Which five? MutantX? Bishop’s solo book?
More a fan of Superman, but I read Wizard for YEARS and never forget what I read…
Wolverine is a man of mystery. He was thought to have been created by Canadian special forces and named Weapon X. His age is a mystery, also, he’s seen pre-adamantium fighting in the French and Indian war, the Civil War, and both World Wars. He’s seen in World War II as a war hero, with… shit, some of the other mutants, I forget who. This leads to the possiblity of time travel provided by Bishop or one of the other future X men. Wolverine’s adamantium skeleton was created by putting him in a pressurized chemical bath and infusing his body with the metal, which gravitated towards and fused with his bone structure, with fissures for muscle attachment. IIRC, adamantium is not only the strongest metal known, it also is the slipperiest (least coefficient of friction) of known metals, and one of the heaviest.
Wolverine’s exact age is not known, neither is his name, althought he calls himself Logan when in Japan. It is not known if Logan is a taken or given name, though.
Sabertooth is thought to be Wolverine’s brother or father, and also related to… oh, hell. The shapeshifting chick. This female is also Rogues’ mom, right? It’s been a while. These four or five people are so terribly intertwined it’s not funny.
Alright, I’ve never even read these comics, so I’ve probably messed some stuff up.
–Tim
I think you’re mistaken about the Civl War. Maybe.
Definitly not slippery. Or Ultron (a robot made of Adamantium) would be a lot slicker than he is. (There may have been a story that said so, but the bulk of stories don’t) It is heavy. And it’s not a “pure” metal as such, it’s an iron alloy (or according to a small group of stories in the early '80s…a plastic. Everyone hates this, so everyone ignores it)
There are two kinds of Adamantium: The real stuff and aargh…call it “pseudo” Adamantium. The difference? The pseudo-Adamantium can be broken with enough effort. If it breaks, it ain’t true Adamantium. The real stuff CAN’T***. This is a recent continuity fix from Avengers and one I wholeheartedly agree with.
In the mid '70s, there was a “Kung-Fu” type book called “Iron Fist” where Sabertooth first appeared . In it, there was like one subtle line that Sabretooth was connected to Wolverine. Over the next half dozen years, tiny hints were dropped about Wolverine’s past and his relationship with Sabretooth. (The first hint that we’d had that Wolverine was old was an offhanded comment about “I haven’t seen a bloodbath like this since Monte Casino”. Am I dating myself if I mention how big a shock it was when we found out that the claws weren’t in the gloves, they came out of his hand?). An iteresting Wolverine “fun-fact” is that the funny-looking haircut, per Dave Cockrum the original artist was a joke. Wolvie was wearing that mask with the pointy bits, right? And in a battle he got all sweaty, right? The weird haircut was simply supposed to be “hat hair”.
Anyway, the writer (Claremont) eventally left the book and the new writer(s) decided to shake things up. Hints about Sabertooth being Wolvie’s dad? Out the window! Wolverine only got Adamantium recently (since it had only been invented a few years back?) Out the window!
Currently, Wolverine and Sabretooth are, I belive, secret agents who had the same experiments pulled on them, but the proceedures worked better on Wolverine. Somewhere along the way, the “brother” theory came and went without a whimper.
Mystique (the blue shape-changing chick) has been hinting for years that she’s Nightcrawler’s mother or sister (mother is more likely). She raised Rogue, but they’re not related by blood. Almost nothing is known about Rogue’s background. As far as I know, other than Mysique bossing Sabertooth around, they’re not related or married or anything of the sort.
[sub]If I keep showing off all my comics knowledge, I’ll have more chicks than I can shake a stick at![/sub]
Fenris
I thought that they were similar (healing ability and animal senses) but different (Wolvie – metal bones and claws; Sabretooth – Supernatural strength). I know Wolverine is strong but I thought it was just exceptional human strength. Sabretooth goes beyond exceptional human strength (I know the movie isn’t the authority on this but Sabretooth beats the crap out of Wolverine on their first meeting).
Right? Wrong?
In the animated series, it was established that Creed, the guy who started “Friends of Humanity,” was the son of Mystique and Sabertooth, and the half-brother of Nightcrawler. After seeing that episode, I wondered if that meant that Creed was a mutant, but didn’t know (or didn’t want to admit it).
Kinda both. I read these as they were coming out and don’t want the deep hurting of trying to reread them, so realized that this is filtered through 10 years of attempts to block this stuff out and I can’t remember Sabretooth’s first meeting with Wolverine, but…
In his first appearance, Sabretooth was slimmer and lithe-er(is that a word?) than Wolverine was. Somewhere along the way, Sabretooth died and Apocolypse(sp) put him in a machine that “rebooted” him by churning out a new Sabretooth clone each time a dead one was put in. Each clone was bigger, stronger, bulkier and (well, frankly) dumber than the last. The current guy running around isn’t the “real” Sabretooth, isn’t as skilled as the original (who went head-to-head with Iron Fist) but is lots tougher and stronger. I’d say the recycled Sabretooth is lots stronger than Wolverine. (He can tear iron apart in his hands), but Wolverine is smarter, meaner and more skilled.
