How tall is Wolverine?

[broberfett]

When I read comics as a kid, Wolverine was a short, stocky guy. When I saw the movie he was at least 6 foot tall. Women like tall men. So they couldn't have a little 5'3" guy play Wolverine. Did they ever change him in the comic book? Is he supposed to be tall now?

 

[OdoWanKenobi]

No, he's still short and stocky in the comics. Jackman was physically miscast as Wolverine, but I think fans warmed up to his performance enough that we really don't mind.

 

[Broccoli]

Jackman was the best actor for the role, so they gave it to him, regardless how tall he was. Clearly, it became a non-issue as, it seems, audiences embraced Jackman's Wolverine.

 

[Agenda]

In the comics, he's short but it's more than compensated for by his sheer bulk. The guy is built like a miniature tank.

I'd like to see a real-life actor pull that off. Couldn't happen.

 

[DarthPipes]

In the comics, he's short but it's more than compensated for by his sheer bulk. The guy is built like a miniature tank.

I'd like to see a real-life actor pull that off. Couldn't happen.

Exactly. That's why you need to cast the best actor available, regardless of size.

 

[Red Ranger]

As I recall, Wolverine was supposed to be 5'5" but built like a brick house. The reason he was short was because he was supposed to be a human avatar of a wolverine, and those creatures are short but mean and dangerous. Hugh Jackman looks enough like the character that his actual height didn't really matter. -- RR

 

[Trekker4747]

No, he's still short and stocky in the comics. Jackman was physically miscast as Wolverine, but I think fans warmed up to his performance enough that we really don't mind.

Precisely.

Jackman is someone who really made a superhero part his own. Like you said, Jackman may not match Wolvie's physical characteristics, but he plays the guy well.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

Depends on the artist.

 

[iguana_tonante]

When I read comics as a kid, Wolverine was a short, stocky guy. When I saw the movie he was at least 6 foot tall. Women like tall men. So they couldn't have a little 5'3" guy play Wolverine.

Hey, don't ditch short guys. Like laptops, we can deliver the same performances but we take less room and are easily portable.

 

[sojourner]

As I recall, Wolverine was supposed to be 5'5" but built like a brick house. The reason he was short was because he was supposed to be a human avatar of a wolverine, and those creatures are short but mean and dangerous. Hugh Jackman looks enough like the character that his actual height didn't really matter. -- RR

Avatar? no, not originally. is that some retcon they did in the last 10 years? The creators just made him shorter than average. Probably to add visual interest in a team.

Why is it every comic character that uses an animal/insect in his hero name eventually ends up some "avatar" crap? First Spidey and now Wolverine? Who else have they done this to since I stopped reading comics in the 90's?

 

[Agenda]

As I recall, Wolverine was supposed to be 5'5" but built like a brick house. The reason he was short was because he was supposed to be a human avatar of a wolverine, and those creatures are short but mean and dangerous. Hugh Jackman looks enough like the character that his actual height didn't really matter. -- RR

Avatar? no, not originally. is that some retcon they did in the last 10 years? The creators just made him shorter than average. Probably to add visual interest in a team.

Why is it every comic character that uses an animal/insect in his hero name eventually ends up some "avatar" crap? First Spidey and now Wolverine? Who else have they done this to since I stopped reading comics in the 90's?

It's because they keep running out of good ideas.

 

[Bad Bishop]

Thanks to the Hugh Jackman influence, Logan is of average height in the animated series Wolverine and the X-Men. But he still appears to be slightly shorter than Cyclops and Angel.

 

[Nerys Myk]

As I recall, Wolverine was supposed to be 5'5" but built like a brick house. The reason he was short was because he was supposed to be a human avatar of a wolverine, and those creatures are short but mean and dangerous. Hugh Jackman looks enough like the character that his actual height didn't really matter. -- RR

Avatar? no, not originally. is that some retcon they did in the last 10 years? The creators just made him shorter than average. Probably to add visual interest in a team.

