X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) Review

X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)

X-Men Origins: Wolverine follows James Howlett, who, after walking away from Team X, settles down with the love of his life. After her murder at the hands of his brother however, he undergoes an experimental transformation in order to enact his revenge. 

I feel like this is a conclusion I keep running into as I occasionally rewatch older Marvel movies that were previously thought bad, but guys, Origins is not nearly as bad as you might remember it. Are there a lot of issues? God yes. Namely in the way it completely butchers the pre-established timeline of the X-Men movies, while thoroughly missing the point of who Wolverine is as a character. For me though, it’s a matter of “did I come out of this movie enjoying myself”? And the answer is, absolutely! How can you not?? We get a popcorn-y, blockbuster about one of the best characters in all of X-Men, and not only that, but he fucking annihilates everyone and everything along the way. 

The story, admittedly, is pretty weak, trying to squeeze in a lot of needless backstory and conflict by way of Team X and the mutant experiments that would give way to “Deadpool”, but there’s also some good, with an interesting through-line of revenge that focuses on his brother, Victor, and his past with Stryker. We also get a litany of classic X-Men characters like Gambit, Blob, Cyclops, Emma Frost, and even Deadpool (even if they did sew his fucking mouth shut), and while they all weren’t executed perfectly, it was still a treat to see. 

We get a interesting cast as well, starring Tim Pocock, Kevin Durand, Lynn Collins, will.i.am, Ryan Reynolds, Taylor Kitsch, Danny Huston, Liev Schreiber, and Hugh Jackman. Jackman, as always, plays Wolverine to perfection, with an added tenacity that is aided by en equally animalistic Schreiber opposite him, that really gives the film more legs than it deserves, especially after a lacking performance from Huston, who is sadly nowhere close to the excellence of Brian Cox in X2. 

X-Men Origins: Wolverine, directed by Gavin Hood, has always been a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine, simply being one of those flicks that is weak on most every front, and yet, it’s impossible to deny just how fun of a ride it is, to just sit back and turn the brain off for a few hours. 

7/10