Marvel Finally Makes Sense of Wolverine’s Resurrection

The full story behind Wolverine’s recent resurrection has finally been revealed.

Warning: this article contains spoilers for Return of Wolverine #5 and Wolverine: Infinity Watch #1!

While Wolverine first returned to life in the pages of Marvel Legacy #1 in September 2017, that issue raised more questions than answers. Why has Logan stayed in hiding ever since? Why is he suddenly so interested in the Infinity Stones? And why does it seem like there are two completely different versions of the character running around the Marvel Universe (not even counting Old Man Logan)?

It was only recently that fans learned how Wolverine escaped his adamantium tomb in the first place. The crossover event Hunt for Wolverine revealed that Kitty Pryde phased his body free and had it quietly buried elsewhere. Some time later, the mysterious Persephone claimed Logan’s corpse and resurrected it herself, in the process granting Wolverine his new “hot claws” ability.

Now, Return of Wolverine #5 reveals Persephone has the power to resurrect the dead as zombie-like drones, and even experience the world through their eyes. She also hypothesizes that Logan’s new hot claws draw their power from his own super-charged healing factor, weakening his regenerative abilities in the process. Persephone offers to use her power on Logan, freeing him from a long life of painful memories and allowing him to live away from Earth as her blissfully obedient servant.

Rather than accept her offer, Logan sets about destroying Persephone’s space station and preventing her from unleashing her power on a global scale. To do so, he’s forced to unleash all the repressed pieces of himself that have been contained inside his mind since his resurrection. Logan’s memories and fighting skills come flooding back. The only fragment of himself Logan keeps locked away in this mental prison is his berserker side, though how long that can last is anyone’s guess.

Return of Wolverine #5 ends with Logan crashing Persephone’s space station safely into the ocean and then making his way back to the X-Mansion. Wolverine: Infinity Watch #1 picks up immediately after, as Logan is greeted by an overjoyed Jean Grey. Unfortunately, this happy reunion is cut short when Logan realizes that he’s being deceived by Loki.

As it turns out, Logan’s ordeal with Persephone caused him to miss out on the events of X-Men Disassembled. He’s returned just in time for most of the X-Men to be shunted off into another dimension. Instead, Loki is determined to recruit Wolverine to help him track down the wayward Infinity Stones. But to Loki’s surprise, Wolverine has no memory of their previous encounters. That’s because, as hinted in Avengers #10, there have actually been two Wolverines co-existing in the Marvel Universe ever since the events of Marvel Legacy #1. The Logan who’s been featured in Return of Wolverine is not the one who’s been appearing in books like Avengers, Thor and Infinity Countdown. And in this issue, Wolverine finally comes face-to-face with his older, Phoenix-possessed self.

This older Wolverine reveals that he traveled back in time to prevent a future where Loki gains possession of the Infinity Stones and is driven mad with power. Claiming the Space Stone in Marvel Legacy #1 and passing it along to Black Widow in Infinity Countdown was all part of Logan’s plan for rewriting the past.

 

But thanks to the events of Infinity Wars, the Stones still pose a threat to humanity. They now exist as living, sentient beings, and it’s fallen on Loki and the younger Wolverine to track them down before others can. Fortunately, the older Wolverine grants his younger self a parting gift – the time-travelling baseball bat first introduced in Astonishing Spider-Man & Wolverine. Between this weapon and his hot claws, Wolverine is just full of upgrades lately.

With the Phoenix-possessed Wolverine returning to his future to die and Old Man Logan nearing the end of his long life, soon the Marvel Universe will be back to having just one Wolverine again. Let us know in the comments below if you’re excited about what the future holds for this iconic hero.

Jesse is a mild-mannered writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter, or Kicksplode on MyIGN.