Why is it every comic character that uses an animal/insect in his hero name eventually ends up some "avatar" crap? First Spidey and now Wolverine? Who else have they done this to since I stopped reading comics in the 90's?

He wasn't created to be part of a team. He first appeared in the Incredible Hulk.

Don't recall how short he was drawn in that issue.

One origin bandied about was to make him a wolverine mutated by the High Evolutionary.

 

[Christopher]

As I recall, Wolverine was supposed to be 5'5" but built like a brick house. The reason he was short was because he was supposed to be a human avatar of a wolverine, and those creatures are short but mean and dangerous. Hugh Jackman looks enough like the character that his actual height didn't really matter. -- RR

Avatar? no, not originally. is that some retcon they did in the last 10 years? The creators just made him shorter than average. Probably to add visual interest in a team.

Why is it every comic character that uses an animal/insect in his hero name eventually ends up some "avatar" crap? First Spidey and now Wolverine? Who else have they done this to since I stopped reading comics in the 90's?

I don't think Red Ranger meant the term in a literal, in-story sense, but in the figurative sense of an embodiment or archetype. His point as I take it is that when Len Wein created Wolverine, he intended the character to embody the qualities that are associated with the animal of that name: small but strong, scrappy, and vicious. After all, why name him Wolverine if he wasn't meant to be similar to a wolverine?

(This is a problem I have with Jackman's casting in the role. Leaving aside what we know about the origins of the character in other media, looking at it strictly from the perspective of the film's reality, why would a 6'3" man get named after a small animal like a wolverine? Why not call him Wolf or Bear or something big? It's incongruous.)

And I don't think Spidey was ever described as an avatar either. An avatar is a corporeal embodiment of a deity. The J. Michael Straczynski comics merely alleged that Spidey's powers might be totemic in nature, drawing on a mystical spider essence that was passed to him through the spider bite, not that Peter Parker himself was a god incarnate. If there was any avatar in that equation, it was the spider that bit him.

 

[sojourner]

Avator, embodiment, totemic representative, you get the idea. It was stupid.

He wasn't created to be part of a team. He first appeared in the Incredible Hulk.

AS usual with first appearances, the character did go through some subsequent changes (like loosing the whiskers on the costume). Was he shorter than average there? Or was it added later when he joined X-men?

 

[Mr. Adventure]

Avator, embodiment, totemic representative, you get the idea. It was stupid.

He wasn't created to be part of a team. He first appeared in the Incredible Hulk.

AS usual with first appearances, the character did go through some subsequent changes (like loosing the whiskers on the costume). Was he shorter than average there? Or was it added later when he joined X-men?

Short from the beginning...
http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2009/02/19/comic-book-legends-revealed-195/

 

[TemporalFlux]

In the comics, he's short but it's more than compensated for by his sheer bulk. The guy is built like a miniature tank.

I'd like to see a real-life actor pull that off. Couldn't happen.

Yep. When the X-men Origins: Wolverine game was being made, I remember some interviews with the programmers about how they had perfect digital models of Jackman, but they digitally added bulk to the model in order to better capture the comic feel they wanted.

 

[OdoWanKenobi]

Avator, embodiment, totemic representative, you get the idea. It was stupid.

He wasn't created to be part of a team. He first appeared in the Incredible Hulk.

AS usual with first appearances, the character did go through some subsequent changes (like loosing the whiskers on the costume). Was he shorter than average there? Or was it added later when he joined X-men?

Short from the beginning...
http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2009/02/19/comic-book-legends-revealed-195/

You know, seeing as he's fighting the Hulk (whose size is constantly in flux based on the artist) and Wendigo, there, I don't think we can accurately tell his size.

 

[broberfett]

During the fight Wolverine says that Hulk is a couple feet taller than him. Then it says that Wolverine is 5'5", I think when he is attacking Wendigo.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

^^ Read the text, don't just look at the pretty pictures.

Seriously though, it states he's five-foot-five.

EDIT: oops, already covered...