15 Best Wolverine Comics of All Time (Ranked)
Wolverine is undoubtedly one of the best and most popular comic book characters ever. Usually depicted as an antihero, Wolverine is basically a hero who, by his own admission, does the same things as other heroes, just a little differently. The character has a massive legacy and has appeared in dozens of adaptations up to day. Now, in this article, we are going to focus on the best Wolverine comics of all time.
The comics are going to be ordered from 15th to 1st. Some of them are going to be individual Wolverine stories, while others will include larger plots where Wolverine player a major part as part of a team or with other characters. We’re going to give you some basic details on the comics and an overview of the plots. Enjoy!
15 best Wolverine comics
15. X-Men: Schism
Publication Date: July 2011
Author(s): Jason Aaron
Artist(s): Carlos Pacheco, Frank Cho, Daniel Acuña, Alan Davis, Adam Kubert
Wolverine, having returned to Utopia after yet another night of fighting crime, refuses to train, retiring to his room to rest.
He is summoned by Cyclops to act as his bodyguard during a speech at the international conference on arms control in Switzerland; he tells him to trust his guide just before he takes the stage inviting the main world leaders to dismantle the Sentinels in their possession, even offering the help of the X-Men to that end.
Unbeknownst to everyone, just as Cyclops’s arguments are being questioned, he enters the Kid Omega room which releases a powerful psychic wave forcing all the leaders to reveal their darkest secrets on live TV before escaping.
After witnessing the televised speech in which Quire claims his action on behalf of all the mutants explaining how in reality humans have always feared and hated them even when they pretended otherwise, Cyclops and Wolverine face a handful of Sentinels hidden inside a truck and let out on the orders of one of the participants before returning to Utopia.
14. “Not Dead Yet”
Publication Date: October 1997 — January 1998
Author(s): Warren Ellis
Artist(s): Leinil Francis Yu
Logan arrived in Hong Kong ten years earlier and is with Ai-Chia Wong. Her father, Tak-Wah Wong, is a film producer. She works for him as a screenwriter and Logan becomes his advisor.
A month after arriving in Hong Kong, Logan meets McLeish, a fifty-year-old hitman who calls himself the White Ghost. The latter was in fact hired by a simultaneous producer to kill Tak-Wah Wong.
McLeish finally kills him with his ivory knife three months later. Logan causes an explosion on a boat that he thinks McLeish is dead. Today in the East Village in Manhattan. When Logan returns to his apartment, he finds a killed homeless man and an ivory knife on his bedside table.
By removing it, the X-Man is actually armind a bomb. He narrowly escaped the explosion: Logan knows McLeish is alive and wants him dead.
13. “Brotherhood”
Publication Date: June — November 2003
Author(s): Greg Rucka
Artist(s): Darick Robertson
On a rainy night, Logan is having coffee and reading a book at a diner called Doggie Diner. He is watched by one of the waitresses: Lucy. That night, Lucy returns home with one of the clients, a middle-aged man in a business suit.
Later that night, the man leaves Lucy’s apartment and insults her by throwing money over his shoulder as he leaves. She runs after him, throws the money, and yells at him.
Across the hall, his neighbor watches through the door of his apartment. The next day at dinner, Logan rereads. Lucy serves him coffee; he doesn’t recognize them at all.
Logan leaves the restaurant and tips Lucy more than the price of the meal. At night Lucy is in her apartment writing by the light of a lamp, she hears something in the hallway, she goes to the door and listens, she opens the door and Logan is standing in the hallway with a knife in his leg. She stands up and watches Logan remove the knife from his leg and then enter his apartment.
12. Wolverine and the X-Men #42
Publication Date: April 2014
Author(s): Jason Aaron
Artist(s): Nick Bradshaw, Pepe Larraz, Ramón Pérez, Shawn Crystal, Steven Sanders, Nuno Alves, Chris Bachalo
This story balances between the events of a graduation day and some connected events that happened about 25 years later. In this story, Wolverine is actually a teacher and a mentor for young mutants in the Jean Grey School.
