Movie Review: The Wolverine

The Wolverine is another pointless standalone sequel with an all too familiar, straightforward and predictable plot.The Wolverine is slightly better compared to X-Men Origins: Wolverine in terms of plot but suffers by a series of unrealistic plot contrivances.Most of the supporting characters are given little or no character development throughout the film, they're just simply there for the sake of story progression.

There's nothing wrong with Hugh Jackman's performance as Wolverine, he showed his dedication ('Wolverine gym workout') and delivered his best portrayal of the character throughout the X-Men series. The problems lies on the script and the character himself. Although the film is loosely based on the 1982 Wolverine comic set in Japan, but is he a compelling character enough to earn 2 spin-offs in the film franchise? One of the best things about X-Men is the idea of taking all of these 'weird, damaged' individual characters and building them into a team, watch how they face and solve issues inherent to teamwork. In a group, these individuals can complement one another in terms of power, weakness and personality, as shown in X-Men: First Class.

The film never takes time to explore the temporary physical vulnerability experienced by Logan...how he feels and deals with the sudden change of his immortality. There's no solid motive or reason why Logan need to stay or remain in Japan. He can choose to leave anytime he wants during the earlier stages of the film, instead he chose to stay to protect someone he barely even know or care about. Furthermore, the relationship between Mariko and Logan feels forced and doesn't seem credible or real, they just barely know each other and the lack of on-screen chemistry between the lead actors makes it even worst.The film briefly mentioned about family honour, respect and love, but one would question about Mariko's action near the end of the 3rd act of the film.

Another issue that begs to question: In X-Men Origins: Wolverine, we learned that he lost his memory; in X2, he's finds back his past and how he becomes who he is now. However, how Wolverine seems to vividly remember the events of Nagasaki WWII?

The action scenes didn't offer anything new (most of them done before by previous X-Men movies) and I'm probably one of the few who doesn't find the 300mph bullet train fight scene exhilarating or cool at all.

The highlight of the film seems to be the mid-credit scene that might excite a lot of X-Men fans, foreshadowing what is going to happen for the next X-Men movie - Days of Future Past.A lot of questions raised as to why and how it happened, a good scene to pique the audience interest about what to come next year.

Recent superhero movies of the decade such as The Avengers and The Dark Knight Trilogy have showed us that superhero films can be something more...and what The Wolverine delivers simply isn't enough anymore. In my opinion, X-Men: First Class is still the best (in terms of character development, story flow, acting, plot) in the X-Men film series.


Rating: 6.5/10