The truth of who Wolverine was had been one of the great mysteries in comics. Some wanted to know answers. Some didn't. Marvel ultimately feared those answers would be given for them by the highly successful Fox X-Men films and so in the early aughts, they bit the bullet and provided Logan an origin story.

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But there's much more to the beginnings of Wolverine than his character history. The creation of one of the most popular comic book characters ever is also full of surprises, so let's take a look at ten things fans should know about Wolverine's origins.

10 Ain't No Stinking Badger

Hulk Fighting Wolverine Breaking Chains Marvel Comics

Because everyone takes credit for a huge success, there's a bit of back and forth on who exactly was responsible for Wolverine. For sure, he was a product of several writers and artists who, over time, added and honed his character. The impetus for him though came from Roy Thomas. Marvel's Editor in Chief in 1974, Thomas wanted a Canadian hero for the company's Canadian fans. He briefly toyed with the idea of calling Wolverine The Badger, but for all our sakes, wisely went in another direction.

9 Unfortunate Son

In the 2001 Origin mini-series, we learn that Logan was born as James Howlett, in rural Canada in the late 1800s. His father is a wealthy plantation owner and James is a sickly boy and it's all very far from what we know or expect. That changes quickly when we discover that James is the illegitimate son of the groundskeeper, Thomas Logan. His true father seems to have had some issues with strange powers and behavior, and the shocking truth - and the deadly consequences - lead toward the first appearance of the man who will come to be known as Wolverine.

8 Wolverine Was Meant To Be Young

Though Roy Thomas conceived of the character, it fell to writer Len Wein to write him in Wolverine's first appearance in The Incredible Hulk. Wein had intended for Wolverine to be a young man, similar in age to Spider-Man perhaps. That fell by the wayside when artist Dave Cockrum later drew him for the Uncanny X-Men and depicted a more grizzled, older Logan. That interpretation stuck, and the concept of who Logan was, and how old he was, continued to evolve over time.

7 Inny or Outy

Another point of uncertainty early on about Wolverine's character was his famous adamantium claws. Initially, Wein and Incredible Hulk artist Herb Trimpe imagined them as simply extensions of the gloves Logan wore. They weren't part of his anatomy.

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However, once legendary X-Men writer Chris Claremont took over writing the character for the revived Uncanny X-Men, he decided to make them retract completely into Wolverine's hands. This simple decision ultimately led to a major branch of not only Logan's history but Marvel's: Weapon X.

6 Weapon X

Weapon X

When comic books fans were first introduced in detail to the concept of Weapon X by Barry Windsor-Smith in 1991, it was at the time the biggest investigation of Wolverine's mysterious past. Even then, there was little to go on. All we knew was that his adamantium claws and skeleton came out of this, and perhaps his memory loss, too (not exactly). Over time, it was revealed that Weapon X was an offshoot of the same super-soldier program that birthed Captain America. The program also resulted in many, many other experimental soldiers.

5 Memory A Problem From The Start

Early on, it seemed Wolverine's lack of memory might be due to the Weapon X experiments that gave him his unusual claws and skeleton. While there was certainly some memory-wiping going on during the Weapon X program - courtesy a not very nice Professor - Logan's memory was an issue from the very beginning. Fans learned in Origin that he suffered his first major memory-loss the moment the man he thought was his father was murdered by his biological father. You'd probably blank that out, too.

4 World War II

Wolverine Captain America History Comic

Logan's long, long life has allowed him to be all over the map and all over history, at least since the late 19th century. A major moment for the character and Marvel history was his role in World War II. Everyone knows Weapon X was an off-shoot of the Weapon Plus program that was responsible for Captain America, so it should come as no surprise the two had adventures together in the '40s kicking butt and taking names for the Allies. On D-Day, Logan is a member of the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion.

3 A Rose By Any Other Name

By design, many of the figures in James Howlett's early life echoed people the character would know later. This was true of Thomas Logan, who resembles his adult son and is certainly true of young James' sweetheart, Rose. She might look a little familiar.

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Rose looks a lot like another redhead Logan would fall in love with and kill in one medium or another, Jean Grey. Everyone has a type and though Logan does. The types of women - people - he finds attractive tend to vary a little.

2 Japan, The First Time

A key feature of Wolverine's known history in the '80s is his time in Japan and his relationship with Mariko. Mariko would become just one of the tragedies in Logan's life when she was poisoned and Logan killed her to preserve her honor (he kills a lot of people he loves), but fans discover later that he spent time in Japan much earlier. After World War I, Logan is there and he meets and marries a young woman named Itsu, who he fathers a child, Daken, with.

1 I'm Not Your Father

Another possibility considered by Wolverine's creators early on was the idea that his arch-nemesis Sabretooth would be his father. With the age of both characters in flux early on and the obvious physical likeness between the two, the idea made some sense. John Byrne intended this to be the case, though it never seemed to get far. Some speculated that the character of Dog, Logan's half brother in Origin, was Sabretooth but this also didn't pan out. So far, the two appear to be unconnected.

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