Alongside your usual X-Men “special effects”, the story also examines Wolverine’s mind and his role in society, especially the fact that he might not be needed, now that there is a whole new generation of young minds ready to protect the Earth.
11. “Wolverine: Alone!”
Publication Date: May 1980
Author(s): Chris Claremont, John Byrne
Artist(s): John Byrne
The inner circle of the Hellfire Club sends some of their soldiers to the basement of their prestigious club in search of Wolverine. Although it is believed he was killed in a flood in the sewers, they want to be sure.
Wolverine is actually safe and sound, hidden in the rafters above them. When water drips from his wet body onto the soldiers below, they discover him and try to shoot him. But Wolverine is too fast for them and he fatally wounds three before taking a few bullets in the stomach and falling into crates.
The soldiers are sure he is dead, but he only plays the opossum after rolling with the shots. He marks another of the soldiers and leaves only one standing. Wolverine senses the soldier’s fear and makes him drop his rifle.
Wolverine threatens the man with his claws and demands everything he knows about his employers.
Above are the other X-Men, the chained prisoners of the inner circle of the Hellfire Club celebrating not only their victory over the X-Men, but the addition of Jean Gray as the new Black Queen to their ranks.
10. “Blood and Claws”
Publication Date: January — March 1991
Author(s): Larry Hama
Artist(s): Marc Silvestri
During his visit to Canada, Wolverine travels to Vancouver’s Gastown district to visit his old pal Puck, who works as a bouncer at the run-down bar in Gastown.
Logan is surprised that his friend is back at his old job before moving on to Alpha Flight, but learns that he only represents his friend Bambi Bolinsky, who suffered a broken arm.
Bambi explains that she broke it when she threw eight men out of the bar the night before and invites them to sit down and play a game called Split the Fly: it’s all about spitting to attract a fly and sugar and try to stab them with a knife.
When Bambi succeeds, she gives her knife to Logan for him to try. Logan tries when the man Puck just threw out of the bar comes back with some of his friends. When Wolverine thrusts a knife into his hand without reacting, the tough guys realize they’re dealing with more than they expected and cautiously flee the scene.
Meanwhile, in Osaka, Japan, the police arrive at the scene where Wolverine fought the yakuza and discover Lady Deathstrike sniffing the area. She has come for evidence of the rumors that Wolverine is still alive.
9. Wolverine: Weapon X
Publication Date: June 2009 — October 2010
Author(s): Jason Aaron
Artist(s): Ron Garney
When the private organization Blackguard, Roxxon’s armed wing, acquires the computer archives of the Weapon X project related to the adamantium infusion procedure, Wolverine is embroiled in an intricate spy design to prevent them from being able to form an army of artificially augmented men with laser claws and artificial restorative factors, the Strikeforce X.
Waking up inside the Dunwich Asylum, Logan seems to remember nothing of his life.
Victim of nightmares concerning heinous murders and enemies of the past, as well as of tortures aimed at bringing to the surface the “beast” in him, he manages to discover some of the backstories that take place behind the rotting walls of the building directed by the sadistic Dr. Rottwell before coming to his senses thanks to the intervention of Nightcrawler, Psylocke and his new girlfriend Melita Garner.
Still recovering from his misadventures at the Dunwich Asylum, Wolverine tells Melita about her past relationships and tries to discourage her.
8. Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk
Publication Date: December 2005 — May 2009
Author(s): Damon Lindelof
Artist(s): Leinil Francis Yu
Bruce Banner is sentenced to death because, in the form of the Hulk, he caused the deaths of more than 800 people; however, he manages to escape the atomic explosion that should have killed him (thanks to a tip from Hank Pym) and decides to change his life and abandon his identity.
After leaving a trail of death in his attempts to settle in Normandy and Paris (where he tries in vain to heal with psychotherapy sessions), Banner goes to the Panchen Lama, in Tibet, where, in the form of the Hulk, he finds inner peace and self-control.
Logan is summoned by Nick Fury and given the mission of finding and killing Banner; after going to Tibet and after making the Hulk lose his temper (talking to him about Betty Ross) the battle begins.
