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Brian Miller
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 8:59am | IP Logged | 1  

JB, when the decision was made to change his costume, was there any thought about simply changing the colors away from the blue and yellow and keeping the overall pattern?

Also, how was the decision to change it come about? Did you and Chris discuss it?

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John Byrne
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 9:10am | IP Logged | 2  

From the moment I was assigned to the X-Men book, I was agitating for a costume change for Wolverine. Dave had, of course, given him the "Fang" costume at the end of his run -- literally handing me a sketch and saying "This is Wolverine's new costume. It's a bitch to draw." -- but I didn't think our Mr. Logan would be content to wear someone else's outfit, even as a "trophy". I was told then that I could not design a new one, so it was Fang's or back into the blue and yellow -- so into the blue and yellow he went.

But, of course, unless they play football in Michigan, Wolverine's are not blue and yellow (and, yes, that college team was indeed the inspiration for the character's color scheme!), so I kept asking if I could come up with something more "wolverine-ish".* Finally Shooter relented and said yes, and I sat down in the bullpen and doodled up what I had in mind. Then colorist Andy Yanchus had some copies made, and played around with different color combinations, the very first of which was. . . blue and yellow!

Then came the matter of introducing the new suit, and, in typical Wolverine fashion, I said he should just show up with it in the first logical issue, no comment. Which is pretty much what we did.

It was gratifying, btw, that the readers (at least, those who wrote in) were almost universally positive. Comic fans tend to fear change, but this one they liked!


*Sabretooth in fact was an early doodle I had done for a new Wolverine
costume, long before I came to do UNCANNY. At the point I did it, Logan
had not yet shown us his face.

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Keith Thomas
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 9:31am | IP Logged | 3  

Sorry for jumping the gun there,

*Sabretooth in fact was an early doodle I had done for a
new Wolverine costume, long before I came to do UNCANNY. At
the point I did it, Logan had not yet shown us his
face.


So did that inspire the Wolverine/Sabertooth father/son
relationship? (appropriate topic for today, surprised
that's never been a commission)
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Brian Miller
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 10:08am | IP Logged | 4  

SO glad you opted not to keep him in Fang's costume. While I like the costume, it never made snese to me to have Wolverine in long sleeves. ( I discovered the Fang costume long after I had been introduced to the character). Even when Jim Lee put the whole team in the yellow and blues ( blacks?) I thought it was cool except Wolverine had sleeves. Sleeves just don't look right on him.

Thanks for answering, JB.

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John Byrne
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 10:25am | IP Logged | 5  

So did that inspire the Wolverine/Sabertooth father/son relationship? (appropriate topic for today, surprised that's never been a commission)

••

In part. As most of you already know, Chris and Dave were thinking of having it revealed that Wolverine was not, in fact, a mutant, but one of the High Evolutionary's Ani-Men. They only got as far as a small set-up in (if memory serves) issue 99, when the Sentinels are confused by the readings they get off him. Then Archie Goodwin, not knowing their plans, used the H.E. for the origin of the original Spider-Woman, so Chris and Dave abandoned their plans. Still, the confused Sentinels were still here, like a bump in the road, and I suggested that perhaps it had been Wolverine's father who was the mutant, and since the mutation had bred true, Wolverine was actually the first of a new species. With this agreed upon, we looked around for a candidate to be Logan's dad, and Sabretooth seemed the most logical.

So, my design got "into the family", just a generation earlier than I originally thought it might.

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John Byrne
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 10:28am | IP Logged | 6  

Even when Jim Lee put the whole team in the yellow and blues ( blacks?)…

••

Don't recall what the Lee versions looked like, but to be absolutely correct, Wolverine's original suit is yellow, blue and black. The body and legs are yellow, the stripes are black, and the epaulets, trunks, boots and gloves are blue (with black trim, in the case of the boots). Sometimes (as in the piece I posted today) the blue is drawn very dark, with a lot of black -- except on the boots, because of their black trim.

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Vinny Valenti
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 10:35am | IP Logged | 7  

For reference:


I thought it was kinda creepy that the X-Men were wearing thongs at the time. Including the men! The design pre-dated Jim Lee, and seemed to be Claremont's idea.
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John Byrne
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 10:39am | IP Logged | 8  

The design pre-dated Jim Lee, and seemed to be Claremont's idea.

••

Oh, the stories I could tell. . . .

Anyway, that looks like a variant on the original school uniforms. Which
would make them yellow and black, of course, but Lee is often inconsistent
in his modeling.
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Keith Thomas
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 10:40am | IP Logged | 9  

Thanks. Hmmm so does that mean Sabertooth got the healing
factor retroactively to tie him to Logan(I've never read
his first appearance in Iron Fist)? Oh and since we're on
him what was Sabertooth's real name? Since I don't think
Victor Creed was revealed until 1992 (and of course the
scrambled memories so it might not be his "real" name).
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John Byrne
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 10:42am | IP Logged | 10  

"My" Sabretooth didn't have a real name. Plus, remember that he made no appearance in UNCANNY while I was working on the book. This was "backstory" that Chris and I might or might not have revealed outright.
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Keith Thomas
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 10:44am | IP Logged | 11  

The yellow and black had already been done ;-)

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John Byrne
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Posted: 21 June 2009 at 10:50am | IP Logged | 12  

Mark Twain said something like "A lie can get twice around the world while the truth is putting its shoes on." If the internet had existed back in 1979, I'd probably still be denying that I ever planned to put the new X-Men into the old uniforms!
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