deadpool autographs for a young boy. In a post-credits scene, Deadpool time-travels to the emergence of his Weapon XI incarnation and shoots him several times, confusing the bystanding Logan, before time-traveling away.

Music videos

The opening scene of a music video for the single "Chk Chk Boom" by the South Korean boy band Stray Kids features Wolverine (portrayed by Hugh Jackman) as a weather presenter on fictional television channel CCB.[66]

Video games

The video games X2: Wolverine's Revenge, X-Men: The Official Game, and X-Men Origins: Wolverine are based on the X-Men film series for which they are named, the latter two including voice acting by Hugh Jackman as Logan, with the first merely featuring Jackman's likeness with Mark Hamill voicing the character. The first game does not take place in the continuity of the film series, having a closer resemblance to the Marvel Universe instead, while the second game bridges the events of X2 and X-Men: The Last Stand, as Logan mourns Jean Grey and faces a returned Jason Stryker and Lady Deathstrike, who working with HYDRA take control of his deceased father's Sentinel to eradicate mutantkind; Logan also faces his brother Victor, who had been bonded with adamantium and mind-wiped by Stryker. The story of the third game is a combination of the backstory explored in the X-Men Origins: Wolverine film and an original plot created by Raven Software using Unreal Engine 3, which was influenced by major events in the X-Men comic series, expanding upon the film's events as Logan recalls the events of X-Men Origins: Wolverine more accurately during the post-apocalyptic future later depicted in X-Men: Days of Future Past.[67]

Reception

The character from the X-Men film series was well received by critics. Daniel Dockery of Syfy ranked Wolverine first in their "Ranking Every Mutant in the X-Men Film Series" list, writing, "For nearly 20 years, we got to see Wolverine from every angle, and by the end of Logan, the sadness in his demise was truly earned."[68] IndieWire ranked Wolverine 2nd in their "X-Men Movie Mutant Characters From Best To Worst" list.[69] The A.V. Club ranked Wolverine 6th in their "100 best Marvel characters" list.[70] Joe Garza of SlashFilm ranked Wolverine 7th in their "Most Powerful X-Men Characters" list.[71]

Hugh Jackman's portrayal of the character has been praised by multiple critics. Jessica Brajer of MovieWeb stated, "The film that kick-started the X-Men franchise and brought Jackman into the spotlight is the original X-Men. [...] Though Jackman wasn't the first choice for the role, it's clear that he has lived up to the expectations set by comic-book fans everywhere."[72] Liam Gaughan of SlashFilm wrote, "If a new actor is cast as Wolverine in a rebooted X-Men franchise within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, they will have to live up to the legacy that Jackman left behind."[73] Christian Bone of Starburst ranked Jackman's performances through the X-Men films first in their "10 Greatest Performances in the X-Men Movies" list, saying, "Some might complain that Wolverine hogs too much of the spotlight at the expense of other characters, but it's hard to blame the filmmakers for this when Jackman is such a strong leading man. Even now, in our superhero-saturated world, his Wolverine remains unique – a reluctant hero, who struggles to control his own brutality. It's the sort of character you don't really get in the MCU, though he no doubt will be folded into it soon enough. Good luck to the poor sap who has to follow Jackman."[74] Scoot Allan of Comic Book Resources ranked Jackman's performances across the X-Men film series third rd in their "10 Best Performances In The X-Men Movies" list, writing, "Hugh Jackman played the mutant hero and became an instant hit with fans of Wolverine."[75] Jackman's performance topped The Hollywood Reporter's "50 Greatest Superhero Movie Performances of All Time" list.[76]

Playing the role for seventeen years in nine films, Jackman held the Guinness World Record of "longest career as a live-action Marvel superhero" between 2017 and 2021 alongside Sir Patrick Stewart.[77] He was initially believed to have regained the record in 2024 after his role in Wolverine in Deadpool & Wolverine, only to lose it again to Wesley Snipes as Blade in the same film.