Review of X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) by Connor S — 15 Nov 2013

Being new to the X-Men universe, I've read a ton of negative hate on the film I'm about to review, X-Men spinoff X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which has been considered by many to be the worst X-Men film ever made. So naturally, I started watching this film with extremely low expectations, and in the end, while I admit that this is the weakest X-Men film I've witnessed thus far, I actually liked this film. I admit it. I kind of liked it. It's definitely not a Marvel masterpiece, but I had some fun watching this.

After he unintentionally kills off his own father, Logan (Hugh Jackman) and his half-brother Victor, who would later be known in X1 as Sabretooth (Live Schrieber), team up together in protection. After serving in every war up to Vietnam, the two mutants are approached by Colonel William Stryker (Danny Huston) to join a team of government mutants, but Logan, disillusioned by war, leaves the group and retreats to Canada and falls in love with the lovely schoolteacher Kayla Silverfox (Lynn Collins). When Victor kills Kayla, Logan, in a mad rage, returns to Stryker and becomes a part of an experiment where his body is exposed to the metal adamatium, making him become the famed mutant known as Wolverine. When Stryker and Victor decide to eliminate Logan once and for all, Logan/Wolverine reunites with old mutant friends to put an end to Stryker's madness, which includes Stryker creating a deadly mutant assassin called Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds).

The film also stars Daniel Henney as Agent Zero, william as teleporter John Wraith, Taylor Kitsch as card-obsessed mutant Gambit, Kevin Durand as The Blob, Dominic Monaghan as electricity-controlled mutant Chris Bradley, and Tim Pocook as a younger Cyclops.

Were there problems with this film? Yes, quite a bit of them. The plot was dull and flat in places, particularly when Logan is hiding in Canada, other plot portions were rushed, especially Logan's family tree in the beginning (I still don't know why Wolverine and Sabretooth are brothers in the first place), there's poor character development in the supporting mutants (which was a problem in The Last Stand as well), and there was a ton of poor acting skills here. But in the end, I mostly enjoyed the ride, and I was entertained with the final product.

Obviously Hugh Jackman was already excellent as Wolverine, but here, he's still awesome as Wolverine. I actually didn't believe this film was actually necessary, cause portions of his origin stories were explained already in the flawless X2, but like his complex role in X2, Jackman manages to be emotionally complex while letting loose and having complete fun with this role. Jackman continues to lead some impressive action sequences, such as him taking down a helicopter and his climatic fight with Deadpool at the end. Liev Schreiber is awesome here as Victor/Sabretooth. Schreiber was more fun in the role than what's his name in X1. Finally Sabretooth manages to have a menacing appearance while being cool at the same time. Jackman and Schreiber have some fun little face-off here and there throughout the film that's pretty enjoyable, though I'm still confused on how they are siblings in the first place. While Jackman and Schreiber are excellent in their roles. the rest of the acting goes a little downhill. Danny Huston was miscast as Stryker. It would have made more sense had they brought Brian Cox back to do the role, cause he nailed the role in X2, but no, Marvel decided to recast the character to make him look younger, when it would have been easier to use digital technology on Cox to make him look younger. Not only did Huston lack the intense nature of the character, but he acted poorly and did not do the role justice. Lynn Collins was dull as Kayla, Wolverine's love interest. She was bland and could not handle emotions really well, especially when it comes to revealing plot twists. Ryan Reynolds, like his terrible performance in Green Lantern, while he had cool action stuff, was annoying as Deadpool, though when he becomes a mute mutant assassin in the end, Reynolds is pretty cool, though I wished he had a ton more development on how he became an assassin. Maybe Marvel can make a Deadpool movie. Anyway, william was completely terrible as the teleporting mutant and was an embarrassment to the film itself (honestly I have no clue why he decided to become an actor anyway). Taylor Kitsch, while he has a cool character as Gambit, was also dull, bland, and underused in his role. But I did like Tim Bocook as the younger Cyclops (I actually thought it was James Marsden at first). Though he had poor development, I was impressed that Marvel brought the character back after the lame treatment they did to him in Last Stand.

While the pacing was sometimes dull and rushed in other places, I will say the action sequences were pretty fun. Scenes include a unique title sequence showing Wolverine and Sabretooth fighting from The Civil War to Vietnam, several face-offs between Wolverine and Sabretooth, Wolverine being chased by a helicopter on a chopper and takes it down (I think haters will likely admit that scene was awesome), and the finale between Wolverine and Deadpool. The visuals might not be strong in places (I'm looking at Wolverine tearing apart a ladder with Gambit on it), but most of it was fairly strong, particularly mutant powers and the helicopter explosion.

And last, Harry Gregson-Williams, a talented and underrated composer, provides the score here, and surprisingly, it's phenomenal. In lackluster places of the film, it's William's score that makes it all worthwhile. The helicopter action scene features a stellar cue with some very unique instrumentation that still sends chills even when reviewing. Out of all the X-Men films I've watched, this film may be the weakest, but William's score here is the best. How ironic!

Yeah this is the worst film in the X-Men universe so far, due to some poor character development on cool supporting characters, poor acting (especially william, Danny Huston, Ryan Reynolds, and Lynn Collins), but Hugh Jackman and Liev Schreiber's fun chemistry, enjoyable action sequences, and a stellar Harry Gregson-Williams score made me actually kinda sorta like this film. It's certainly not a Marvel masterpiece (including X2), but it's definitely not the mess I've heard about this underappreciated spinoff.