Ba {ae En Th IRE EI PR rp tp mmr nae et nr By Mark Fisher ost superheroes are American. That Mews come as a surprise, as the USA is where the comic book industry has its origins. Americans love their icons, and their symbols. Superman grew up in America’s heartland in a blue-collar family. Batman is able to fight crime and have all his nifty gadgets because he’s a rich American capitalist (same goes for Iron Man). Peter Parker, better known as Spider-Man, is a typical American nerd (and a large part of his popularity comes from how similar he is to the average nerdy comic book fan). Captain America is a reflection of America’s pride and its courage, and the days when America never had to question itself. Almost every important comic book hero created from the 1940s to the 1960s—the boom period of comic books— was a good ol’ apple pie-eating, flag-waving, baseball- watching, tax-paying Yankee, with the exception of heroes of mythological origin, like Wonderwoman and Thor. Wolverine first appeared in 1974, in an issue of The Incredible Hulk, who was having an adventure in the Canadian wilderness. The = | cover reads a “HE’S HERE! The world’s The origins of a Canadian superhero =e 18 CANADIAN SUPER-HERO!” As the years have gone by, this Canadian superhero made the X-Men the most popular and highest- selling comic book in the world. X-Men became the team series that every other team superhero book imitated. It spawned more spinoffs than one can count, and later, hit movies and popular cartoon shows. Wolverine’s mysterious origin became such a cause for speculation that now almost every hero has a mysterious past of their own. So how did a Canadian end up becoming one of the most popular superheroes, and arguably the driving force of the comic book industry for the past 35 years? The year was 1975. Marvel Comics, the upstart company that created huge hit series in the 1960s, such as Fantastic Four, The Avengers, The Incredible Hulk, Daredevil and most importantly, The Amazing Spider-Man, had gone through a rapid growth period, but it was starting to cool off. Looking to continue their newly found leadership in the industry, they decided to revive their cancelled series, X-Men. That’s right, the comic book series that would eventually become the biggest series in the world, and now one of the biggest film franchises, was cancelled due to lack of readers back in the late ‘60s. The original run had only lasted for 66 issues, and characters such as Magneto, Cyclops, Beast, and Professor X were at one time headed to the trash heap of discontinued comic characters. The series was brought back with the same name, but a new team—both on the pages and behind them. X-Men was a series about mutants, who were the next stage in evolution after humans and therefore had phenomenal powers, but faced discrimination because they were different. Professor X created the X-Men in the hope that mutant superheroes would help humans accept mutants and the two species could co-exist. The original series failed to catch on, partially due to the fact that all the “mutants” who “didn’t fit in” were good looking white American teenagers. Thus, for the new line-up, the writers decided to make sure the team didn’t look like an episode of The Brady Brunch. They upped the freak factor and made sure every character would stick out, even when they weren’t in a costume. And to make sure the team was as different as possible from the old, they made sure not a single new member was American. In addition to the Canadian Wolverine, other members on the new and improved X-Men were Storm (Egyptian), Nightcrawler (German), Collossus (Russian), and Shadowcat (British). Each different nationality on the team served a different purpose. Wolverine was chosen to be Canadian because they needed a member with a wild side, and despite the fact that Canadians are usually seen as politer than Americans, we also are a country with a vast wilderness where there is no trace of civilization, even to this day. From any major city in Canada, you’re never far away from the great outdoors, where wild animals rule and human laws don’t exist. Because he was from the Canadian wilderness, Wolverine’s animal instincts and inner beast were always just beneath the surface, and these traits are what made him so popular. On some level many of us are conflicted with the battle between our animal side and society’s rules, but we have to make the best of it. That’s what Wolverine symbolizes. Superheroes used to be about upholding the law and doing what was right. In the late ‘60s and early “70s, it started to become clear that those weren’t always the same thing. When America started to question its beliefs and its actions in the 1970s—specifically with the Civil Rights Movement, the Vietnam War, Watergate, the Cold War, etc., they needed a superhero that would question the law but would try to do the right thing the best he could. Wolverine would become that hero. What better place to be from could there be to have someone who would question the laws and of America, and to battle against what was wrong about it, while still fighting to protect what was good about it, than America’s neighbour and closest ally? May Ist marked the release of X-Men Origins: Wolverine in theatres. Wolverine has been the feature character of each X-Men film, but this movie gives his character a chance to be explored without all the other members of the team needing screen time as well. They delve into Wolverine’s hidden past, which was only hinted at in the second X-Men movie, including his brutal childhood, his life in the wild, and his stint in the US Army. Because Wolverine has always been one of the more violent comic book heroes out there, the movie doesn’t go long without a fight, but it still manages to contain story points about mutants being treated as less than human. The movie leaves Wolverine’s Canadian origin intact, and a good chunk of the action takes place north of the 49" Parallel. My favourite moment of the film is was when Wolverine’s former army commander tries to bring him back into the fold by telling him that his country needs him, and his fitting response is to simply say: “I’m Canadian.”