Talk:Wolverine (character)

Superhero

Presently the intro paragraph identifies Wolverine as solely a character, with a note suggesting that whether he is considered a superhero or an antihero is subjective. While he has antiheroic traits, there are certainly hundreds of sources that characterize him as a superhero. E.g. "Wolverine superhero" gets 139,000 hits on Google whereas "Wolverine antihero" gets 742. I think the intro sentence should designate him as a superhero, and then the later sections in the page elaborate the unusual aspects of the character that make him an antihero. Wrangler1981 (talk) 19:08, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Old Man Logan

Presently, Old Man Logan is listed in the publication history. Because this is an alternate version of the character, I think this should only be addressed in the sections for alternate versions. I understand that it's a particularly popular and influential alternate, but so is the Ultimate X-Men version ... Wrangler1981 (talk) 19:10, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Biography: 2000s and 2010s

What should we do with the excessive detail of the '00s and '10s sections? Before I started editing there was almost nothing about the 1970s-'90s, but there is really undue weight on the '00s-'10s. Is it possible that this information could be moved to a new page? Would it be possible to make a new article only about Wolverine's complicated fictional biography, or about his story lines in the 21st century? Wrangler1981 (talk) 23:11, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

From what I've seen across Wikipedia, there has never been an instance where a character's fictional biography had its own page. And honestly, it never should. One of the main criteria of Wikipedia is notability; providing real-world information about things, including fictional characters. Having a page just for Wolverine's biography, by its very nature, would not provide any of that real-world info. The best thing to do is trim the Biography section as much as possible. From some recent comics character article I've seen that have become Good Articles, you could look at Captain America or Iron Man on how to do it. --PanagiotisZois (talk) 23:39, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Ok. Thank you. Wrangler1981 (talk) 11:51, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

Roy Thomas

I have concerns.

Len Wein, the writer who co-created Wolverine, passed away on September 10, 2017. (Disclosure of potential conflict of interest: I knew Wein personally.)

• On October 10, 2017, a month after Wein's death, an unregistered anonymous user who has never edited anything else before or since edited this page and the Roy Thomas page to claim for the first time that Thomas had co-created Wolverine. The change here was promptly reverted for being unsourced. (Disclaimer: I was not involved in this edit war, and did not even know about it at the time.)
• That same day, another unregistered anonymous user who has never edited anything else before or since restored the claim, and it was again promptly reverted for being unsourced.
• A few days later, on October 13, another unregistered anonymous user who has never edited anything else before or since restored the claim, and it was once again promptly reverted for being unsourced.
• On October 16, yet another unregistered anonymous user who has never edited anything else before or since restored the claim again, and it was yet again promptly reverted for being unsourced.
• On October 24, one more unregistered anonymous user who has never edited anything else before or since restored the claim yet again, and it was of course promptly reverted for being unsourced.
• On October 25, another unregistered anonymous user who has never edited anything else before or since restored the claim twice, and it was reverted both times for being unsourced.

Are you seeing a pattern?

On October 26, yet another unregistered anonymous user who has never edited anything else before or since restored the claim. In response, Wikipedia admin BOZ not only reverted the change for being unsourced, but also temporarily changed the page's protection level to prohibit further edits from unconfirmed users, with the message: "rather than edit-warring, please take some time over the next three days to find a source for this information."

IMPORTANT: At that time, there were no sources for this claim.

The very next day, however, October 27, 2017, Thomas told the Boston Globe that he had co-created Wolverine. Given the context, this potentially runs afoul of WP:BIASEDSOURCES. Nonetheless, a few days later, on November 2, a new unregistered anonymous user who had never edited anything else before or since restored the claim and linked to the Globe article as a reference.

No one else who might be able to clarify what actually happened is still alive: The artist, Herb Trimpe, died in 2015, Stan Lee died in 2018, and John Romita Sr. died last year. It appears that the claim has been allowed to stand unchallenged until a few days ago, March 27, 2024, when another user apparently noticed the discrepancy and removed Thomas from the infobox (though not from the article).

As I said: I have concerns.

It seems to me that, at the very least, the article should disclose the source and timing of this belated co-creation claim. I have tried to edit it in accordance with the recommendations in WP:BIASEDSOURCES. Please let me know if I have overstepped.

P.S. Did you know that I co-created Star Trek with the late Gene Roddenberry? Just wait until I tell the papers! --Shadow (talk) 17:47, 30 March 2024 (UTC)

Hi there, I’m the one who edited the infobox after seeing someone bring up concerns on twitter (this might have also been you idk). I’d like to explain that I only edited the infobox and not the article because I mostly edit on my phone.

When I looked at the article and saw the mass of text in the edit box my brain turned to mush and I decided to leave it to someone else. I left that comment in my revision in hopes that someone would see it and remove other instances in the article.

