As an X-Men movie fan, it was hard not to worry about “The Wolverine.” With its Japanese setting being radically different than not just the other X-Men films but most other superhero films in general, the fact we didn’t get our first trailer until a few months before the movie was released while big superhero movies like this usually get some sort of teaser sometimes a year before they are released (and no trailer can sometimes mean the studio isn’t too confident in their picture), and, finally, because the last Wolverine movie, “X-Men Origins: Wolverine”, was a very mediocre film. The trailers were fine and all for “The Wolverine” but nothing had me dying to see the film. So, I didn’t exactly go into the movie with high expectations. Thankfully, I came out loving it. “The Wolverine” is definitely one of the biggest surprises of the year.
“The Wolverine” follows the events of “X-Men: The Last Stand.” Logan/Wolverine retreats to the Canadian wilderness following the (second) death of Jean Grey and the end of the X-Men team. A woman named Yukio finds Logan after being sent there by Yashida, a soldier that Logan saved in 1945 from the Nagasaki bombing who is now the CEO of a technology company. Yashida is dying of cancer and offers Logan the chance to transplant his power of immortality to Yashida. And, well, the movie kind of goes on from there.
Almost immediately, this movie is a breath of fresh air due to the Japanese settings. One of my worries of the film turned out to be one of the highlights of the film. It was interesting seeing a superhero movie in this environment and the filmmakers did a great job of not overdoing it with the Japanese culture but still having enough of it. This breath of fresh air along with the great story make “The Wolverine” stand out from other superhero movies.
As for the story, it is leaps better then that of “Origins: Wolverine.” It’s interesting, it continues the story from the previous movies (I’m pretty damn sick of reboots, remakes, and prequels), and it sets “The Wolverine” up perfectly for “X-Men: Days of Future Past” which opens not even a year from now. My only gripe with the story is that it has some unnecessary characters which didn’t add too much to the story and it kind of got a little too predictable toward the end. Other then that, I loved the story to this movie.
The standout in this movie isn’t the story or the action, it’s the development of Logan. Hugh Jackman gives his best Wolverine performance here and the writers of this movie did an excellent job of continuing this poor character’s story. The supporting cast on the other hand, is where I have some issues. A good chunk of the supporting characters are forgettable. It’s not too much the performances that’s the problem but the story didn’t need a few of them and the ones that were necessary did nothing for me. Viper was a character I was interested in but she was completely wasted in this movie and added nothing at all to the story.
The action, on the other hand, is pretty awesome. These fights were a lot of fun with the train fight and the Silver Samurai fight being the standouts (mainly that train fight which was fantastic in every possible way). The special effects were great in this movie. Every time Wolverine slashes someone or every time some poor assassin faces a brutal death (either by Wolverine or someone/something else), I just had a huge smile on my face. This isn’t Pacific Rim or “The Avengers” level of excellency, but it’s some pretty fun action with only the train fight being the unnecessary one (but that fight was one of the best parts of the movie so I can’t complain).
I did not see the movie in 3D.
THE VERDICT
“The Wolverine” was awesome. It had great character moments for Logan and some pretty fun action scenes. This movie was also a breath of fresh air since it’s so different then most other superhero movies you might see. Most characters were either unnecessary or wasted and the story lost a bit of its greatness during the final act, but that doesn’t stop “The Wolverine” from being the great superhero movie it is.
IS THERE A POST CREDITS SCENE?
Yes, in the middle of the credits. Not one after the entire credits sequence.
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