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Marvel Comics (via EW) has announced this morning that come this September, everyone’s favorite X-Man won’t be around any longer, as the legendary Wolverine will be kicking the bucket. Already robbed of his healing factor in the monthly “Wolverine” title, the events of the past year will come to a head in a four-issue mini-series titled “Death of Wolverine” from writer Charles Soule and artist Steve McNiven.

“For a long time, no matter who Wolverine was battling, he’s been the eternal victor,” executive editor Michael Marts said. “He almost always comes out on top. Now he finally comes up against an adversary that he cannot win against, he cannot fight. What does that mean for this character who’s been around for hundred years?”

“He’s reflecting on his own life as he’s reflecting on his own death,” Soule said about the character. “We wanted to have the reader do that at the same time. In each issue, we’re focusing on a different aspect, or a different quintessential Wolverine.”

The first issue will be released on September 3rd with the remaining three issues to hit stands for the rest of September. Check out the first page of the first issue, along with the cover art, below!

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Here’s a fun series of infographics that break down the cost of being a superhero when these characters were first introduced and compares it to the expenses the characters’ current iterations would rack up today. The series was created last year for Mashable with artwork by Bob Al-Greene. We came across them on Emil Lendof’s Behance Gallery — Lendof worked on the text and graphics. Even if this series didn’t contain all the interesting stats that it does, I would still love the layout and designs. Al-Greene and his team did a fantastic job of arranging the classic character designs alongside the modern day look of the superheroes. I’ve also included textless versions of just the characters below the infographics.

what do you think>  I think i would just hang up my tights!

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Deadpool Vol. 4 #27

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Marvel killed off its most popular character 13 months ago, and while writer Dan Slott had a plan to bring him back, he had to make kids cry to keep it secret. He did, however, hint at his plans to the on-screen Parker, actor Andrew Garfield.

“To do that for a solid year of my life, that’s the hardest thing I’ve had to do — to look small children in the eye at a convention and lie to them,” says Slott. “One of them with an honest-to-God Little League uniform and a quivering lip. Inside, part of me was dying.”

He did, however, cave under the pressure when he met actor Andrew Garfield on the set of “Amazing Spider-Man 2.” After the actor who plays Parker on the big screen expressed his shock over the death of the beloved character, Slott admits he dropped some secretive hints.

“(Parker’s coming back) just in time, fancy that, for a major Spider-Man motion picture,” quipped Slott. “It seems uncanny. It was very nice for Sony to schedule the movie around the story.

Bumping off the face of franchise, though, was a risky move.

Ever since Stan Lee and Steve Ditko (and possibly Jack Kirby) launched the awkward super hero in 1962’s “Amazing Fantasy” # 15, Parker even more than Spidey has been the publisher’s most popular creation. He’s relatable because his Spider-Sense couldn’t help him manage his personal life any better than his readers could manage theirs.

“It would have been great if you took a photo of my face at that time. I was not very thrilled,” says Marvel Editor in Chief Axel Alonso of Slott’s initial pitch, during an editorial retreat several years ago. “Let’s just say that as cynical as the hard-core fanboy was, I was more cynical.”

Alonso, however, adds that after five decades of stories that featured Parker battling a recurring set of villains and personal problems, “I do feel people will appreciate him a little more after this. I do think people have been taking him for granted.”

And over the past 13 months, the unthinkable happened: many fans gravitated towards the meaner, more arrogant Doc Ock version of Spider-Man — some maybe even prefering him to the goodie-two-shoes original.

“It feels like for every reader lost another reader jumped on,” says Matthew Klein, 27, a worker at Forbidden Planet, a comic book store near Manhattan’s Union Square.

“We’ve gone over 30 issues without Peter Parker, so when we let him out of that box and he gets to put on that costume again and he gets to swing through the sky, it’s going to be the greatest feeling,” says Slott.

“But there’s a twist. There’s always a twist.

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