Meanwhile, Betty Ross is in pain for Banner, because despite everything she still loves him: she manages to trick Fury, for whom she works, and to obtain a variant of the super-soldier serum created by Dr. Jennifer Walters, capable of transforming her into Hulk but with self-control.
After injecting it, Betty transforms into She-Hulk, launches herself from a plane, and attacks the Hulk, who is on the verge of devouring one of Wolverine’s legs after breaking it in two.
7. The Jungle Adventure
Publication Date: February 1990
Author(s): Walter Simonson
Artist(s): Mike Mignola
At one point during his travels to the Savage Land, Wolverine lost his lighter. The Savage Land is a part of Antarctica that is different from the rest of the continent; it is, in fact, a tropical prehistoric land surrounded by volcanoes, preserved from most outside interferences.
Wolverine, of course, goes back to get his lighter and has to fight his way through the savagery of the Savage Land. He fought a T-Rex and got eaten by it, only to kill it from the inside and get out normally.
This impressed the people of the Tribe of Fire, and once Wolverine easily defeated their chieftain in hand-to-hand combat, they named him their new leader.
It is then that Wolverine finds out that someone is out to destroy the Savage Land (again) and he decides to stay there for a while to stop the land’s destruction. As it turns out – the main villain is Apocalypse, i.e., En Sabah Nur.
Wolverine easily fights and defeats Apocalypse, only to find out that he was actually battling a very realistic Apocalypse android. The real En Sabah Nur appeared on a screen, but he wasn’t really a threat after the android’s destruction.
6. Snikt!
Publication Date: July — November 2003
Author(s): Tsutomu Nihei
Artist(s): Tsutomu Nihei
Just a normal day in New York. Wolverine is walking through Central Park when a girl named Fusa tells him that her people are being slaughtered. Without further ado, this brings Wolverine to the year 2058, when humanity is nearly extinct due to new creatures called Mandates.
Fusa asks Wolverine to fight against the Mandates that create programs to process metals, all but adamantium, the metal that covers Wolverine’s bones and claws.
Wolverine accepts and goes on a mission to the Mandate Colony, where the Progenitor is located (the first and only reproducible Mandate). During the mission, Wolverine’s team is killed, leaving only Wolverine and The Colonel (an adamantium cyborg).
The Colonel makes it easier for Wolverine to reach the Progenitor’s weakness: his spherical core. Once there, Wolverine destroys the Spherical Core, which destroys all other Mandates.
Ultimately, Fusa asks Wolverine to stay in the future, but Wolverine tells her that he belongs in a different place and hopes to never see her again (in positive terms). Fusa then transports Wolverine to the past.
5. Enemy of the State II
Publication Date: October 2016 – March 2017
Author(s): Tom Taylor
Artist(s): Nik Virella
After receiving a package with a Trigger 42 test tube, Laura decides her current apartment is no longer safe and moves into one of Logan’s old safe houses with Gabby and Jonathan.
After the cabin lights go out, Laura heads to a nearby town called Daylesville. When she received information about the blackout from the owner of a local gas station, a fleet of water bombers arrived and released the scent of the trigger across town.
By the time Laura recovered, everyone in Daylesville was dead, and it wasn’t long before the team of S.H.I.E.L.D agents led by Nick Fury arrived and arrested Wolverine.
When Fury discovered the water bombers, he sent two fighter jets to intercept them, but they were shot down from a flying fortress emblazoned with the Madripoor flag. Fearing an international incident, Fury decided not to prosecute them. It scared Laura away.
After regrouping with Gabby and escaping encirclement, Laura contacted Ash, a pirate captain she had once spared. Ash took Laura and Gabby to Madripoor, but she secretly worked for Kimura.
4. Wolverine #17-23
Publication Date: November 1989 – April 1990
Author(s): Archie Goodwin
Artist(s): John Byrne
Deep in the Australian outback, Wolverine hunts a wild boar with his enhanced senses. He hunts and kills the boar easily and begins to feed on the creature, when he remembers when he lost his battle against Lord Shingen and as he just called him an animal at the time.
As Wolverine considers himself nothing more than Lord Shingen said it starts raining and he realizes the cause of the unusual weather: his fellow X-Man, Storm.
