The Top Ten Wolverine Moments of the Groovy Age!
NOTE: These events are in chronological order, not order of importance. Just sayin'...
10) X-Men #96: First view of Wolverine's Berserker Rage! We'd heard about Logan Unleashed, but we finally saw Wolvie cut loose with all his fury on one of the N'Garai...did a super-HERO ever go that nutso before?
9) X-Men #98: Wolverine Unmasked! He has a face! And a funky hair-do. Who'da thunk it?
(Yeah, Logan was unmasked on page one of ish 98, but we didn't know it fo sho until the panel above that it was Wolvie. That's my story and I'm stickin' to it...)
8) X-Men #98 (again!): Wolverine's Claws Are a Part of Him! Here we were thinking those adamantium Ginsu knives were in his gloves...
7) X-Men #101: Wolverine Says It with Flowers (Or Not)! A rare early glimpse of Wolverine's tender side as he deals with his feelings for Jean Gray in his own inimitable way...
6) X-Men #108: Wolverine Is HOW Tough? While battling the Imperial Guard, Logan is punched literally into orbit and survives. Yeah, the scene is played for laughs, but think about it. Approaching escape velocity. Alive. Wolverine. One tough dude!
5) X-Men #109: Wolverine's Not Just About Killing... Logan has a sensitive side and a depth neither the X-Men nor many of us readers had given him credit for up to this point...
4) X-Men #116: ...But Wolverine Will Kill Without Mercy! When lives are on the line and stealthy assassination is a must, Logan will do what he has to do . And his fellow X-Men will just have to live with it...
3) X-Men #118: Wolverine Meets Mariko. Logan meets the love of his life, giving us a new and very unique wrinkle in our enigmatic hero's personality--the romantic ronin. (And she'd better be in this new flick!)
2) X-Men #132: Wolverine Emerges from the Sewer, Ready to Kick Butt! ZOOM! Logan's cool-factor multiplied by triple-digits with the last page of X-Men 132, one of the all-time iconic images in all of comicdom. Beaten and humiliated, his teammates captured, the baddies aren't a bit worried about Wolvie. They think he's dead. Their bad.
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1) X-Men #133: Wolverine Lives Up to His Promise (and Does a Pretty Good Dirty Harry)! We expected to see Logan go to war on the Hellfire Club's minions when we got our eyes filled with that last page of X-Men 132. We tear back the cover of ish 133 to see if our expectations are fulfilled. Boy, are they ever!
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What d'ya think, Groove-ophiles? Those are my picks. What are yours?
"Take him, you fools--he's only one--AARRRGH!" You know you've got a great character when it seems like you feel the strike almost as much as the victim!
ReplyDeleteWhat a great rundown of those early Wolverine moments. I think you've covered most of the bases.
Thanx, Comicsfan!
DeleteThank you,Mr Groove!
ReplyDeleteYes,Mariko is in Wolverine.
Actress Tao Okamoto(28 years old)
born in Japan plays Logans lady.
To judge by the pictures and interviews
she is a most extraordinary beauty.
Apparently this is her first time acting.
Looking forward to hear some Snikt!
Cheers!
/Mr Anonymous
Glad to hear that Mariko is in the Wolvie flick, Mr A! I hope to see it tomorrow (Saturday) night. Fingers crossed...
Deletesee, I'd've had number 2 at number 1. to this day, it remains my favourite Wolverine moment, EVER. cracking good list, thought, great fun. it's nice to remember the days when Wolverine was cool. . .
ReplyDeleteTotally agree with ya, Mighty Joe! However, since that would have meant moving the other "moments" around and coming up with a real countdown--which I was too lazy--er--busy to do, I did 'em the way I did 'em.
DeleteGreat Countdown, Mr. Groovy Agent !
ReplyDelete(and please forgive the mistakes : I'm French !)
I surely wouldn't have thought of any better list than yours. Even makes me want to have ten more, but I suppose the average note of 20 moments would have been as good then the average of the 10 ten best you chose !
As one says (Alex Toth ?) Less is more. I would add : 10 is perfect.
Once again, I'm gonna read this Byrne/claremont/Austin run from the beginning.
Thanks !
X-Men 132-133 is, without a doubt, what made Wolverine a superstar. I was a major fan at the time. Without being there, and having to wait 30 days between issues, I don't think you can appreciate the impact that the Claremont/Byrne/Austin run had back then. In the sequence from 133--coloring the panels red, hinting that Wolverine is killing the henchmen is brilliant!
ReplyDeleteThe last panel of ish 132 and the cover of 141 are as good as comics have ever been, in my opinion.
Wolverine was such a great and interesting character then. It's such a shame that Marvel has totally mishandled him over the years.
Neil
Good list.
ReplyDeleteLooking back over the issues it was interesting again to see how long it took for the distinctive take on the character to emerge.
The first usage of the 'fastball special' in 100 is distinctive, but is shared with Colossus, I guess.
Other than that, the panels just after the ones you showed from 109 stalking the deer and the panels before the ones from 116 with him talking to Zabu are favourites of mine, and, I think, mark the character's turning point.