Yes, I know. I’m being negative. I do have a right to be, though. Like many guys my age who grew up on comics, Wolverine was the first really cool comic character to enter our lives. If you are a DC guy, you have no idea what I am talking about, but if not then you totally understand. Wolverine was an outcast and loner prone to fits of uncontrollable rage. If that doesn’t sound like adolescence, I don’t know what does.
Introduced in the Incredible Hulk as a trash-talking government agent, the character was fleshed out in the pages of the X-Men where he joined the international cast of unlikely heroes who slowly but surely took over the modern comic book scene and remain a best-selling title in the industry. Starring in three films to date the musical theater actor Hugh Jackman has made every fanboy happy with the most inspired performance of a comic book character that they had ever seen.
So why am I upset, you ask?
Now he has his own movie entitled X-Men Origins: Wolverine (catchy, huh?), a movie that promises to fill in all of the gaps left empty in the X-Men movies. This in itself is a weird idea given that Wolverine practically took over the X-Men movie franchise demoting anyone who is not Patrick Stewart to a supporting actor role. So where is the need for this film to be made? I have no idea.
The most recent trailer insinuates that it will crib ideas from both Origin and Weapon X, two comics that in themselves are over-rated and shed little light on the actual character of Wolverine and spend more time on filling in continuity. The big problem, however, comes from the scenes in the trailer that show Logan willingly accepting his place in the Weapon X program, to the point that he even chooses his cool code name.
HUH???
Didn’t this guy whine and moan his way through three movies about fighting his nature and hunting down the shadowy government agency that experimented on him? Now you are telling me that he was once okay with all of this? I’m never one to throw so much negativity on a glimpse of a completed movie, but this is a bad idea and misses the point of the character entirely.
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The last problem I will bring up is the ‘cast of thousands’ that strut across the screen. Everyone from Deadpool to Gambit to the White Queen is in this thing and none of them have anything to do with Wolverine’s origin. And who, I ask you is the teleporting cowboy in trailer called ‘John Wraith’??? For some reason the role was important enough to cast will.i.am. in his acting debut, but I have no clue who this is. The rumor that both Gambit and Deadpool spin-offs are in the works just adds to the hurt.
I like Wolverine… a lot… and I wouldn’t mind seeing Jackman return to the character but if the latest trailer is anything to go by, it will make X-Men: The Last Stand look like X2: X-Men United. X-Men Origins: Wolverine looks like a train wreck of a film.
I hope that I am wrong and this is just a very poor trailer, but until then I’ll just avert my eyes and wait for the madness to end.
2/18/09 UPDATE:
After seeing the newest trailer that focuses more on Logan’s origin and less on his rowdy friends… I’m almost genuinely excited about this movie.