Wolverine is furious that she saw a side of him that he wishes his fellow X-Men didn’t see. However, Storm assures Logan that he is more than a beast and that he should regard his superior tracking skills as a gift rather than a curse.
Logan tells her that the X-Men are his family and that he isn’t comfortable showing his animal side in front of them.
Soon after, Logan decides to go to Madripoor again and tells Storm that they can ask Psylocke to telepathically contact him if they need to. With that, Logan Gateway opens a portal to his second home and walks through it.
3. “Weapon X” (Marvel Comics Presents)
Publication Date: March – September 1991
Author(s): Barry Windsor-Smith
Artist(s): Barry Windsor-Smith
The series begins with Logan captured and prepared for being injected with liquid adamantium.
He is repeatedly described as being very tough, and the Professor, the director of the Weapon X program, along with his assistants Dr. Cornelius and Miss Hines, clears his mind and binds him to adamantium, the firmest known substance on earth, to prepare him to be a spiritless and soulless killing machine.
Prior to Wolverine #75, the plot had too much adamantium bonded to his forearms which caused him to scratch, which resulted in the development of tubes in his flesh to keep the skin apart for the extraction of the claws.
Throughout the program, Logan is constantly mentioned not as a person but as a subject, and his humanity is almost completely ignored during the experiments.
Logan often clashes with his mental programming and ends up escaping into the wild after killing all the soldiers there (except one, future Weapon X Director Malcom Colcord) while the Professor, Cornelius, and Hines end up locked in a secure room, which Logan should not be able to enter.
2. Wolverine (volume 1)
Publication Date: September – December 1982
Author(s): Chris Claremont
Artist(s): Frank Miller
Wolverine hunts in the Canadian Rockies a bear with an arrow stuck in the back that drives him mad and kills at least fifteen people. Once the bear is taken care of, Wolverine traces the scent of the arrow back to his tracker and brings him to justice.
Wolverine tries to call Mariko Yashida, but her family hangs up. Wolverine flies to the fortress of ancestors Yashida in Japan and finds Mariko in the gardens under a statue of Buddha that hides her face.
At Wolverine’s request, she shows her injured face, which Wolverine concludes to be that of her husband Noburu-Hideki. Mariko explains that she had to change her obligations after her father returned.
Mariko’s husband shows up and Wolverine intends to kill him until Mariko avoids the bloodshed. Wolverine prepares to fly to New York, but is ambushed by poisoned shuriken.
Wolverine awakens and finds himself in captivity by Lord Shingen, who challenges Wolverine to a duel with him to prove his worth to Mariko.
They fight with wooden swords and Lord Shingen cheats during the fight by kicking Wolverine who takes revenge by removing his claws. However, due to his recent poisoning, Wolverine finds it difficult to contact the Elder, who ultimately wins the battle.
1. Old Man Logan
Publication Date: August 2008 – September 2009
Author(s): Mark Millar, Brian Michael Bendis, Jeff Lemire, Ed Brisson
Artist(s): Steve McNiven, Andrea Sorrentino
The United States of Earth-807128 has been conquered and divided between supervillains, with territories belonging to Abomination (later conquered by the Hulk), Magneto (later conquered by a new Kingpin), Doctor Doom, and the Red Skull, who has named himself President.
The superheroes have been wiped out of existence, with the few survivors in hiding. Logan lives with his wife Maureen and young children Scotty and Jade on a vacant lot in Sacramento, California, now part of the territory known as the Hulkland.
Needing money to pay rent to his landlords, the Hulk Gang (the Hulk’s incestuous hillbilly grandchildren and his first cousin She-Hulk), Logan takes a job from a now-blind Hawkeye to help him travel east to the capital of New Babylon and deliver a secret package (which Logan assumes to be drugs).
Logan and Hawkeye find various diversions on their journey. They rescue Hawkeye’s daughter, Ashley Barton (who appears to be a Spider-Girl wannabe), from the clutches of the new Kingpin. She murders the Kingpin and reveals his intention to seize her Hammer Falls (formerly Las Vegas) territory.
