Am I the Only Person Not Excited About ‘The Wolverine’?

Am I the Only Person Not Excited About ‘The Wolverine’?

The Evolution of James Howlett

By Brandon Alexander

Samurai, Mutant, God

So we’re officially one week away from the release of Fox/ Marvel’s much anticipated  The Wolverine. Sadly, I don’t number myself among those who eagerly wait for the adamantium struttin’ animal to slice a foe or two; the reason? I’m just plain tired of Wolverine in nearly every medium, especially in movies.

Don’t get me wrong, Wolverine is probably the best comic book character to be adapted to the big screen. Hugh Jackman does a fantastic job of displaying the Logan we’ve come to know despite being a foot taller than his comic book counterpart.

The Wolverine we all know and love.

My lack of respect for Wolverine isn’t a recent development, since the days of X-Men the Animated Series, I always preferred the likes of Cyclops or Gambit to the brooding tough guy. But even then I didn’t dislike the character. He was done right; a great mix of depth, mysteriousness and humanity that created a character that many would grow to love.

It didn’t take long for Wolverine to become the X-Men’s star character, brushing aside many other character development so that he could have the opportunity to pop his claws.

As a kid, I remember my dad taking my brother and me to see Bryan Singer’s X-Men in theaters. X-Men was often thought of as the first superhero movie that “did it right” (not counting Christopher Reeve as Superman and Tim Burton’s Batman). X-Men propelled superhero movies into the current era that mixed story and action in a way that allowed it to transition from niche market to a broader audience.

X-Men tells the story of two colleagues with similar ideologies but drastically different methods and ways to achieve them. We learn about the Xavier Institute and it’s array of characters after Wolverine decides to go with the team. While the bulk of the film centered on the team, there was still a heavy amount of Wolverine-fueled story and development. The film did a decent job of combing subplots from the comic books with more original content and the result was an unforeseen box office hit.

“Hey, Wolverine, can I be front and center this time?”

The success eventually led to the sequel X2: X-Men United which led to the audiences first look at Wolverine’s past. This movie is regarded as the the best of the trilogy because it had a much larger budget than its predecessor and was able to utilize it efficiently without sacrificing the story.

X2 is where the story of the X-Men begins to become the “Wolverine show”. His mutant ability to heal quickly becomes almost godlike and it turns out that he’s not a bad guy at all, making him out to be a mysterious Bruce Wayne character instead of a guy trying to even out his wrongdoings. While he attempts to figure out why he is the way he is, the X-Men just follow him around and help as much as they can, as if there aren’t other mutants who need saving.

I don’t mean to be harsh on X2, it just leaves a bitter taste in my mouth a bit because it seemed during most of the movies it became less about the mutant struggle and more about a couple of characters, though Mystique does deliver a pretty awesome line to Nightcrawler.

Of course, we all remember the catastrophe that was X-Men: The Last Stand, with its over-saturation of mutants to the point of some complex characters being set up for the sake of cheesy punchlines. While a good chunk of the story focused on the emo Phoenix and the cure, there still was a bit of a heavy dose of Wolverine (although less than the previous film). This movie was made clearly to turn a profit and it shows.

With what seemed the end of the X-Men movie trilogy (curse you, George Lucas, for setting this standard for American cinema!) many people were elated when it was announced that there would be an entire animated X-Men show starring Wolverine and aptly called Wolverine and the X-Men. This show was a poorly veiled attempt to raise awareness for Wolverine’s untitled spin-off movie.

Again, the rest of the X-Men appeared as mere ghosts of their former selves. Cyclops was reduced to a depressed, manic soul; Rogue, the girl who couldn’t touch anyone, takes people’s abilities at least once an episode; Gambit, your favorite trickster’s favorite trickster can be easily be fooled by Wolverine. And with all of the blatant flaws that everyone else has, Wolverine continues to remain spotless. A troubled guy with good intentions and who rarely did anything morally questionable and popped his claws every 30 seconds.

Wolverine and the X-Men was on its way to greatness with the Age of Apocalypse story tease, but it served its purpose and was pulled from the market before anyone else took Wolverine’s shine. Wish I could have seen what that show could have become.

By this time, it seemed like the X-Men franchise had devolved into what someone called, “Wolverine and Other People with Powers”; and that is exactly what we got in Wolverine: Origins.

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While marginally better in terms of production than X-Men: The Last Stand, Origins was still a very subpar film. It used the plot of X2, Wolverine tries to escape his past by embracing it, then has to liberate a bunch of mutants from Weapon X. This time, however, the audience was able to fully indulge itself in the snarling mutant. Story continuity errors were abound in that film that would forever mark a dark day for those who loved the X-Men (There was a tease at the end of the movie featuring Wolverine in Japan).

Not long after that, X-Men: First Class was released and I breathed a sigh a relief knowing that instead of seeing Wolverine’s played out storylines, I’d be seeing Magneto’s overused origin story. I have to admit, the cameo featuring Wolverine, was probably the funniest and best I’ve ever seen. Of course, the sequel to First Class will be based on the Days of Future Past saga, so expect to see Wolverine ‘all up
in that thang’.

Now we’re up to date and that brings us to The Wolverine, the story of Wolverine’s time in Japan, at first I believed that this may be a good film, until I heard that the plot was involved Wolverine receiving a mutant cure. . . wait, you mean like X3?? That’s where I lost interest. A character with limitless potential and we have to sit through the movie with him potentially not having his powers (Iron Man 3 anyone?).

Am I saying that I won’t go see The Wolverine? Heavens, no. This is my type of movie. I’m just a little tired of being fed the same plots and characters time after time. If I wanted that, I’d watch James Bond all day. So if you want to see it, I’m not trying to discourage you, I’m just saying it’s time for Cyclops to have his own movie ;).