It is not very often that an actor gets to end an epic run for a character on a high note. It happens even less that it ends after 17 years of doing said same character. However, that is exactly how Australian born Hugh Jackman ended his run as the legendary WOLVERINE from the X-MEN franchise. The 48 year old actor first appeared as the foul mouthed, cigar smoking, beer drinking antihero way back in 2000. He has long been considered one of the more interesting and box office worthy big screen X-Men which was proven by his three solo movie spin-offs.
However, THIS one, LOGAN was by far, the crown jewel to not only The Wolverine movies but ALL of the X-Men movies combined! I think before I go into my review,I should explain how they managed to bring about such a masterpiece. This movie is a mash-up of several MARVEL comics boiled down to its most essential parts. The night Wolverine was tricked by MYSTERIO into killing every single X-Man in the mansion. Then he wandered into the woods and tried to commit suicide by having a train run over his skull.
Didn't work. He just derailed the trained. F'BEEPin’ adamantium! He then swore never to pop his claws again. Now that spins off into an entire different series for
OLD MAN LOGAN where he sticks to that promise until a family of HULKS kill his family just because. Then he goes on a bloody f'BEEP'in spectacular killing spree. The introduction into Laura is very well thought as well. The video of them being trained and evidence of not only how they were treated but experimented on was enough. You DEFINITELY believed they could have some of Logan's DNA laying around somewhere. This is kinda cool.
I don't have to worry about giving too much away because I was like the only person on the planet not to see this in theaters. Now that I have given a little of the comic book background, let's get into the movie, eh? LOGAN revolves around the two remaining X-Men and at this time, Mutants known to man. Logan (Hugh Jackman), Charles Xavier (Sir Patrick Stewart) and Caliban (Stephen Merchant) are hiding out on the Mexican border. Logan is tending to Professor X who is suffering from Alzheimer's which can be deadly for anyone nearby because even without Cerebo, he can still kill people by accident. Which is is due to episodes he has unless he takes meds that Logan gets for him.
They are simply a couple of guys who have lived through and seen some real sh'BEEP! They are both mentally, emotionally and physically beat to sh'BEEP! Logan's healing factor seems to be going away and his adamantium claws are so labored, that he has to pull them to get them to come out all the way anymore. There has been debate online about why his healing factor is not working the way it used to. The most simple way of explaining it is like a car battery.
When you get a new car, the battery starts it, works like a champ. Now after years of heat and cold, the radio and phone chargers, leaving the lights on and whatever, it tends to wear down. Until you need jump and eventually, it dies. The same thing with his healing factor. He has lived an incredibly long and violent life (Some people say that he could be nearly 200 years old! There's no way of telling exactly because until now, his healing factor healed all of his pains that would come with old age.).
However now, wear and tear and time, has caught up with him. To make matter worse, when they illegally experimented on him, no one had any clue about the long term affects of having metal bones in your body. Now that his healing factor is wearing down, Logan's body is feeling ALL of those adverse effects. Enter X-23. Ain't it always a woman to come along and add more fuckery to your already fucked up life? Laura (Dafne Keen) is X-23. A little girl that was experimented on, much like Logan, at an illegal lab in Mexico.
She was smuggled out by a woman who treated her like her daughter and managed to track down Logan. Are you wondering why she's called X-23? She's the only one out of 23 attempts to survive the procedure! Ain't THAT f'Beep'ed up. When she arrives, Logan absolutely wants NOTHING to do with her but, Charles sees her as a chance for redemption. A chance for Mutant kind to live on.
Of course she is being pursed by Donald Pierce (Boyd Holbrook). A security contractor with the laboratory that conducted the experiments. He is tasked with bringing the little girl back who is seen basically as property. I think I should warn all you pussies out there who think comic book based movies are “Too violent”. This, much like DEADPOOL ain't for you.
This is Logan at his lowest point, his most bloody and violent. If you allow your kid to see this movie, you're a terrible parent! (Didn't I say that about Deadpool too?) The fight scenes are f'BEEP'in’ bloody and wonderful. Still, watching Logan, Charles and Laura become what they all had lost a FAMILY, is touching. The end nearly made my black heart tear up a little.
To end a 17 year, career defining run on THIS note, aint too shabby.
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