Fenris
Oh man! Dude, some of us haven’t seen the movie yet. Yeah I know, its probably just me and some guy in Elkheart but you really should warn people about possible spoilers.
Not posting a spoiler warning like this will get ya lynched in a comics Usenet group, ya know. 
Speaking of which, for good primers on whic mutant is related to who and how, rec.arts.comics.marvel.xbooks has several X-Men related FAQS. They’re a good read.
Adamantium is not actually the strongest metal known in the Marvel Universe. It is merely the strongest metal that can be created by man on a regular basis.
The actual strongest metal in existence is an adamantium-vibranium alloy. It was created in a lab accident and no one has been able to reproduce it. Adamantium was actually created during the attempts to make another sample of this miracle metal.
So what happened to this one piece of adamantium-vibranium? It is carried by Captain America as his amazing shield. It not only can’t be cut by such things as Wolverine’s claws, it also has the property of totally absorbing any impact. This is why Cap, who is merely human, can use his shield to deflect artillery, locomotives, and what have you.
… but I had to correct a few things here.
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“True” Adamantium is only #3 on the official Marvel list of Unbreakable Stuff. The rarely seen Adamantium-Vibranium alloy is #2. #1 is Uru, which is what Thor’s hammer (and a few other Asgardian things) are made of.
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Apocalypse isn’t the one who possibly cloned Sabretooth. That would be Mr. Sinister, who was created by Apocalypse. Part of Mr. Sinister’s MO is that his hired thugs, the marauders, are all “recycled”- when they die, he just clones them. Sabretooth has definitely worked for Mr. Sinister, as one of the Marauders, but the general practice with Sabretooth is to write him as the unquestioned original. This is good, since it’s generally agreed that making him a clone (or series thereof) would make him a really weak character.
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For those who have only seen the movie, in comics contiuity, both Rogue and Mystique are Very Different from the way they’re presented in the movie. So far as Mystique’s “relatives” go:
A. Rogue was raised as a child by Mystique and her “longtime companion” Destiny.
B. Both Nightcrawler and Creed (the politician) are/ were probably Mystique’s children by Sabretooth.
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The whole Sabretooth / Wolverine thing pretty much depends on who’s writing what. However, last I heard, the final word on the subject was that both Wolverine ans\d Sbretooth had had blood tests at the same time, which incidentally happened to rule out any chance that they were related.
Gotta disagree with you Saltire, per Kurt Busiek, current writer of Avengers, and well known ultimate Marvel geek, despite what one of the “Offical Handbooks of the Marvel Universe” (and I agree) that Cap’s shield is made of some unknown metal and Wakindan Vibranium (remember that there’s a second type of Vibranium from Antartica, which has totally different properties).
See Dejanews for the source of the quote and the discussion surrounding it.
Again, that retcon was only from a “Marvel Handbook” which also repeated the error that Adamantium is a plastic.
That said, since both Cap’s shield and true Adamantium are both unbreakable, you can’t ask which is stronger, since they’re both absolutes.
Fenris
I disagree. We’ve seen Uru broken a number of times on panel. In an early Journey into Mystery, someone (Absorbing Man? Radioactive-Man? broke Thor’s hammer into golf-ball sized pieces. Thor ‘borrowed’ a steel mill in Pittsburgh to reforge the pieces of his hammer. Thor’s hammer is tough, but it’s the magic not the Uru that makes it so tough.
Per the “adamantium”-vibranium combo, see my prev. post. In unbreakableness, nothing tops Adamantium. (That’s not to say other stuff doesn’t have neat properties: Uru holds a spell better than anything else, for example)
You’re completely right. I misremembered. It was Mr Sinister. But if the goal is to write him as the original character, every author, including Claremont who, with John Byrne created Sabretooth has failed. The original Sabretooth from Iron Fist 14 was sneaky, subtle and not super-strong. I suspect that Byrne had a large hand in the “sneaky” Sabretooth and with him gone, Claremont changed him into the engine of destruction we all know.
Sabretooth is Nightcrawler’s daddy??? Where’d that come from? Yuck!
Fenris
I like the way they did it in the MAD parody:
Jean Grey: “Look at this! His entire skeleton is laced with adamantium!”
Cyclops: “Adamantium? What’s that?”
Jean Grey: “It’s the second most indestructible substance in the universe, next to that plastic stuff they wrap CDs in.”
Pete
Long time RGMWer and ardent AOLer