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29.04.09 # 4:59 # Review # 8 CommentsOur official X-Men Origins: Wolverine review. Is this the end or a new beginning for the X-Men franchise?
Director: Gavin Hood
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Danny Huston, Will i Am, Taylor Kitsch, Ryan Reynolds
Hands up who’s a fan of Wolverine? Okay, most of you. Good – you can stay. Hands up who’s a fan of Gambit? Okay, just as many. This might not be the movie you’ve been waiting for but it will have to do. Hands up who’s a fan of Deadpool? Yes, you, the person with the rage in their eyes and the froth in their mouth – you may want to sit this one out buddy.
Let’s get it straight. The name of the movie is Wolverine, so that means anything that happens of relevance in the movie is for Wolverine’s sake. This is a Hugh Jackman vehicle plain and simple. There are lots of side characters in here that appear and are not given the movie treatment they richly deserve (Cyclops, Emma Frost, Gambit, Deadpool et al I’m looking at you) but frankly anything that features them is a either slight bonus or a royal two fingers up to what history has been previously established in the books.
Is this movie enjoyable? Yes in short. My favourite part is the first 20 minutes where you get to see Wolverine and Sabretooth’s pasts, growing up through and fighting in several World Wars (all during the credits) and then very quickly you are introduced to the team that William Stryker (Danny Huston) puts together in the form of Wolverine (Hugh Jackman), Sabretooth (Liev Schreiber), Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds), Wraith (will.i.am), Bolt (Dominic Monaghan) and Agent X (Daniel Henney). The team is then sent to Nigeria beat up some random bad guys (probably to prevent credit card fraud scams) in a series of very cool sequences that displays their talents. What caught my eye was how we get to see Reynolds at his best being a smart-mouth and at the same time kicking a lot of ass in the space of 3 minutes – I’ve never really followed the Deadpool character at all and was immediately enchanted. Shame what happens to him the end, eh? Which co-incides with the last 10 minutes being the least enjoyable for me.
Anyway, it was nice to see that the movie had made way for the violence that goes with characters being shish-kebabed and others being brutally killed, especially when you compare it to the kid-friendly first X-Men movie. More blood would’ve been better though. Several times Wolverine’s bone blades are shown graphically penetrating people yet no blood appears when retracted. WOW, I just realised how much double-entendre is within that sentence.
Moving on. Gambit as played by Taylor Kitsch is almost good although he doesn’t really attempt a cajun accent so no “mon cher”s or mention of his “momma’s gumbo”. In fact, there’s not much difference between the character he plays on the Friday Night Lights TV series and Gambit, except the exploding cards and lightning rods he uses of course. The movie allude to the love-hate relationship between him and Wolverine, which was a nice nod to the fans and could easily develop in movie sequels. Special mention should go to Liev Schreiber though who is entirely watchable and makes the Sabretooth character work in his own way. Forget the rabid, hairy, neanderthal-like version that we are accustomed to in the comics, his is a sharp, devious and enjoyably evil iteration that deserves recognition in its own right.
Oh yeah, there’s a romantic plotline in there as well for Wolverine but I won’t bore you with the details. Wolverine has a lot of ladies in his storyline and this one doesn’t really stand up to Jean Grey or even his Japanese escapades. The action set-pieces are quite awesome, but you can’t help but feel being put off by some of the ropey CGI. Sometimes, Wolverine’s claws don’t look real for one and THAT is a major problem considering it’s such an iconic feature of his persona.
*** MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD ***
The ending let me down a bit, especially the way they treat the Deadpool character – they basically deform Ryan Reynolds to have no hair or mouth. Then suddenly he has giant blades sticking out of his fists, can teleport and shoot optic blasts from his eyes a la Cyclops and he’s the final bad guy. WTH – seriously, such a letdown as his character started so well! There was talk of a Deadpool movie before this and it would have worked with Reynolds as the main man – then they went and cut his head off. Great.
Having done some research – apparently, Deadpool can survive decapitations. Yippee!
Revenge!
*** SPOILERS END ***
Our Rating: B-
Leave your own X-Men Origins: Wolverine review in the comments.
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gambit did have a cajun accent, not as heavy as The animated series but still noticeable and good.
