Wolverine: Revenge - Red Band #1

History

The project was publicly revealed in May 2024 via Polygon, formally announced by Marvel as a companion to Wolverine's 50th-anniversary publishing push. Capullo had returned to Marvel in July 2023 at San Diego Comic-Con — initially only for cover work, beginning with a Wolverine variant — and signed a broader contract that November. Wolverine: Revenge was confirmed in May 2024 as his first interior assignment under that deal. Capullo and Hickman worked in Marvel's traditional plot-style method, with Capullo laying out pages from a story outline and Hickman then crafting dialogue against the completed pencils. The Red Band Edition, released simultaneously with the standard Wolverine: Revenge #1, was produced as a polybagged variant containing exclusive pages and more explicit violence not present in the standard edition, while sharing the same core Capullo cover and interior art team of inker Tim Townsend and colorist FCO Plascencia, with lettering by VC's Cory Petit and editing by Drew Baumgartner and Mark Basso.

Trivia · 9 facts

• Written by Jonathan Hickman with interior art and cover by Greg Capullo; inked by Tim Townsend; colored by FCO Plascencia; lettered by VC's Cory Petit; edited by Drew Baumgartner and Mark Basso under Editor-in-Chief C.B. Cebulski.
• Released August 21, 2024 (cover-dated October 2024) as part of a five-issue prestige limited series; the Red Band Edition was published simultaneously with the standard Wolverine: Revenge #1.
• Represents Greg Capullo's return to Marvel interior artwork — his first since his X-Force run in the early 1990s — after a multi-decade period primarily at Image (Spawn) and DC (Batman, Dark Nights: Metal).
• Timed to coincide with Wolverine's 50th anniversary as a Marvel character, first introduced in Incredible Hulk #180 (1974).
• The Red Band Edition is only the second Marvel title to use the polybagged explicit-content Red Band format, following the Blood Hunt event series earlier in 2024.
• Set in an alternate continuity (not Earth-616): the story's world has been plunged into a global power blackout after a dying Magneto unleashed a worldwide EMP upon the destruction of Asteroid M.
• Within this alternate timeline, the issue marks the 'first appearance' of every major character in this continuity, including the deaths-on-debut of Maria Hill, Clay Quartermain, Dum Dum Dugan, Captain America (Steve Rogers), and Winter Soldier (Bucky Barnes) — all killed during a failed S.H.I.E.L.D. mission against the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.
• The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants in this timeline is composed of Mastermind (Jason Wyngarde), Omega Red (Arkady Rossovich), Sabretooth (Victor Creed), Deadpool (Wade Wilson), and Colossus (Piotr Rasputin) — with Colossus as a villain who betrays the heroes — and serves as the central antagonist faction driving Wolverine's revenge quest.
• The series was subsequently reprinted as Wolverine: Revenge – Red Band Raw: Black & White Edition #1–5 (debuting July 16, 2025), showcasing Capullo's original pencils without color.

Cast · 14 characters

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Variants (2)