He says he’s the best there is at what he does…and that just might be survival. Thanks to Wolverine’s healing factor, killing him lies somewhere between difficult and next to impossible. On top of that, his sheer tenacity and desire to win have kept him going in ways that no one else could.
Yet that doesn’t keep his enemies from trying to find a way. Shocking though it may seem, there actually have been times when Wolverine has been killed. The successes are far fewer than the failures, but every once in a while… someone finds a way that works.
10 Forced Self-Impalement
In issue #31 of the first What If? series, Wolverine’s first showdown with the Hulk ended differently than it did on Earth-616… namely with the Hulk’s murder. Originally happy about his kill, Logan soon began worrying when he accidentally killed a man during a bar brawl. While seeking refuge from the authorities, Logan was recruited by Magneto to infiltrate the X-Men. Magneto soon attacked the X-Mansion with his Brotherhood, but Logan turned on them when Magneto nearly killed Jean Grey. Logan nearly killed Magnus before Cyclops stopped him, but Magneto retaliated by magnetically forcing Logan to stab his own throat.
9 Impaled On A Tree
In his prime, Wolverine would have likely survived having a tree branch ripping through his chest. In the film Logan, however, the character wasn’t quite at his physical peak anymore, as time had caused his healing factor to weaken. Consequently, the Adamantium grafted to his bones was slowly beginning to poison him. While Logan believed the Adamantium poisoning would eventually kill him, his death was accelerated by a vicious battle with his clone, X-24. Worse still, the serum he had taken earlier to boost his healing factor had not only worn off, but had also weakened his healing powers as an after-effect.
8 Adamantium Poisoning And A Beatdown
Dying from a weakened healing factor and Adamantium poisoning like in the Logan film, “Old Man” Logan began making preparations, including trying to kill Mysterio to prevent his life’s greatest tragedy from happening in the main Marvel Universe. Believing he’d succeeded, Logan returned to his home reality.
Reunited with Danielle Cage and Bruce Banner Jr., Logan and Dani soon found themselves chasing down Sabretooth, who’d kidnapped young Bruce under orders of an aged Mr. Sinister. Logan, Dani and Bruce defeated the villains, but Logan’s healing factor had grown too weak to save him from the poisoning and his battle injuries.
7 Cut With Debris While Healing Factor’s Turned Off
In the future timeline of "Here Comes Tomorrow,” the Beast, who was under the control of the sentient bacteria called Sublime, gained near god-like powers when injecting himself with the blood of Jean Grey, who had been reborn after death as a full-fledged Phoenix host. After Sublime killed Tito Bohusk Jr., the grandson of Barnell Bohusk, Wolverine lashed out at Beast in revenge. Though he managed to stab Beast’s eyes, Logan was quickly defeated when Hank used his new abilities to shut off Logan’s healing, then used telekinesis to rip through Logan’s body with shrapnel. Though in pain, Logan died peacefully, glimpsing at the afterlife.
6 Bitten By Zombies
When an infected Sentry from another universe began transforming people into zombies, those already converted rapidly spread the plague by biting the heroes and villains of Earth-2149. The X-Men’s battle against the growing zombie hordes began when the zombies attacked Westchester and ate Professor X’s body. With Magneto’s help, Logan and several X-Men survived, later regrouping with several others in Nick Fury’s Helicarrier to form a plan. Wolverine and many other heroes were sent to look for survivors to bring to the Helicarrier, but Logan was sadly bitten by Hawkeye and Captain America. Not even his healing factor could halt his transformation.
5 Heart Ripped Out
Wolverine’s healing factor wasn’t always as powerful as it is today. In his earlier appearances, he was much more vulnerable, as seen in Uncanny X-Men Annual #11, when the alien being Horde ripped out Logan’s heart. To Wolverine’s great luck, a droplet of his blood landed on the Crystal of Ultimate Vision, which Horde sought to use to attain virtual godhood. The crystal supercharged the healing factor in Wolverine’s blood, growing him a new body while his old one lay lifeless on the ground. Logan then killed Horde and briefly accessed the crystal’s vast power, but ultimately chose against using it.
4 Stabbed By The Gorgon
With enemies like the Hand and the Silver Samurai, Logan’s fairly used to being impaled with swords and then just walking it off. Not so with the Gorgon, however, whose clean-cut actually killed Logan, or at least left him close enough to death so he could be revived and brainwashed by the Hand.
It is unclear whether Gorgon was using the Godkiller, a sword actually capable of killing the young god Phobos, although it would explain why Logan’s healing factor struggled to reverse the blade’s damage. The swords do look identical… although perhaps the Gorgon simply knew how to cut Logan best.
3 Swallowing A Grenade
While hunting down a terrorist group called Scimitar, Wolverine and Amir, his Atlantean paramour, were lured to a Scimitar pirate ship. There he encountered Shogun, an armored warrior made from a piece of Logan’s soul, who killed Amir with a throwing star and forced Wolverine to devour a bomb. Logan’s body healed, but his soul had lost in battle to Azrael, the Angel of Death, and thus had vacated Wolverine’s body. With Doctor Strange’s help, Logan’s soul returned to his body, and he sought out revenge against Shogun and the true masterminds behind his death: Phaedra and Azrael himself.
2 Incinerated To The Bone
Losing the Adamantium may have briefly cost Logan his healing factor, but it eventually came back stronger than ever—and stayed that way even after the metal was reinserted into his bones. In the post-apocalyptic future of “Days of Future Past,” however, Logan never went through that traumatic experience, meaning his healing ability likely never got that super-boost. That and the ageing that came from a weaker healing factor may explain why that Logan was unable to regenerate when reduced to just a skeleton, which the “main” Logan eventually pulled it off in the main timeline.
1 Petrified And Suffocated In Adamantium
Logan’s arguably most famous death occurred during a final showdown with Abraham Cornelius, the man who bonded the Adamantium to Wolverine’s bones in the first place. Cornelius had sought to replicate the process in others to create thousands of perfect, obedient soldiers. When Cornelius tried to activate the Adamantium bonding process in his latest test subjects, however, Logan broke the containers containing the metal’s scalding, liquefied state. Wolverine was completely drenched in Adamantium as a result, yet before it could harden around his body, the X-Man chased Cornelius to the rooftop, killing the scientist as his final act.