ATC here, your official Marvel comics tour guide. Let’s walk through the history of a certain female clone, X-23, a.k.a. Laura Kinney. There’s no warm-up period with this one. We’re going straight to the good stuff. Strap in.

Her roots run deeper than comics, with her first gig being in the animated series X-Men: Evolution in 2003, masterminded by series writer Craig Kyle. Following the footsteps of Harley Quinn, X-23 was born specifically for the tiny TV screen before the comics welcomed her in. By 2004, she made her mark on the Marvel 616 continuity with the NYX series.

The Birth of X-23 in the Marvel Universe

“The Facility,” a top-secret government program with an overwhelmingly bland name, cooked up the idea of X-23. Nope, it wasn’t an intern’s coffee spill on some important documents or a side effect of some radioactive mishap. It was a calculated plan to clone Wolverine. Dr. Martin Stutter, the lead mastermind behind the project, was so hellbent on this that he pulled a known mutant geneticist, Dr. Sarah Kinney, into the mix. But plans seldom go smoothly, and the damaged Logan genes refused to cooperate. Unfazed, Kinney suggested a workaround: why not try a female twin of Logan? So, on the 23rd attempt, Kinney personally gave birth to X-23, adding another chapter to Marvel Comics’ history.

X-23: The Living Weapon

The Facility threw ethics out the window and tutored X-23 through horrifying experiments. After her healing ability started showing, they gifted her with an adamantium skeleton. All in a day’s work, right? Like some twisted homage to Logan, she got metal claws, transforming her into a lethal assassin.

After much drama and fridge-raiding (we assume), the newly minted X-23 escaped the facility, but not before the panicky scientists made her go ballistic. She rather efficiently trimmed down the Facility staff population. Unfortunately, her birth mom and geneticist bore the brunt of her rampage, but not without planting her real name—Laura—in her head and asking her to give Wolverine and the X-Men a buzz. A teenager by now, Laura decided that the X-Men’s group insurance policy looked really good.

X-23’s X-Men Chronicles

With the harrowing Facility chapters behind her, Laura found her way to the X-Mansion and cozied up with the X-Men. She formed bonds with fellow mutants and even dabbled in teen romance with Angel, a founding X-man who indulged in time travel.

Over time, she grew closer to Logan and even tussled with her villainous brother, Daken. After a stint with Logan on the militant mutant squad X-Force, Laura assumed the disguise of Wolverine to honor the presumably dead Logan. Even after Logan’s return from the dead, she kept his name and yellow costume. Evidently, the X-Men are big on recycling— so now they have two Wolverines.