Wolverine

History

Wolverine's claws were easy to prototype after making Cyclops as the sliding method under the paper is fairly simple. The hard part was cutting the cardboard blades without them ripping. One side came out perfect and the other was not as straight as I wanted. The claws are just thin cardboard with silver Sharpie marker over them. The edges of the claws are bent down slightly so they fit to his knuckles. The back of the claws have a handle to slide the claws down from his forearms.

Just like Cyclops, whatever black marker I used bled over the years noticeably around the markings on his ribs which were more detailed and sharp. I thought the flesh tones and highlights on his arms came out better than I first thought. I didn't think of using them on the costume until I detailed his arms. The highlights would be used on later cardboard figures.

I would have liked to make the shoulder pads separate so they could rotate independently of his arm movement but I didn't think of that at the time. You can see in the wire stand that I intitially made him too tall after standing him next to Cyclops and had to trim his legs down after assembly since Wolverine was always short.

The look of the character was inspired by the Art Adams cover art from Classic X-Men #1. I absolutely loved the X-Men ToyBiz 5” scale figure from the '90s with a simple tab on his back to make him slash his claws side to side at the waist with your thumb. The claws also had a little spring in them to pop out when pushed in. Wolverine was a perfect action figure to me back then.