Marvel’s latest plans for Wolverine could set up an MCU future without Hugh Jackman

Wolverine is back in this summer’s Deadpool 3, making Marvel fans’ dreams come true, but amidst the excitement, we need to come to terms with a sad truth: Hugh Jackman won’t be playing this character forever.

2024 marks an incredible 24 years of the Australian icon bringing Logan to life, ever since 2000’s X-Men, with Ryan Reynolds managing to tempt Jackman back into the X-Men fold for their inaugural MCU outing. And, sure, maybe there’s a chance he’ll come back once more for the multiversal crossover event Avengers: Secret Wars, but the time is fast approaching when Marvel is going to have to introduce its own X-Men line-up and the day for Wolverine to be replaced will finally come.

Despite the constant fan-casts — everyone from Tom Hardy to Taron Egerton to Daniel Radcliffe has been linked with the role since 2017’s Logan — the idea of recasting Jackman as the adamantium anti-hero seems an impossible task. So maybe an alternate route for the MCU to take has just been suggested by the latest goings-on in Marvel Comics.

Who are Logan’s daughters, the Sisters?

In Daredevil: Gang War #2, from writer Erica Schultz and penciler Sergio Dávila, Elektra’s Daredevil confronts a new enemy, a mercenary working for the corrupt cop running one of the new gangs terrorizing New York. When their paymaster attempts to kill them to cover their tracks, the masked merc slices the cop’s arm off with their claws. Elektra is dumbfounded at how this assassin could have claws like Wolverine, but readers will recognize this as the surprising return of Bellona, one of Logan’s clone daughters.

Specifically, Bellona is one of the Sisters, the clones of Laura Kinney aka X-23 aka Wolverine — so, yes, they are clones of a clone — created by Alchemax. When Laura discovered their existence, she fought to break them out of the evil laboratory. Although originally 10 in number, three survived — the smallest, Gabby, the oldest, Zelda, and Bellona, who had albinism. To allow Laura to escape with the other two, Bellona remained behind, which tragically meant she underwent further mental conditioning that put her on the path to villainy. You get it, she’s basically Wolverine meets Winter Soldier.

The interesting thing about Bellona returning to the comics now is that it puts the Sisters back on the radar of Marvel Studios, thereby giving them the perfect way to tackle Wolverine in a fresh context in the MCU come Phase Seven. Building on the introduction of Laura in Logan, whether she’s played by Dafne Keen or not, would be a smart move as recasting Logan immediately is such an intimidating prospect.

What’s more, exploring the mythology surrounding Laura — the Laura lore, if you like — is key to examining the legacy of Logan and the mantle of Wolverine in a way that honors Jackman’s record-breaking tenure in the role much better than simply finding a new actor as soon as he’s out the door. The fans’ love for Logan means this tactic would no doubt ruffle a few feathers, but if handled correctly, Laura and her Sisters might be the best approach to continuing the Wolverine brand on-screen.