Canada Might Erect a Wolverine Statue In Edmonton, Alberta

A petition to get a life-size statue of Marvel superhero Wolverine erected in his home province of Alberta, Canada has won the approval of an Edmonton City Council member.

The petition, posted on Change.org, has only been signed by just shy of 3,000 people, far off the 100,000 it would need to be acknowledged by the Canadian government.

That said it has been noted by Edmonton City Council's Andrew Knack, who told CTV News: "The first reaction is, this is kind of funny, but then you realise they're taking this very seriously. I think it's a great idea, assuming we go about it the right approach, it can't be taxpayer dollars to fund a statue of Wolverine."

The petition requests that a statue be considered to find a home at City Hall, a local square or the Alberta Legislature Grounds.

The news comes during a Marvel Comics run that will see the X-Men character die next month - not a spoiler by the way, as the four-issue series is called Death of Wolverine.

As for his statue, bizarrely there is a precedent for such monuments to fictional icons of pop culture. A Rocky Balboa statue was erected in Philadelphia in 1980, and earlier this year Detroit unveiled a statue of RoboCop.

There's also a Superman statue in Metropolis, Illinois, a tenuous link given the Metropolis that Superman comes from is entirely fictional.