I'm not that guy anymore

James Howlett has had a hard life, it is obvious he is old but in his waning years all he wants to do is drive his limo and collect his pay. Unfortunately his nap is cut short by a few young hoodlums trying to steal his tires. He stumbles out of his car, and tries to ask the men to leave the car alone that they are just going to strip the chrome lugs somebody pulls out a shotgun and shoots the goofy looking old man.

Now NORMALLY that would be all she wrote, but surprisingly the old man stumbles to his feet and asks the young men to stop again. Well if we can't shoot him, let's beat him up. And that, my dear friends, is where they messed up because that shaggy bearded, weird haircut having old man used to go by ANOTHER name there are a pair of dog tags sitting somewhere that say Wolverine. And while the song warns you about tugging on Superman's cape it should also have a verse about pissing off the canuckle head. While baseball bats are weirdly clanging off of his flesh and bones a visceral growl can be heard and out of nowhere a slow sickening *schlikt* can be heard. Adamantium claws are loosed from their sheaths and men are sliced into like butter. One looses a leg, another an arm, and the survivors run from the crazed beast who appeared out of some beaten down old bum.

James then gets into his cab and drives to pick up his riders for the evening, some old Gambler, Some young men partying out on the town, a bachelorette party, and in the morning a funeral. While he stands away from the mourners a woman runs up and calls him by that OTHER name, Wolverine. He doesn't know her and goes back to his latest fare, telling the patron "I don't know who that crazy lady is, she confused me for someone else." Later on, while sitting in front of a hospital a strange blonde headed man hops into his car to ask him some interesting questions and calls him by yet another name:

Logan


The truth about Logan is simple it is a take on a Marvel storyline called Old Man Logan, there have been many imaginings of the ending of the Wolverine: how he dies, how much aging he will do before he dies, and what will become of Marvel's Ultimate Alpha Male. Of course Fox doesn't own the rights to all of the characters involved in THAT story and they wish to give Hugh Jackman a decent send off while still leaving room to continue on with various mutant franchises. Things I will give them points for, introducing X-23 in the movie of course she is most likely the 23rd experiment whether it be the 23rd experiment with wolverine's genes or the 23rd over all we aren't really sure. In the comics it was a play on the fact that they could only get half of wolverines chromosomes to work in the cloning process and then matched that up with a woman to which they were able to create a little girl, Laura. I will also give them points for coming up with a Scientific reason for Laura to have foot claws, they compared her to a lioness the front claws are for hunting and the rear for protecting.

There is also a fair amount of "No More Mutants" mixed into the story, now no they don't have a big fight between Scarlett Witch and her father Magneto where when the world has be remade into an image he might like she is disappointed in her father harming her brother. To which with her reality altering powers she utters the words "No more mutants" and another mutant is not born on earth for a number of years. They give into some light conspiracy theorism but I will let you watch the movie to find that. This is obviously a torch passing movie, there is no doubt about it you have the old dog and the young pup both and different points in their journey.

Laura has been raised in a testing facility, at her young age she already has her adamantium claws, her healing factor reminds you of the Logan of old, and her ferocity is almost unmatched. As you can see in the trailer yes she looks small and innocent, but once she pops the claws out even a muscle bound man may find himself missing a few limbs. Her guardian is the one who tracked Logan down at the funeral and somehow gets Laura into Wolverines custody. They are on a mad dash to Eden some wonderland where supposedly mutants MIGHT be safe. Logan is not alone in his old age, he lives with Caliban a mutant who can detect other mutants, though he is allergic to sunlight. And Charles Xavier, unfortunately Charles is not his old self. He is not as sharp as he once was, some sort of neurological disease which in the world most powerful psychic can be a problem. Laura is being chased by some bad men from the original testing facility(and they are actually from the comics, and have history with Caliban) thing is if it ain easy to take down and old and sickly wolverine what are you gonna do with two. One sick and one young and enthusiastic? I would say run but what do I know.

NEXT

While the movie is good, I think they missed a lot of opportunities to make deeper statements as well as develop an aging Wolverine and his reaction to finding out that he FINALLY has a child(sort of) which in the comics was always a big deal for Wolverine, he never had a family. Initially he couldn't remember them and then he never seemed to be able to have any.  There is also a healing factor rule that they sort of ignore, hell it was even in Days of Future Past like I said I get that this was a torch passing movie, but there is a lot of retcon in them thar hills. You will enjoy most of the ride as Logan tries to basically convince Laura NOT to become just like him because all of those he loves will get hurt eventually. And as he tends to outlive everyone anyway, there is a lot of pain to follow as you watch those you love and train with wither away. The Climax is anything but, cheapened by the fact that you sit in the theater saying umm so what that ain enough to do the trick. Even the big bad is a tease, I mean you know who you want him to be but you also know that isn't who he is, as a matter of fact the entire premise of him is kind of blah if you watched Age of Apocalypse we have been down this road and while it was cool looking we didn't like it. I understand that this movie was set up during the end of Age of Apocalypse but they did such a lousy job with it. Is it making money, yes. Is it the SECOND BEST X-men Franchise movie? Hell Yes, Deadpool is still the best by miles and leagues.

Sometimes it is better to leave a question about a thing than there is to do a thing, especially when what you are doing takes a lot more set up than you have had time to create. Eikichi complained that they did way more telling than showing, which is true. They also seem to have a fetish for whining to the comic books fans while at the same time trying to coerce them into liking their movie because it is FINALLY a rated R Wolverine film(which it's about damn time). It always made no sense for the guy who had claws that could cut through ANYTHING to not live a string of loosely attached bodies. Yes you kind of want to have a FAMILY MOVIE but the guy is "the best he is and what he does, and what he does ain good." He's an assassin, a Samurai, a gladiator better suited for olden times when the sword, might, and muscle ruled. Oh sure you can shoot him, problem is bullets just piss him off. Logan has a lot of great stunts in it, plenty of explosions, and so decent CQC. That Laura is socially awkward and thus constantly annoying Logan with her judging eyes, she could POSSIBLY be having conversations with Charles for most of the car ride which of course SUCKS because who needs the crotchety guy younger than you constantly judging you to what amounts to your kid/reincarnation.

While it is PARTIALLY presented as a coming of age movie, and also a buddy/road trip movie it really is about torch passing. Fox is supposedly working on the new mutants so this is there lead up to that. Of course Deadpool 2 is coming out in 2018 and yes I talked about the teaser in my previous blog. There was no after credits scene attached to Logan which was weird, does that mean Fox is back at the drawing board unsure of where to go next, are they at the breaking point and thinking of doing a deal similar to Sony's with Marvel(one can only hope). I think most people will enjoy this film as a good send off to Hugh Jackman our first on screen Wolverine, they may just be looking for a little more meat when the credits roll

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