I also shared the tweets that tipped me off to this situation in a comics discord that I’m in but unfortunately this has to come to my attention during the height of the Ed Piskor scandal (another comics creator who was briefly associated with X-Men that no one likes and for good reason) so most people are discussing that in there. I will be sharing the tweets in other discords soon to hopefully get more eyes on it.

I hope that this situation is decided in favor of Len Wein and his collaborators, who do deserve to have their hard work co-opted after their deaths by someone who was barely involved in the actual process. TheJellyfish77 (talk) 01:46, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

• who do NOT deserve to have their hard work co-opted

Boy did I fumble that one my bad TheJellyfish77 (talk) 02:14, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

Just for the record: Wasn't me on Twitter. Haven't used my account there in forever. --Shadow (talk) 20:59, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

I share your general concerns (as someone who also knew Len slightly, and collaborated with Herb but only got to meet him at all decades later.)

Having said that, we cannot say that an IP user has never edited anything before, because IPs can be dynamically assigned. Even a well-intentioned not-logged-in editor can find his edits listed under many different IPs. But yes, there is no proof that said editor(s) had done anything beyond these edits. -- Nat Gertler (talk) Nat Gertler (talk) 05:00, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

Fair point, Nat! All we can say definitively is that no one edited anything before or since using that exact address. It's entirely possible that those were all the same unregistered user. (It's actually pretty likely, in fact, because the "Geolocate" links place all eight of them in Cambridge, Massachusetts.) Should I edit my summary to delete all the "who has never edited anything else before or since" text, do you think? --Shadow (talk) 21:15, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

In the interest of fairness, this part - On October 10, 2017, a month after Wein's death, an unregistered anonymous user ... edited this page and the Roy Thomas page to claim for the first time that Thomas had co-created Wolverine - isn't really true. Roy Thomas was added as co-creator to this article on December 15, 2012, and though people did fiddle with the creators listed over the years, it seems like, from a brief skim, Thomas' credit was mostly left alone. If you look at the revision before that edit, you can see Thomas is already there; the linked edit just added it in the lead in addition to the infobox. And if you go back to 2016, so before the time the article now says Thomas was taking credit, this article was already stating Thomas was Wolverine's cocreator [1]. Nohomersryan (talk) 01:17, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Technically accurate; boy, did I not go back far enough! Thank you! It is still true, however, that notwithstanding this unsourced edit to the article's Infobox, (1) the text of the article itself never gave Thomas co-creator credit until 2017, and more importantly (2) Thomas never publicly claimed that he had co-created Wolverine until 2017. I therefore respectfully stand by my edit of the article itself. Comments/concerns? --Shadow (talk) 19:29, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

It seems like most professionals in the comic book industry agree that Roy Thomas did not co-create Wolverine, and think that it was a money-grab on his part well after Len Wein died, and as such was unable to defend himself: Source 1 Source 2 David A (talk) 06:14, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

There are descriptions and listings of wolverinr in antihero lists .

https://www.cbr.com/best-anti-heroes-marvel-comics-deadpool-punisher/ There are other sources,im afraid links wont getbpisted here due ti wikipedia scam system 46.70.169.8 (talk) 14:46, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

First solo story.

I’ve added information about Wolverine’s first solo story to the lead because he is not a typical popular comic book character who began as a protagonist or debuted in his own series. Wolverine initially appeared as an antagonist for the Hulk and was later added as a supporting character for the X-Men to help create a team of multinational heroes. In the 1970s, John Byrne revealed that Chris Claremont had considered writing Wolverine out of the X-Men because the creative team struggled to find a direction for him. John Byrne persuaded Claremont to keep him on the team. The first story to focus on Wolverine as the main character marks an important historical milestone.

At least three industry leaders—CovrPrice, Key Collector, and Mile High Comics—have identified "At the Sign of a Lion" as Wolverine’s first solo story. Additionally, a representative from Marvel has stated that the reprinted version of this story in Marvel Treasury #26 is "(Wolverine's) first solo story without the X-Men." This story was largely unknown for over 45 years but has very recently gained attention. The main reason is that it was published in the UK in 1979 with very limited distribution and was not distributed in the US. Currently, CGC has no copies of this issue listed on its census. LoganHunter22 (talk) 16:18, 23 November 2024 (UTC)

A quote from a blog article at GoCollect (https://gocollect.com/blog/x-men-133-vs-marvel-uk-335-which-is-wolverines-first-solo-story)

"Why does it matter? For a popular character like Wolverine whose first appearance is in another character's series and had only appeared as a complementary character in a team-up book (the X-Men) through the end of the 1970s, the first comic book where he is the primary focus of the story is significant for Wolverine fans." LoganHunter22 (talk) 16:32, 23 November 2024 (UTC)

While the fact that he made a solo appearance at that point may be worth a brief mention in the introduction, the details of the story are not. The story content is not significant in the in-universe history -- can't be, because few (including probably few of those who have written the character since) have read it. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 23:27, 23 November 2024 (UTC)