Comic Book Questions Answered – where I answer whatever questions you folks might have about comic books (feel free to e-mail questions to me at brianc@cbr.com).

Reader Jamie C. wrote in to ask, "I'm writing in because I've been wondering when the first time that Deadpool broke the fourth wall was, like was it at the same time that he became an anti hero or was it some time after?"

Fine question. It wasn't QUITE as on the spot as that, but yeah, it was pretty close.

When Rob Liefeld and Fabian Nicieza debuted Deadpool in New Mutants #98, he was definitely a wiseass, but not even close to breaking the fourth wall...

The character had such a great reaction from Marvel editorial than Liefeld and Nicieza stepped up the wisecracks and soon, when Deadpool showed up in other titles fighting superheroes, he was known for his jokes. However, the jokes were not fourth-wall-breaking jokes.

I just wanted to share this awesome Adam Kubert Wolverine cover...

In the fight with Wolverine in the issue, Deadpool might be getting a BIT like Bugs Bunny or something like that, but certainly not breaking the fourth wall.

Deadpool first became an anti-hero soon after that Wolverine issue, when Deadpool got his first miniseries. He then had a second miniseries before eventually getting his first ongoing series in 1997.

In the first year of that series, Joe Kelly, Yancey Labat and Sean Parsons did a Deadpool #0 for Wizard Magazine, and Kelly used the short length of the comic to first make a fourth wall breaking joke...

There were more instances in the issue where Deadpool talked to the readers...

So that's definitely the FIRST example, but I know some folks don't like to count it because it certainly seems to be an out-of-continuity story, so then the real answer would be this slight gag in Deadpool #28 (by Kelly, Pete Woods and Walden Wong), where Bullseye asks how long its been since they last saw each other and Deadpool reminds him that it was in Deadpool #16....

Soon, Christopher Priest would take over the series and he would just have Deadpool outright break the fourth wall...

So yeah, Jamie, I think it is fair enough to say that it was becoming an anti-hero that opened up the character to star in his own titles, thus allowing him to break the fourth wall, which is typically reserved for lead characters.

Thanks for the question, Jamie!

If anyone else has a comic book related question, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!