The Birth: Marvel wanted to broaden it's market to foreign countries. The X-Men had already become an instant hit with it's various members from different nationalities. Around this time, Dave Cockrum came up with the idea of introducing a pointy-eared, furry beast with a long tail as a superhero. His idea; initially meant for DC comics' "Legion Of Super Heroes"; was rejected because the hero was too funny looking. Their loss became Marvel's winner. Along with X-Men writer, Len Wein, Dave decided to make him German. The rest is history. His first appearance was in Giant Sized X-Men #1.

Nightcrawler's origins weren't explored until later. A sorceress by the name of Margail Szardos brought up Nightcrawler as a child. Margail told Nightcrawler that she foung him lying next to his dying mother and his father; Eric Wagner, who was already dead from a heart attack. Thus Margail called the boy Kurt Wagner.

But it was later found out that Kurt's real mom was Raven Darkholme - known to all as Mystique. Raven married a Bavarian Count who died late due to mysterious circumstances, after leaving his wife pregnant. The baby was immediately branded as a devil by the locals and his mother, a witch. Fearing death, Raven disguised herself as a local townsman and flung the baby off a cliff. That's when Margail Szardos found him and raised him as her own.

The Legend: Kurt Wagner grew to become a great acrobatic and the star attraction in the circus. The audience always suspected that he was wearing a mask as part of the show, not knowing that the tail and the fur was his real form. When the Taxas billionaire; Amos Jardine bought the circus, he saw Kurt only as an attraction and wanted to put him in the freak show. Naturally, Kurt refused and ran away.
But later, when Stephan, one of Margail Szardos' son's went mad and attacked the local children, Kurt rushed back to stop him. But he inadvertently killed his step-brother. The enraged locals now believed that he was the cause of their children's death and swooped down upon poor Kurt. And that's when Professor Charles Xavier intervened and saved Kurt from the mob.

A turning point in his life, Xavier persuaded Kurt to join his school for gifted youngsters - namely, The X-Men That's when Kurt Wagner took the name NightCrawler.

Nightcrawler was with the X-Men nearly from the begining. During a leave of absence, he founded the group - Excalibur when he believed that the villain, Adversary had killed the X-Men. At that time, Nightcrawler stayed in England with his friends, Rachel and Kitty.

NightCrawler's devilish appearance has often given others the wrong impression of him. Kurt is covered with a short fine indigo-colored (in other words blue) fur. He has only 3 fingers on each hand (including his thumb), he also has only 2 toes on each foot. His prehensile tail, which he often uses to grip or hold on to things with, and his pointed ears give him a devilish appearance. His eyes are a solid yellow color, devoid of any pupils.
As for his powers, they were slowly developed as time webt on, by Marvel. His most frequently used and most popular power his his teleportation facility. Kurt can teleport up to a three mile range. He must prior knowledge about the place that he is going to teleport, meaning either he has been there or he can picture the place in his head. If he doesn't know the coordinates for the jump he can unsuspectingly teleport into a solid object. The shock of appearing within a solid object would be enough to kill him. Liquid and gases simply displace to accommodate NightCrawler when he reappears from his teleportation. Kurt side steps into an alternate dimension when he teleports, so he more or less fades out of this dimension and goes to another, and then back to this one when he ports. He is mentally unaware of his brief stay in the intermidiate dimension. The smoke and burning brimstone odor is a result of the atmosphere of the alternate dimension he temporarily goes to. A small popping sound, Marvel creators dubbed by the phrase BAMF, is the air rushing in to fill the void NightCrawler has left behind.
Like a chameleon, Nightcrawler can fade away into deep shadow. While he remains invisible to the naked eye, he can be detected by heat seekers or telepaths.
Another of his frequently used powers is his ability to adhere to solid objects like Spider-Man.
Besides, these powers, Nightcrawler is also a master swordsman; a fact which also explains his attraction towards the Errol Flynn movies. He has been trained by Forge and thus is also a great fixit. Kurt also knows first-aid and runs the medilab at the X- Mansion.