The Wolverine: Origins graphic novel explores the untold aspect of the Wolverine. Reading it, James Howlett is not yet the antihero. He isn’t the tough bearded fellow you see in the films or other comics. He’s vulnerable, quick to trust others and wishes the problems he encountered never happened, rather than to combat them. This being his origin story, doesn’t show him being born and continue from there, but instead shows the pinnacle events that occurred in his early life that made him the man we see today, depicted in the present comics and movies.

Tragedy after tragedy strikes before the man with accelerated healing has any time to spit them out and close up the wounds.  Family disputes, love affairs and abandonment hits hard, all at once, ripping Logan up and leaving him to put himself back together, but regeneration doesn’t medicate a broken heart, and some wounds become permanent scars. If every day you kick the dog you walk past, eventually you’re going to get bitten, and the animal wont make the same mistake of letting you make the first move next time.

By the end of the book, the character is not in the same place he was in the beginning. He isn’t quite the polished product that is the Wolverine, but you would never look at him in the same way. Instead of some of Logan’s actions being perceived as cruel or unkind, they’re what’s expected from him. His choices are understandable, given the circumstances at the time, and if he has gone through something similar before. To be cold-hearted, still requires a heart to be frozen over. That meaning that no-one is born the way they are; its their surroundings that shape them. There is a reason why he is constantly trying to withhold his animalistic side, why he tries his best not to get too close to people, why he’s so hard on himself and others. Now I know that reason.