Well I’ve also seen the movie and I also saw the leaked version. Because i saw the leaked version I thought i owed it to one of my favorite comic book characters a chance to shine with all of its intended scenes and affects. With that said I really didn’t see much of a difference from the leaked version. Jackman as Wolverine is always awesome I love him as Wolverine but for the rest of the cast played their characters well I must say I enjoyed their performances, especially Ryan Renolds and of course Hugh Jackman’s. Now for the bad, script was bad I felt that script was not true to the characters ( although the attempts were made at points) and its plot was full of holes that left me uninterested, fights scenes were all right, effects sub par, and of course Deadpool at the end being totally wrong to the point that i wanted to walk out. Yes I know that when a movie based on a book or comic there are changes but dam, really do you need to move that far to the point that fans are throwing poop at it but i digress. in the end i give this movie a C- (I’m a teacher I’m allowed to grade). This movie is not intended for comic book fans this is just more for general audience so I know they will like i wish they didn’t but you know they will just like many liked X3 which was mind numbing bad. I hate Fox
i was a fan of wolverine a long time ago but lately i have been put off by him. The one thing that i really liked about him was that he had main character possibilities and storylines but he was the guy in the background. Always with the ruggid guy schtick and quick to serve a beating attitude. Now he is seen to be invincible and the leader of the pack. man i loved to see him brawl and trade hits with other comic entities where in some cases he’d get laid out . i always felt it added to his character. This movie for me was a huuuuuge disappointment. it went from a “hey im gonna take my girlfriend to see this” to a ” im not even gonna waste my money on this one”. the first parts of the movie are really good but at the moment where victor creed runs like a dog with obvious string attached my interest was lost . i must admit deadpool was really cool at first, reynolds was a good choice, but how they turned him in to that ooooh man . i wont buy this movie or rent it or see in theatre at all even cheap seats because i dont want to support this kind of movie making.
Ok, decent movie, but:(Spoilers)
*I missed Gambit’s cajun accent. And I always pictured him as older and cuter….
*When Wolverine’s lover tells him the story of the animal howling at the moon….um, wolverines don’t howl. That would be wolves. She must have gotten confused!
*Seriously, how can you kill Dominic Monaghan! That’s hobbit-cide!!
*I agree with the review that Stryker was kind of blah. And also, Deadpool at the end is seriously freaky. Nightmares galore.
*In the Wolverine-Origins graphic novel – which is awesome, go out now buy it and read it – he lives with a wolf pack for a while and hunts with them. this SO should have been in the movie.
On the positive side, yes we get to see Wolverine naked, and he and Sabretooth are seriously hot. And Gambit is pretty cool. Great fight sequences.
Yep middle america shlock directly to our movie theatres.
Good ol’ mainstream demands defiling the sanctity of our traditional stories.
Goes back as far as Disney stealing old European folk stories and making them as white bread as possible for mainstream America.
Ok so this is Hollywood…. Never read a wolverine comic so they said, “ hmmm, wolverine? That’s kind of like werewolf lets use silver bullets… no, no, no, adamantium bullets it’ll make the fanboys go carazy”
Seriously I have no problem with the bullet to the head losing memory thing, the concept is a little contrived but I’ll roll with it, if it wasn’t done with a frakkin SIXSHOOTER!!!!
I mean seriously the stopping power of a sixshooter is laughable, and using a stronger metal for the bullet then the housing will warp the cartridge irreparably after the first bullet, and let me not even get into how much gun powder would be necessary for a bullet that dense to reasonably leave the chamber…
The story was awful, the cg was bad, and the action was reasonably okay once in a while but it wasn’t great, and some of the story was just painful, I mean painful. Mind you I have not even said anything about deadpool. I loved ryan Reynolds for the 10 seconds he’s in the movie, and that’s pretty much all I liked. Im not gonna even bother with the continuity gaps, or comic to movie translations, or that heather Hudson wasn’t a 60 year old woman yadda yadda yadda. I can appreciate a movie for its stand alone artistic value, but I cant justify that movie. I liked blade 1 and 2- if u read the comic, it’s a 180 to its origin but still great movies that I watch over and over, iron man was incredible, and pretty close to the story. The incredible hulk, the second attempt was fantastic. I still like the dolph lundgren punisher no matter how dated and horrible, so please don’t think im just a fanboy who is nitpicking on a film cause the writers took a little creative license, believe me if that were the case this would be a heeeelllllll of a lot longer.
Some last things….
-white queen is silverfox’s sister????
-wtf was up with the cg professor (its giving me nightmares!)
-Thanks Hollywood, because most adolescent boys want to see hugh jackmans ass!
-last but not least, since all 3 xmen movies were all about wolverine, and this travesty is about… wolverine, can we focus on a couple of other characters in the next film??? I don’t know, its just a suggestion considering each xman has about 25 to 40 years of backstory to draw from….(yeah im exaggerating)
btw they greenlit wolverine in japan….why???
I would rate this movie an 8 out of 10. Simply because the CG for wolverine’s claws was rediculous! They looked much more realistic in the previous X-men movies, why couldn’t they have done that again? Also, wolverine’s girlfriend, Kayla said two lines that bugged me. I wish she knew that wolverines didn’t howl at the moon; everyone else knows that. And when she told striker to “Keep walking till your feet bleed, and keep walking after that.” I know that they shouldn’t have killed him, but c’mon… that’s all you got??
*** MAJOR SPOILER ***
omfg deadpool is awesome i was devistated when they killed him