I Know Everybody Loves Logan, But Could We Please Finally Give 2013’s The Wolverine Its Flowers?
Everybody’s talking about Wolverine again due to the recent Deadpool & Wolverine, which we gave a pretty good review.
However, while most people lovingly bring up James Mangold’s Logan as the greatest cinematic Wolverine story ever told (and I’m not disagreeing with them), I also feel like people just ignore Mangold’s other mutant movie, 2013’s The Wolverine, which I’ve always thought to be a pretty good flick.
So, I want to rectify that, since I think The Wolverine deserves its flowers, too. Here’s why.
The Wolverine Is A Monumental Step Over Its Predecessor
I just want to preface this by saying that I haven’t watched Deadpool & Wolverine yet, so if the movie pulls an Avengers: Endgame (in which the oft-overlooked Thor: The Dark World played a pivotal role in that film’s plot), with The Wolverine, then I wouldn’t know.
That said, I do vividly remember that the original Deadpool movie mocked X-Men Origins: Wolverine, for its portrayal of Deadpool, and rightfully so, since Origins is absolutely dreadful.
However, while I feel like plenty of people talk about Origins, and most people love Logan (We even called it one of the best western movies of all time!), I’m always left wondering this question: Where’s the love for The Wolverine? For one thing, can we just talk about what a monumental step it is over its predecessor?
The Wolverine follows the events of X-Men: The Last Stand (which I also dig) with Logan heading off to Japan. Once there, he must battle with old and new foes, all while drained of his healing abilities.
It’s a huge step up from Origins. Here, we have a story that is completely centered around Logan, and the stakes couldn’t be higher, as he could genuinely die in this movie, given that his healing ability is essentially being siphoned away from him.
Yet, so many people seem to forget about this film and only focus on Origins (for how bad it is) and Logan (for how good it is). It kind of annoys me, if I’m being completely honest. This movie deserves to be acknowledged, too!
The Japanese Setting Really Works In Its Favor
I’m going to be honest with you. As much as I like the X-Men movies (Though, I much prefer X-Men ‘97), I find most of them to be pretty forgettable. It’s not that the stories are bad or anything (well, for the most part). It’s more the fact that a lot of them take place in the same settings, and they kind of all bleed together for me. For example, there are scenes from the first three X-Men movies that I mistake for one movie or the other.
Take X2: X-Men United, and The Last Stand, for instance. The other day, my friend and I got into an argument because I kept saying that Kelsey Grammer’s Beast character first appeared in X2, and he kept telling me that, no, he first appeared in The Last Stand. He was right, of course, but I could have sworn that Beast appeared in X2 (I was thinking of Nightcrawler). But, I think that’s only because those films seem so similar in their settings.
The Japanese setting in The Wolverine, though, feels extremely distinct. From bullet trains, to ninjas, to the overall aesthetic throughout, it’s completely unique in its location.
From the very beginning, where Logan is in a Japanese POW camp, the movie is so distinctly different from every X-Men movie before it (or since), that I’m genuinely surprised that so few people tend to bring this movie up, given how radically different it feels. Japan really works in its favor.
The Main Antagonist Is A Unique Choice
I mentioned earlier how this feels distinctly like a Wolverine story, and it does, even more so than Logan in a lot of ways. For example, Logan feels like a story that is also about Professor Xavier, as well as all of the X-Men of the past who are no longer alive. It was also a movie about X-23 (whose actress, Dafne Keen is all grown up), and was truly a film that was about living in the past, but also moving toward the future.
The Wolverine, however, is completely focused on Logan as a character, and that couldn’t be clearer than with its main antagonist, Silver Samurai.
Silver Samurai, who actually first appeared in a Daredevil comic, is a long-time rival of Wolverine, and appeared in the 1982 comic miniseries, Wolverine, by Chris Claremont and Frank Miller. In the film, he’s actually the man who Logan saves in the beginning of the movie, and he wants to drain Logan of his abilities. He also wields an adamantium sword, using Logan’s greatest weapon against him.
In every way, he’s a worthy antagonist, and one who I don’t feel gets nearly enough credit.
This Feels Like Its Own Side Story, Rather Than A Stepping Stone To Logan
The Wolverine is interesting in that it truly does feel like a side story. It follows the events of The Last Stand, and Wolverine is wrestling with his guilt of having to kill Jean Grey. But, from there, it feels like something completely different from all of the other X-Men movies. In fact, it kind of feels like DLC to a video game.
Some people might view that as a negative, just think of some of the best video game DLC of all time, like Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, or The Last of Us: Left Behind. Some might say these stories are just as good (if not better) than the main quests, and I feel the same way about this movie.
Logan’s story with Mariko, Yukio, Shingen, and Yashida is super fascinating, and I like that we don’t see these characters again in his other cinematic stories. They all fit into this one compact narrative, and I really love it for that purpose. Plus, it truly doesn’t feel like it connects in any way to Logan, and I like that about it, too. It’s doing its own thing.
And Honestly, The Action In This Movie Simply Kicks Ass
Lastly, the action in this movie KICKS. ASS. I love that Wolverine fights off ninjas, and hangs onto the side of a bullet train. I love that he is constantly on the move, and every fight feels like it could be his last. I also really love the battle at the end with the hulking Silver Samurai. I love everything about the fight scenes in this movie, and I definitely think they get overlooked.
That’s a shame, because Wolverine’s combat is unlike any other X-Men. We get to see an older, more tired version of him fighting in Logan, and we get the ridiculousness of him fighting in Origins, where every fight looked like a cartoon (and not in a good way). But, The Wolverine’s fight scenes are much more visceral and raw.
In fact, my two favorite fights in any Marvel movies contain trains, as there’s the one in Spider-Man 2, where Spidey fights Doc Oc, and then there’s the one in The Wolverine, where he’s fighting at full speed on a shinkansen. Add that to the fantastic fight in the snow, and you have one of the most badass superhero films ever. So, why don’t more people talk about it?
Well, I have, and I hope you will, too, because The Wolverine is freaking awesome! For more news on all things Marvel-related, be sure to swing by here often!
