Yes you heard that right, “Logan” the movie is Hugh Jackman’s last stand as Wolverine and he went out with a bang. Hugh Jackman has been playing the role of Wolverine for over 17 years, 17 years wow that’s crazy, just let that sink in. Who do you know has played a longer character other than probably Tom Cruise as Ethan Hunt in mission impossible. From the moment Rogue saw Wolverine fighting in the cage match in the first X-men movie, we could not have asked for a better person to play this gritty, non heroic character who surprisingly is probably one of the most heroic when it comes down to backing the people he loves and cares for. We saw the transformation of Wolverine throughout the years of his trials and tribulations and Logan shows first hand how old age, and hardship of fighting and losing your friends can take a toll on the body.
There has been so many speculations over these last few months about would the movie be good, will we see flashbacks of the suit, all this stuff then Rotten Tomatoes hit with a 96 percent score for the movie. People lost their minds counting Rotten Tomatoes as the natural score all things good and also with an R rating many people were completely sold from hearing these few things and from the trailers that were released. I for one was extremely excited for many reasons, but I will share the first reason before I get further into this review. I am a huge Wolverine fan, and I saw the movie was coming out March 3rd no big deal right, but my birthday is March 5th, so that made me so happy like what are the odds one of my comic book characters comes out the weekend of my birthday.
We first encounter Wolverine what looks like he appears to be drunk in the back of a car, and his rims are getting stolen, Logan doesn’t want to hurt the gang of men trying to steal his rims. As they classically shoot Logan which the audience knows by now this isn’t going to end well for these men. As Logan regains consciousness and heals we see the group of men are shocked, but not how it was a few years ago when we first saw Wolverine get shot and people looked like they almost pissed in their pants. We see that people are used to Mutants at this time period, but still shocked because of how someone can even still survive let alone live from a gun shot. At this point sitting in the theater, you’re thinking it’s a wrap for these guys, but we see a twist of Logan getting stomped out, until we see he’s thinking to himself like am I really getting beat up by these guys kind of face. Starting the movie off with a thundering slashing sequence. I myself have not read the Old man Logan comics, but I kind of already had an understanding of what was happening to Wolverine and why he started to age more.
We soon learn that Logan is a limo driver in the year 2029, and something’s still haven’t changed from Prom to driving the big shots, to bachelorette parties. We also learn that Mutants are almost nowhere to be found anymore and very few are still living. The movie doesn’t fully go into what happened to all of the mutants, but there are many speculations after the movie, and also Professor X touches on it a little later in the movie if you can catch it. When Logan returns to where he has been staying we a mysterious character by the name of Caliban who Logan has been staying with, and a mysterious person who both of them have been taking care. Turns out the man they have been taking care of is Professor X who is completely delirious and you can tell he is also beating himself up from losing everyone . The Professor is also having seizures at random times which makes his mind control powers go high wire if not treated fast, I think maybe this is part of his old age but more so post traumatic stress from the mutant war. Might I add Professor X was extremely funny and amazing in this movie provided a bit of comic relief at times.
Now many people already know the villain of the movie is The Reavers, but I have to commend Boyd Holbrook who plays Donald Pierce but as most of us know him from the hit show Narcos. Boyd did an amazing job in this movie at times I would get upset like damn can they shake this dude, but honestly I loved how Boyd put his own spin on this character and was constantly persistent with trying to catch this young girl by the name of Laura. Boyd truly made you feel how vicious Donald was and how much he wanted to capture these mutants, and that he would try to get them at any cost. The Reavers were always one step behind Logan and professor or either right on their heels. We got to see the full depth of the Reavers when they found where this new breed of mutant was hiding.
Laura aka X-23 what can I say oh my god she was amazing that little was such a monster and was taking no prisoners. The scenes in the trailers do not do her justice for how badass she was in this film. I truly hope Marvel keeps up with this young actress and follow her and keep her in mind for another X-men movie or at least another Wolverine kind of film. Like every scene Laura had was just crazy, for example all her scenes when the Reavers tried to capture were great especially when she ran back in the building, and the end fight scene was just epic. I love that they gave her , her foot claw, if you have ever seen pictures of X-23 or even read the comics you know that she has very distinct claws. I also love that she spoke Spanish, so this would further diversify Marvel if they ever decided to go further with an X-23 film.
