The Wolverine Files by Mike W. Barr

Don't know much about Wolverine? Well, here's your chance to learn and find out, courtesy of Nick Fury and Shield. This book traces Wolverine's origins as a boy named James Howlett all the way into the present day. With Wolverine being over 100 years old (but stuck in his physical 40's due to his mutant healing factor), Wolverine has seen and done a lot ever since he's been introduced to the Marvel Universe.

This is a fairly hefty book, and if all the material had only been about Wolverine, it would have been much, much shorter, so in addition to Wolverine himself, it also introduces his friends and his main foes, everyone from the Hulk to Jubilee and Shadowcat. It even reprints the panel where someone was wondering why Wolverine strikes up such close friendships with young girls. "Inappropriate Friendships" to use the quote. I'd seen the panel before, but it still gave me a chuckle.

After the other sections, another is devoted to the "What if?" comics that Wolverine appeared in, such as "What if Wolverine became Lord of the Vampires?" (Dracula bites Storm, she converts the other X-men, and Wolverine kills Dracula. Eventually, Stephen Strange, who has been killed by Wolverine, but becomes a spirit, persuades Wolverine to read the Montesi Formula, which destroys all the vampires, including himself.)

This book covers pretty much everything you would want to know about Wolverine: the women he's loved, his close friends, his enemies, the groups he's worked with- even his costumes. This is a great resource on Wolverine, but equally so on the heroes he's worked with and some of his great foes. It's a testament to the popularity and longevity of his character, filled with great art and panels from the comics.

Even the slipcover is Wolverine-related, seeming to have been rent by his claws with huge slashes that show the book underneath. It's a little expensive ($40), but collects all the information on Wolverine in one place that is scattered across hundreds, if not thousands of individual comics and hundreds of graphic novels. Personally, I was looking forward to seeing Mean, from the Nightcrawler Limited series, as that was a parody of Wolverine, but it wasn't included. And I'm not sure why. If they could have the "What If?" Universes, why not Mean?

Well, this book would be too expensive for me to buy, but I enjoyed getting it out from the library. Another problem is that the slipcase box is rather flimsy and might get torn up or damaged easily- for something that's so much more expensive than a graphic novel, this is a minus or a con in pros and cons. Recommended, but the price may prove prohibitive.