How Did Wolverine Get His Adamantium Claws Back in ‘Days of Future Past’?

Fox’s ‘X-Men’ franchise, which started in 2000 with the original ‘X-Men’ movie and concluded in a not-really fashionable way with ‘The New Mutants’ in 2020, might be a thing of the past, but thanks to the upcoming MCU movie ‘Deadpool 3,’ we aren’t done with it just yet. Like all long-term franchises, X-Men also had its ups and downs, but one thing that we can all agree on is that it featured probably the most confusing timeline, which we can thank 2014’s ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past,’ in which Wolverine, unlike in other movies, had his bone claws instead of adamantium ones once he went back in time. But how he got his adamantium claws back after changing the timeline? We’ll try to answer in this article.

The main plot of ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’ takes place in 1973, before Logan’s skeleton was fused with adamantium, which explains why he had bone claws when he traveled back in time. After changing the timeline to save other present-day X-Men, he woke up in the present day with his adamantium claws again. Since changing the timeline erased everything that happened to him and other X-Men during that period, the movie’s final scene shows how Wolverine was pulled from the river by Mystique disguised as William Stryker. After that, Wolverine was experimented on via the Weapon X program again, which fused adamantium with his skeleton again in the revised timeline.

The fans of superhero movies usually like to say how there were so many Batmen, Supermen, and Spider-Men on the big screen. But even after over two decades, there’s still only one Wolverine. The one and only Hugh Jackman. Jackman debuted as the Wolverine in the original ‘X-Men’ movie in 2000, and after ‘X-Men: First Class’ kicked off a prequel saga in which the majority of the cast was recast, Wolverine was still the same. Not only because of Jackman’s terrific performance but because Wolverine doesn’t really age, not even in the span of 50 years.

The history of Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine (in the original timeline)

The original ‘X-Men’ trilogy started with the original X-Men movie in 2000. That movie marked the beginning of this franchise and Hugh Jackman’s long path as the Wolverine.

We meet him for the first time when Marie D’Ancanto, also known as Rogue, arrives at the bar in Alberta, Canada, where Wolverine is making money as a cage fighter. After Sabretooth attacks them on the road, they eventually meet Cyclops and Storm, who take them to Charles Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters.

Wolverine is generally known as the most popular X-Man, and in the original ‘X-Men’ movie trilogy, he was depicted as a team member, while his more personal stories were depicted in his own trilogy that started in 2009 and concluded in 2017. The original trilogy focused on him as a member of the team and his love story with Jean Grey, which ended tragically when he was forced to kill her to stop the Phoenix.

When we first met Wolverine, he already had his adamantium claws for a while now, and his origin story wasn’t depicted until 2009’s ‘X-Men Origins: Wolverine,’ which depicted Logan’s beginnings in Canada and the Weapon X program, which reinforced his skeleton with the indestructible adamantium.

While the first movie of ‘The Wolverine’ trilogy takes place before the events of the ‘X-Men’ trilogy, the second installment, 2013’s ‘The Wolverine,’ takes place after the events of ‘X-Men: The Last Stand,’ since one of Wolverine’s character arcs in ‘The Wolverine’ was overcoming the fact that he had to kill Jean, the woman he loved.

The mid-credit scene of ‘The Wolverine’ leads directly into the events of ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’ when Logan is approached by Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr, who warn him about the Sentinels, a new human-created weapon designed to destroy all the mutants.

The ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’ events start in dystopian 2023, where Sentinels are hunting and killing mutants. Charles Xavier’s plan is to use Shadowcat’s powers to go back in time to 1973, when Bolivar Trask first created the Sentinels. Wolverine is the only one who can go back in time due to his enhanced healing abilities, but going back to 1973 also means losing the adamantium in his skeleton.

How did Wolverine get his adamantium claws back after ‘Days of Future Past’?

The main plot of ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’ finished with Mystique sparing Trask, leading the public to believe that she saved the president of the US. The Sentinel program was decommissioned, which changed the timeline and saved all the mutants from 2023, including those who died before, such as Cyclops and Jean Grey.

Upon returning to the present day, it didn’t take long for him to realize that changing the timeline didn’t take away his adamantium claws permanently, which is explained in the movie’s last scene when he was taken out of the river by Mystique, disguised as William Stryker, the head of the Weapon X program.

Wolverine didn’t have a large role in the next sequel, 2016’s ‘X-Men: Apocalypse,’ which takes place in 1983. It followed young Charles Xavier and the group of his young mutants in a battle against the En Sabah Nur, also known as the Apocalypse. Wolverine appeared in only one scene. When Cyclops, Jean Grey, and Nightcrawler infiltrated Stryker’s facility at Alkali Lake, Jean freed Wolverine from his containment unit. He slaughtered all the guards and later escaped into the unknown.

This scene showed that Wolverine was subjected to the Weapon X program again, which gave him back his adamantium claws in the revised timeline. After that, Logan returned one last time in 2017’s ‘Logan,’ which takes place in 2029, when Wolverine is experiencing health problems due to adamantium poisoning him from the inside. After taking all the mutant serum to help Laura and her friends, Wolverine ultimately dies after his fight against X-24.

As we already know, Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine will return one more time in ‘Deadpool 3,’ which will be another Multiverse superhero story, although Ryan Reynolds and Jackman promised that they won’t be touching Logan’s death from the previous movie.

Hugh Jackman will return as Wolverine in ‘Deadpool 3,’ which is set to be released on May 3, 2024. However, with the SAG-AFTRA strike currently ongoing in Hollywood, it’s hard to say the movie will stay at that date. Regardless, we’re all looking forward to the Wolverine’s return to the big screen.

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