Review: ‘X-Men Origins: Wolverine’ – Travis’ Thoughts

Fox should be ashamed of themselves. Once again, Fox has gone and taken a big steaming pile of pooh on the floor and now, all I want to do is just rub Fox’s nose in it and yell, “Bad Fox, Bad! You’re a baaad Fox!”

In a spirit of full disclosure, I do have to confess up front that I am a bit biased towards this movie. I was a fan of Wolverine and the X-Men growing up and read the comic books. They were a large part of my childhood. So, when I say it feels like Fox went and took a big dump on my childhood, I actually do mean it from the bottom of my heart. With that said, I will attempt to speak my mind as clearly as possible and not rest solely on my past with the subject matter. However, it does and will factor heavily into my opinion of this movie.

As for the director, part of me wants to blame Gavin Hood and place a hex on his career, but I know that Mr. Hood has fought his own battles in the making of this movie. So, I am issuing a pardon to Mr. Hood and letting him slide on this one. On the other hand, I simply cannot allow myself to forgive the suits behind this debacle.

‘X-Men Origins: Wolverine’ at it’s core is not an entirely hopeless disaster. Even if I did not actually believe that, the overwhelming majority opinion of the audience exiting the movie last night was fair to positive. Considering this, I will admit that the movie had some cool scenes. I will also emphasize that I am NOT attempting to convince readers to pass on this movie. By all means, go see the film and decide for yourselves. All I’m saying is that there’s a good chance that ‘X-Men: Wolverine’ will end up on my Ten Worst Films of 2009 list.

The movie attempts to introduce Wolverine and his origins, beginning with him and Victor Creed as children. This portion is done well enough, as is the creative montage of the two characters fighting side by side through five wars during the opening credits. At this point, I still held hope for the movie being a success. After meeting Stryker, Wolverine and Victor join a special ops team and the story rolls along fine until Wolverine decides he has no interest in the killing of innocents and walks away. This is when the film gradually starts to fall apart.

Hugh Jackman is just fine as Logan/Wolverine, maintaining the same quality interpretation of my beloved superhero. Honestly, my only “minor issue” with Wolverine himself was that it seemed his claws were much more realistic looking in the X-Men movies than they are in this movie. Well, there’s that and then I wasn’t very pleased with how they chose to portray Wolverine’s initial adjustment to his new adamantium-laced claws. Wolverine comes off as a clumsy comic relief in the scene at the elderly couple’s home while fleeing Stryker.

Oh boy, now on to the rough stuff. I won’t bore the average reader by going as deep into the Wolverine lore as I would like to, but I’ll sum it up by saying this is a minimally accurate representation of Wolverine’s past and calling this an origin story is taking a huge creative license. Wolverine’s relationship with Silver Fox was done well enough, and I have to say the relationship and chemistry between Wolverine and Victor Creed (aka Sabretooth, even though he was never once referred to as such in this movie) was extremely well done. Liv Schreiber was actually great as Sabretooth (sorry, I can’t avoid using his true name) and captured the essence of what Sabretooth was becoming.

Let me give you a bit of advice… after seeing this movie, fast forward several years and realize Sabretooth has progressively become more of the animal, thriving on and craving the killing and losing his humanity at an exponential rate. Now, hit the pause button at the moment we are [re]introduced to Sabretooth in the ‘X-Men’ movies. Make more sense now?

I am going to break the next portion of my review down into segments, each of which will focus on supporting characters:

Cyclops – Why was he in this movie? He’s a virtually helpless teenager who has zero control over his ability to generate powerful force beams from his fuzzy warbles. Actually, you will likely refer to them as “laser beams” based on how they are portrayed in this movie. It’s OK, I don’t mind. Here’s my theory of why Cyclops appears in this movie… someone REALLY liked how his eyeball lasers looked on film and wanted the “big bad villain” (explanation to come later) at the end to have those powers, but had to include Cyclops in the story for that to happen. Whallah! Otherwise, there is absolutely NO LOGICAL REASON for Cyclops to be in this movie.

Gambit – Sorry Mr. Kitsch, you gave a valiant effort in portraying Gambit for the whopping ten minutes (give or take) you had in the movie, but you didn’t cut the mustard. What little accent you had was southern at best, but you needed to find that special Cajun flair… it didn’t happen. Otherwise, I fault you no more than the filmmakers. The card-throwing scene was awesome, but I have to ask… When did Gambit develop super-human speed, strength and agility?

The Blob – I have to say it was kind of interesting that they chose to include this character and his scenes were a lot of fun, even if he had nothing to do with Wolverine’s origin. This is especially awkward, considering Wolverine “accidentally” gives Fred Dukes his super-villain name in this movie. This character, along with Wraith (played by Will.I.Am), Bolt (played by Chris Bradley) and Agent Zero (played by David North) are all welcome and actually give the movie some brief but enjoyable moments of entertainment.

Wade Wilson / Deadpool / Weapon XI – Pardon my French, but this portion of the movie is nothing short of being a thorough cluster f***! I will say that I had no problem with Ryan Reynolds as Wade Wilson, especially as a lead into Wade becoming Deadpool. In fact, he had one of the coolest scenes in the movie, showing off his abilities. However, it’s that transition into Deadpool that gets all messy and discombobulated. I’ll refrain from going into detail as not to give anything away (as if it matters), but the end result becomes absurd, confusing and just plain disturbing. Let me just say that if the potential Deadpool spin-off goes the direction this movie suggests, I will become angry… and you won’t like me when I’m angry.

Weapon XI, the “big bad villain” that Wolverine faces at the end of the film is intended to be the ultimate mutant-killer and is in no way shape or form anything even remotely resembling the true Deadpool character, despite the subtle innuendo that it is that leads to a “hidden” Easter egg suggesting this even further. In terms of character design, it’s cheeky, borderline overly CGI and is just laughable. Weapon XI is given the powers of all the other mutants that Stryker has captured for their DNA. Add to that an adamantium skeleton and healing factor like Wolverine… AND, built-in retractable katana swords that emerge from his wrists, despite the fact that these indestructible adamantium blades are longer than the forearms they emerge from, yet he has no problems with his elbow flexibility. Now, that’s a miracle of science!

This brings me to the ending. All the previous elements of the movie come together for a giant-sized ending of epic and disastrous proportions. The final battle could have been cool in concept, but the execution is just plain ridiculous. Stryker’s exit is dumb and unnecessary, but the approach to dealing with Wolverine’s memory loss is somewhat effective, despite it’s flaws. I found myself feeling the urge to walk out of the theatre by this time, but forced myself to endure the entire experience. The absolute best advice I can give anyone who wants to see this movie is to see it with a grain of salt, avoid considering this as an actual origin story and watch it simply as an action movie. Then go out and read the comic books to experience the real story in all it’s glory. Trust me, with the marketing of this movie the books are WIDELY available in trade paper (graphic novel) format at virtually every bookstore.

[Overall: 2 stars out of 5]