6 Times Wolverine and Hulk Went Mano-a-Mano

In Honor of HULKVERINES, here are a few times Wolverine and Hulk butt heads before teaming up!

Wolverine and the Incredible Hulk—two incredibly powerful Marvel heroes who, unfortunately, don’t always get along. One is a nearly immortal and grizzled mutant with an adamantium skeleton while the other is a green-skinned monster who is pretty much always angry.

In the first issue of Greg Pak and Ario Anindito’s HULKVERINES (now on sale) Wolverine and Hulk team up to take down Weapon H, an abomination that combines both of their powers.

Still, the two characters haven’t always been buddy-buddy and in honor of the new storyline, we took a look back at all the times Wolverine and Hulk went head-to-head and fought one another.

Uncannily enough, Logan actually made his comic book debut not in the pages of an X-Men story, but in 1974’s INCREDIBLE HULK #181. And, of course, their first-ever meeting wasn’t exactly cordial. In an effort to defeat the Wendigo, Hulk was lured to the wilds of Quebec and ended up in a tussle with the clawed man himself. Wolverine was sent to dispatch the Hulk and in Logan’s own words, “I’m a gent who always does his job!” Fortunately, their differences were put aside when Wolverine began to fight the Wendigo, and the Hulk realized that the enemy of his enemy is his friend. Once the Wendigo was dealt with, however, they went back to sparring.

After his family was murdered by the Hulk’s grandchildren (aka the Hulk Gang), Old Man Logan decided to take out his own personal hit on Bruce Banner. Logan came up with a strategy for fighting the big green galumph: Always go the legs. If he sees you coming, distract him first and then go for the eyes. With his healing factor not what it used to be, Logan took quite a bit of damage before learning that he was actually trying to defeat Amadeus Cho. Amadeus, while refusing to give up the location of Banner, offered to help work things out with Logan, whom he thought was Wolverine’s grandfather. Before he could decide, the fuzz showed up and Logan made a break for it.

In ULTIMATE WOLVERINE VS HULK, Bruce Banner was thought to be dead when reports of a Hulk-like creature begin to crop up around the world. To find out what was going on, Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. sent the only man he trusted to take care of business: Wolverine.

Logan barged in on the Hulk with a harem of women in Tibet and the Hulk quite literally ripped Wolverine in half. He then taunted the mutant, asking which leg he should devour first. Jeez, the Hulk is hardcore.

After crashing in the snowy mountains, Wolverine met Po, a strange little girl who shifted between human form and that of a child’s drawing. She then pushed him into a mountain cavern, which contained a sleeping Hulk. Not happy to be woken up, the Hulk punched Logan so hard, that he flew 20 feet. Logan tried to reciprocate, but Po—who lovingly called the Hulk “Uncle Bruce”—wouldn’t let him use his claws because it would have just made the Hulk angrier.

Wolverine tried to reason with the brute, who just wanted to crush the mutant with a large chunk of ice. Unable to use violence, Logan tried to distract the Hulk in an effort to calm him down, but that didn’t work either. Finally, Logan brought out his claws and fought the Hulk in the wreckage of an airplane. This was finally enough to draw Banner back out.

When the Hulk returned to Earth from Sakaar, seeking revenge on those who exiled him into space, he tracked down Professor X and asked if he would have voted to also send him away. When Charles answered in the affirmative, Hulk prepared to kill the professor, but the X-Men intervened. Wolverine showed up and gave the brute a good slashing with his claws before he was punched right into the forest. He returned after the rest of the team had their butts thoroughly kicked, remarking: “It always comes down to you and me anyway.” Hulk replied that this was different than all those other times and nearly killed Logan before Juggernaut intervened.

In 1997, Wolverine attempted to subdue the Hulk after his skeleton was no longer coated in adamantium. Logan jumped out of the trees and ran his bone claws across the Hulk’s neck. Expecting for blood to begin spurting out like a fountain, the green guy clutched his neck before he realized that his jugular had not been severed and quipped, “No…metal. What’re those? Bone?”

HULKVERINES #1, written by Greg Pak with art by Ario Anindito, is now on sale online and at your local comic shop! You can also pre-order HULKVERINES #2, available Wednesday, March 27, today!