The 5 Most Memorable Wolverine Fights

The Wolverine hits theatres this week and in anticipation of the ass-kickings it will contain we’ve compiled a list of Wolverine’s most memorable comic book battles. Remember though folks, “memorable” doesn’t necessarily mean “Wolverine kicking ass and taking names”. While he does plenty of that on this list, he’s also an immortal with an unbreakable body which makes a lot of his most insane moments the ones where he’s literally being destroyed. So read ahead only if you enjoy severe emotional scarring, like the time …

5. Wolverine Kills Jean Over and Over and Over and You Get the Idea (Phoenix: Endsong #3)

Phoenix: Endsong starts with Jean Grey dead (surprise, surprise) and being resurrected by the Phoenix Force to use as a host. Her and Wolverine are transported to the North Pole to fight it out, where Jean regains control long enough to ask the worst favour ever and requests Logan kill her to weaken the Phoenix. As Wolverine’s just been hit with a mini-black hole she’s nice enough to take care of the first kill herself.

But after that point it’s up to Wolverine to do what he does best and keep the Phoenix weak by killing her a dozen times over. Turns out he’s disturbingly good and unhesitant about disembowelling the woman he loves, over and over, and …

… and over and over ….

Eventually Wolverine kills the Phoenix enough times for Jean to take control again and just to epitomize how screwed up their relationship is, she thanks him for all the murdering and then goes and freezes herself in some ice or something complicated like that because this is a story about Jean Grey and the Phoenix Force after all.

4. Colossus Gets High and Rips Wolverine Apart (Literally) (Ultimate X-Men #96 and #97)

As this is an “Ultimate” series about mutant superheroes you can guess that when we say “high” we probably don’t mean on something mediocre like crack or heroine. No, instead Colossus was high on “Banshee” a super addictive drug that increases a mutant’s powers and turns you into an asshole in the process. Wolverine, in the calm supportive demeanour he’s famous for, handles Colossus’s addiction problems by cutting out his heart during a fight.

Unfortunately for the great canuck, Colossus is so amped up he keeps on fighting without a heart in his chest, logic be damned. It’s at this point that Wolverine’s awesomeness comes back to mess him up terribly, as Colossus’s revenge involves literally ripping him limb from limb.

The great thing about this fight is that it’s completely logical within the limits of Wolverine’s powers (if we ignore Colossus doing it while having no heart of course) because even if Wolverine’s bones are adamantium and unbreakable, the cartilage that holds his skeleton together isn’t, making his joints as rippable as paper to a ‘roided out Colossus.  Of course, Wolverine recovers and they’re all friends again by the end, or as close as he has to friends.

3. Wolverine Lobotomizes Sabretooth (Wolverine #90)

Wolverine vs. Sabretooth is one of the greatest feuds in comics. These are two guys with equal powers, hatred and savagery who love going at it as much as we love to watch it happen. In this story Sabretooth is being held prisoner by the X-Men at the mansion, but when the rest of the team goes off to do Age of Apocalypse things Wolverine stays behind, lets Sabretooth out of his cell and cuts loose.

It’s not made clear what Wolverine’s plan was, if he had any, but the result is pages of slashing, badassery and Sabretooth refusing to shut up about how if Wolverine doesn’t beat him he’s going to kill everyone Wolverine cares about, and also Cyclops.

Wolverine gets the upper hand and pulls the move we all love where he holds a guy’s face in two claws while keeping the third claw down. Normally this is the part where he threatens to pop that last claw and one of the X-Men talk him down in the nick of time before he murders someone … but the rest of the X-Men aren’t here so …

The claw to the brain ends up lobotomizing Sabretooth in a crowning moment of awesome and we have to imagine that even in his messed up state, Sabretooth has learned you don’t mess with Wolverine.

 

2. Wolverine Destroys the Hellfire Club Singlehandedly (Uncanny X-Men #133)

 This fight makes our list entirely for the pure fun that Wolverine is having during it.

Seriously, he’s killing guys left, right, center, above and below and is having the time of all his lives and we can’t say it isn’t a beautiful thing to see Logan in his element in a non-angsty, fun killing spree.  Story-wise he’s on a mission to save literally all of the other X-Men who are being held prisoner by the Hellfire Club but the story is completely irrelevant as the entire issue is clearly an excuse for Wolverine to kill people for 15 pages.

Even after all that murder the best part of the fight might be when Wolverine ultimately wins by threatening the last guy into surrendering.

 

1. Magneto Pulls the Adamantium Out of Wolverine’s Body (X-Men #25)

This is it. We’ve all thought about it, and talked about it, and probably know that it happened but have you ever actually seen the brutality that is Magneto tearing the adamantium out of Wolverine’s body? Not to worry, because here it is.

As is the norm, this story has the X-Men fighting Magneto during some scheme of the week for mutant superiority but with one difference, this time Magneto isn’t screwing around. Instead of the usual no consequences everyone-gets-tied-up-in-metal-cables fight we normally see, Wolverine breaks through when Magneto gets distracted and slashes him for possibly the first time ever.

Magneto doesn’t take well to having his wardrobe destroyed and finally does the thing we’ve always known he was capable of but never did; he rips the adamantium off of Wolverine’s bones and pulls it out through his pores.

It’s insanely brutal and awesome at the same time and we’re told the closest anyone’s ever come to permanently killing Wolverine.

The team, much like us readers at home, cannot believe that just happened and react with appropriate shock to seeing Wolverine is still breathing despite having his bones outside of his body.

Obviously he lives, but in the next issue we see Wolverine after the fight and the bits of adamantium sticking out of him are inexplicably gone, never to be mentioned again, which is actually a shame because that would have been a cool look.

Did your favorite Wolverine fight make our list? Let us know in the comments.