How Old is Wolverine (& Can he Actually Die)?
Wolverine is one the most famous Marvel heroes of all time, yet not even his fellow X-Men know how old he truly is or how his healing factor works.
Wolverine's popularity has always been rather surprising. The character is virtually defined by his sass and violence, and he's the type of the character who easily could have turned fans off. However, Wolverine persevered, thanks to the caliber of his writing over the years. The legendary X-Men member has a huge presence in media of all types, but the comics are where the most questions about Wolverine get answered.
Wolverine is a near unstoppable combatant, his healing factor and adamantium skeleton allowing to survive attacks that would kill basically anyone else. This resilience, as well as the breadth of the character's history, has caused people to ask two questions about Wolverine: how old is he and can he actually die? There are mostly concrete answers to both questions, although one is more solid than the other.
The Past Is Prologue
For years, fans knew little to nothing about Wolverine's origin. In fact, no one knew he was called Logan until 1977's Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 1) #103 (by Chris Claremont, Dave Cockrum, Sam Grainger, Janice Cohen, and John Costanza), almost three years after his debut. For years afterward, very little was known of Wolverine's upbringing and family tree. As time went on, Marvel Comics established that his healing factor also slowed down his aging to a crawl. Readers would get flashbacks to various times in Wolverine's life, and a key one came in Wolverine (Vol. 2) #10 (by Chris Claremont, John Buscema, Bill Sienkiewicz, Mike Rockwitz, and Ken Bruzenak). This flashback seemed to take place in the late 19th/early 20th century.
This was also an important part of Wolverine and Sabretooth's bloody history, since it was their first fight. It took place after Sabretooth seemingly killed Wolverine's girlfriend, Silver Fox, an Indigenous woman. Readers later learned this was a manipulation by Weapon X in Wolverine (Vol. 2) #50, by Larry Hama, Marc Silvestri, Dan Green, Hilary Barta, Tom Palmer, Steve Buccellato, and Pat Brosseau. Silver Fox showed up in this issue and Doctor Cornelius, the head scientist of the Weapon X program, remarked that the cabin simulation — where Wolverine lived with Silver Fox when he thought she died — was pretty standard for every member of Weapon X's mental conditioning.
This reveal cast Wolverine's actual age in doubt. He was at least old enough to be an adult in WWII, as established in Uncanny X-Men #268 (by Chris Claremont, Jim Lee, Scott Williams, Glynis Oliver, and Tom Orzechowski). This issue showed Wolverine fighting alongside Captain America and rescuing Black Widow when she was a child from the Hand. Wolverine (Vol 2) #50 came out in 1991, and fans waited years before they found out Wolverine's actual early years. This fresh insight came in the comic series Origin, by Paul Jenkins, Andy Kubert, Richard Isanove, John Roshell, and Saida Temofonte. This established that Wolverine was originally a sickly boy named James Howlett. The Howlett family was a well off Canadian family.
Origin never put an exact date on when James was born. It's definitely in the 19th/early 20th century, and the solicit synopsis for the first issue says "a century ago." The Fox X-Men movies gave a concrete date for Wolverine's birth, 1832. Nothing in the comic gainsays this, and it definitely seems, from a technological standpoint and looking at the clothing styes, that Wolverine was born during the 1800s. The book came out in 2001, so if the solicit synopsis is to believed, the story takes place in 1901. James is a young boy at this point, between eight and ten years old, meaning his birthdate would be sometime around 1891 and 1893. However, most assume that the date given by the movies is closer to the truth. Solicit synopses aren't canon. In fact, they have been known to contain some blatant falsehoods.
Regarding James Howlett's age, there's a range from 1832 to 1893, making Wolverine somewhere one hundred and thirty and one hundred and ninety-one.
Two Ships Passing In The Night
Wolverine has been in some bloody battles and has survived fights that would kill an army. In Death Of Wolverine #1 (by Charles Soule, Steve McNiven, Jay Leisten, Justin Ponsor, and Chris Eliopolous), Wolverine goes to Reed Richards for help to get his healing factor back. Reed remarked that Wolverine's adamantium skeleton was radioactive from when he got caught in the nuclear blast at Hiroshima. This definitely feels like it can't be true, since Wolverine reportedly got his adamantium skeleton somewhere between the 1950s and the 1970s, but it was established in a comic, making it true. Logan also doesn't even have the same adamantium on his skeleton that was originally there. However, again, it was written by Soule and okayed by editor Mike Marts. So, his healing factor not only held radiation poisoning at bay for close to a century, but he even survived the nuclear bomb blast itself.