Logan, Laura and Professor X all trying to escape from the Reavers, I loved the hotel scene; where Logan finds out Laura has been reading X-men comics. That scene itself reminded me of the TV show “Heroes” how Isaac drew the comics and everything actually happened how it did in the comics, and I love when movies or shows do that and kind of relate back to the original origin of the stories or a minor piece that seemed to irrelevant in comic book movies for years. I love the hotel scene for many reasons Professor X and Laura are watching the movie “Shane” and surprisingly I was randomly thinking about that movie without even knowing it was apart of the movie. And I also loved when Laura and Logan save the professor and how the professor was controlling everyone.
Logan truly gives you that this is Wolverine’s last stand, I don’t know if it’s because of how much the commercials and advertisements played it that way, but also in the film you saw how Logan didn’t want to fight anymore, but if he had to he would still kick your ass. He was much older, and not like himself drinking so much, you could tell Logan just wanted it to be the end and to be over at least finally be at peace with his grievances and bring along the one person who helped him in life. Watching this film made you feel emotional because you were truly watching the end of something that most of us were there for the start of. This isn’t to say that Marvel will stop making X-men movies or Wolverine movies, but you knew that this was the last time you would see Hugh Jackman playing this role.
I am not going to lie this is a long film, and there’s some where you can feel the length of the film, but the ending of Logan is well worth it, like the ending is so epic how fast pace it moves, and just the rawness of how Logan and Laura are fighting. We also get to see some younger mutants who are just like Laura not with the same abilities, but different ones, and I truly hope they do a movie with Laura and these other kids when they’re older because it would be just great especially with what these kids could do. The ending of Logan was just badass, nostalgic, any kind of metaphor for excellent you can think of that’s the ending for this movie. Every single sequence you’re just on the edge of your seat how determined Logan is to finish this battle.
Ultimately I was very satisfied with this movie, I won’t say I didn’t have high expectations for this movie, I just didn’t like how the other Wolverine movies were constructed like they had great ideas and concepts, but they just didn’t come out right on film for me. But with Logan they hit all marks, and made you want more from the film. This film gave us a good story, but you also wanted to know more specifics on like what happened to all of the X-men, and why did they never really let Professor X fully go in depth. As a fan you also kind of wish they showed flashbacks in the film because all of the movies are connected in a way, it’s just Wolverine’s story was on a different kind of timeline but still went along with everyone. I think the R rating also helped this film, I say that to say not because of Deadpool, but it gave this movie an opportunity to kind of really show the nature of wolverine and how dangerous his claws are and how it would really look if something like this did go down. I think once I started to hear everything that was going to be in this movie, and also Hugh was giving us huge but subtle teasers on his social media. Almost every other week there was a new image that had the internet buzzing.
As a huge Wolverine fan I absolutely am so happy Hugh Jackman was casted as Wolverine and stuck with and didn’t just let someone else take it and he owned it. I am just upset that his movies didn’t do him justice until this last film. Let me back track my statement the second wolverine movie was actually pretty good and I had to wonder why people didn’t like it as much. I do agree with fans I do wish we could’ve seen Wolverine in the classic outfit, but I have been seeing a lot of fan art or fan adaption of him in full armor I don’t think he would’ve went the full armor route. I think if Hugh Jackman had a say he would’ve went with the short sleeve maybe brown and black look. By Hugh not wearing the costume I think that kind of added to his take on the character that this is the Wolverine that doesn’t do costumes and wants you to see who he is. Logan was an excellent movie and very well done definitely exceeded my expectations and made me hopeful of not more R rated films, but more comic book films that go in depth and hit all cylinders. Thank you Hugh Jackman
Riceball Rating: 9/10
RiceBall 