20 Of The Best Wolverine Stories

From Kitty Pryde and Wolverine (Image via Marvel)

1. Kitty Pryde and Wolverine

Or, Kitty and Logan Go to Japan.

Okay, maybe that’s enough to make you a little leery. I don’t blame you. After all, Asian cultures have been subject to plenty of cringe-inducing stereotypes. Given that this was published in 1984 and 1985, it’s enough to make you worry that your pals, the X-Men, might make a terrible misstep.

To be fair, there are some weird notes. In the six-episode miniseries, Kitty Pryde follows her businessman father, Carmen, on a trip to Japan. She suspects that he’s fallen in with a bad crowd, a sort of organized-crime-based crowd if you know what I mean. In quick order, Kitty is captured and then brainwashed by evil ninjas and the Yakuza, who teach her to become an evil assassin. Wolverine and the legitimately awesome Yukio (a female ninja and old friend of Logan’s) show up to save Kitty and break through the brainwashing.

Veteran X-Men writer Chris Claremont and artist Al Milgrom teamed up to create a darker-than-usual X-Men story. Remember, this was before the nineties when grimdark comics became so overwrought and ubiquitous that it all circled back around to parody (before circling back to grimdark again and settling there for who knows how long. Thanks, Zack Snyder).

At any rate, Kitty Pryde and Wolverine was a genuinely interesting step forward in the development of both Kitty and Wolverine as characters. So, yes, there’s some weird ninja stereotypes going on, but the writing and illustration are more than enough to draw you in.