Of course, the power of Wolverine's healing factor has changed as much as Wolverine has changed as a character. He could take shots from the Hulk and Wendigo in his first appearance, which demonstrated his durability. In later comics, Wolverine's healing factor's efficiency and time to heal depended on the severity of the injury. Cuts and bullets holes healed rather quickly, but the more damage done to him, the longer it took for him heal. Wolverine's bones could break, but to do so one had to bend adamantium, which isn't an easy feat even for the Hulk. Speaking of the Hulk, in What If... (Vol. 2) #50 (by John Arcudi, Armando Gil, Gina Going, and Janice Chiang), the Hulk hit Wolverine so hard it destroyed his bones and brain inside the adamantium, killing him. This was based on the fight between Wolverine and the Hulk from The Incredible Hulk (Vol. 1) #340 (by Peter David, Todd McFarlane, Petra Scotese, and Rick Parker), meaning that this was the Grey Hulk, a weaker version of the character. However, this took place in an alternate universe, so some readers ignore this.
Wolverine died in the future during Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 1) #142 (by Chris Claremont, John Byrne, Terry Austin, Glynis Wein, and Tom Orzechowski). A Sentinel blew away his skin, muscles, and organs, killing him. Years later in Wolverine (Vol. 3) #43 (by Marc Guggenheim, Humberto Ramos, Carlos Cuevas, Edgar Delgado, and Randy Gentile), Wolverine got struck by an explosion created by the villain Nitro. This burned away everything but Wolverine's bones, and his healing factor rebuilt him. However, it was later established in Old Man Logan (Vol. 2) that Wolverine's healing factor didn't as work as well as he got older, so this could be why he died in that issue of Uncanny.
Wolverine's healing factor reached its zenith after he lost his adamantium. His body no longer had to deal with adamantium poisoning, and his mutation continued unabated into a feral state, which was his genetic destiny. After adamantium was rebonded to his skeleton, his healing factor became fast again, and that's where he is today. Wolverine's life involves suffering, and he's gotten very good at surviving it. However, Wolverine's healing factor has seemingly slowed down in recent years during the Krakoa Era. Being burnt down to a skeleton will apparently kill him now, as evidenced by his multiple deaths at the hands of Nimrod — referenced in Inferno #1 (by Jonathan Hickman, Valerio Schiti, David Curiel, and Joe Sabino). This mostly just seems like an excuse to have Wolverine use Krakoan resurrection more. In the '00s and the '10s, wounds he's suffered in the Krakoa Era wouldn't have killed him.
Starvation isn't a thing for Wolverine, because he can eat his own skin and muscle because it grows back, which he has claimed he's had to do. Drowning is a surefire way to kill him. However, he can come back from drowning as long as he's taken out of the water before his body's energy reserves are exhausted. It's also been established in recent years that Wolverine's healing factor comes from cells in his blood. Since blood eventually pools in a dead body where ever it's laying on the ground, Wolverine's healing factor would stop working if the blood could no longer get to the heart and make it keep pumping.
Wolverine can be beheaded or ripped in half, since adamantium doesn't cover the vertebrae in the neck and spine. So someone who knew right where to swing the sword could behead him and anyone strong enough can rip him half. However, if Wolverine's severed head or the two halves of his body are put back together, the healing factor brings him back to life. It's unknown, however, how long having his head severed or being ripped in half would take to kill him. It's assumed that either method would work as long as his pieces were kept far enough apart. This is how Beast killed Wolverine in Wolverine (Vol. 7) #26 (by Benjamin Percy, Juan Jose Ryp, Frank D'Armata, and Cory Petit), since Beast kept Wolverine's adamantium skull in his quarters on Krakoa.
Wolverine learned from Romulus, a mutant with the same powers as him, that he could survive for thousands of years, but it's hard to know if it's that true in Wolverine's particular case because of the revelation of Old Man Logan (Vol. 2). However, Old Man Logan was from another universe, so this might not affect the 616 Logan. As illustrated several times in the comics, Wolverine can die even if his healing factor is working. Drowning is the easiest method; the weight of his adamantium skeleton makes swimming harder for Wolverine because he's not extremely buoyant. Severing his head or ripping him half will work as long as his pieces are kept far enough apart. Sometimes, having his flesh, muscle, and organs burnt off will kill him, but other times, it won't.
So, the concrete answer to whether Wolverine can die is yes. It's not at all easy, but it's definitely possible.
Wolverine's Tough And Old But He's Not Invincible
Wolverine's age has always been the hardest thing to identify over the years. Marvel kept Wolverine's origin as opaque as possible for long as possible. However, when Joe Quesada became editor-in-chief of Marvel in 2000, he decided it was time to reveal Wolverine's origin. This decision likely resulted from how bad Marvel was doing from a sales standpoint at the beginning of the new millennium. That said, they didn't give readers the exact year Wolverine was born. Apparently, Marvel's old habits of keeping Wolverine's origin in the dark kicked in just a bit. However, getting to see Wolverine's childhood, his mutant gift awakening, and the early years that shaped him into the person he would become thrilled longtime fans of Wolverine.
As for dying, Wolverine is extremely hard to kill, but it's not impossible. The ol'Canucklehead has survived all kinds of damage over the years. He's among the most durable fighters on Earth, and that's saying something in a superhero universe that includes the Hulk. However, Wolverine is not an invincible warrior. There are several foolproof methods to kill him, the easiest being drowning. If an enemy knows who they are dealing with, Wolverine can be killed.