X-Men Origins: Wolverine-review

he character of Wolverine has always been a hard sell for yours truly. As a comic book superhero, Wolverine has always been one of the more overrated in Marvel Comics in spite of his rabid following. Wolverine's progression from this tier villain to top tier superhero has been nothing short of remarkable, so when he received his own spin off that unfolds to tell his story once and for all, I was quite confused. The entire "X-Men" film franchise have already been nothing more than vehicles for the Wolverine with the X-Men taking nothing more than a supporting status to what he can do on screen. We've already had three Wolverine films, did we really need to see another with the furry one front and center? Yes and no. The approach here is basically the approach to Singer's films. Focus on the man and take as little time as possible to tell the story of other characters.
With "Wolverine" we're given the whole kit and caboodle of Wolverine's lifetime and like Captain America he's the super soldier who managed to progress in to the modern world due to secrets, discoveries, and a clandestine government privy to keeping the whole truth in the back burner which is what's covered in all three of the "X-Men" sequels. Though not the first time Wolverine's origin was approached, "X-Men Origins" gives the man's life a good try worth watching. It's imperfect as a production but it manages to make good on most of its promises action wise and it's still fun watching Jackman reprise his role as Wolverine once again to take the character by the throats. Jackman never fails to give a great performance of the raging Canadian beast whose own life is a menagerie of lies and deceit from almost everyone he's ever met.

There's also Liev Schreiber who is fantastic as Logan's brother Sabretooth, a man very loyal to whom ever is willing to allow him to kill and mame. Danny Huston plays a perfect William Stryker, while folks like Ryan Reynolds and Taylor Kitsch get their moments to shine, respectively. Though out of his element, Schreiber's performance is a high point as he conveys a giddy evil and sadism that can only work with a psychotic force of nature like Sabretooth. With that, "Wolverine" punches in some killer action scenes and ace choreography that make the experience worthwhile in the end. There's also a wonderful climax that incidentally parallels the film and adds a reason for the appearance of certain characters. Gavin Hood and co. go to great lengths to connect this story to that of which we saw in "X-Men" and it's pretty stunning that they make it work wonders as compliment to the storyline.

What do we get with this "origin"? Well we learn very little and this is supposed to be who Logan aka Wolverine was in his past. What were his experiences as a teenager, what were the difficulties with his parents that the film barely scratches the surface of? And mostly, why are we told it's his origin when we get very little. We know h e was very sick as a kid, killed his real father, was close to his big brother and basically fought in all the wars. And this is what we get in the first ten minutes. The rest is based around a basically cliché and awfully vague storyline that could possibly have been written all on one page. Any chances of getting to know the deep down Wolverine and his experiences in his life are side stepped immensely just to squeeze in enough time to pass off fight scene after fight scene all with no real bearing on where the movie is going. The pay off is really just the fight sequences and the story is sadly just an after thought through all one hundred minutes of it.

We never get a sense of the brotherly bond he and Victor Creed had as children and young adults and we never understand when or why they drifted apart. The explanation makes the entire script feel incomplete and rather than just admitting it's a Wolverine movie we're given the fallacy that this is all about where Wolverine came from. They don't even chronicle his battles in all of the wars and instead opt for a montage that only breezes through their journeys for a few minutes at a time. There are also a lot of scenes where the movie takes bigger elements from other stories and injects them in to this. For example, who would have guess an old farming couple would stumble upon a naked Logan in their barn? Can anyone say Superman? That's really only the tip of the iceberg for what's essentially a clunky telling of Wolverine's "origin."

It has a clunky pace, derivative story elements and plot holes that are never explained, but through it all it comes up almost fresh as a fun near guilty pleasure that feeds the appetites of X-Men and Wolverine buffs. Hey, it won't win any awards but it does the trick.