Saturday, November 21, 2009

X-Men Origens Wolverine (Spoilers)

In the title, I state that there are spoilers. If I don't state it, then there are no spoilers.
Also, this was one of my first reviews from months ago and as a result, it has many grammatical errors. Please forgive.
STORY
I don't read many comic books, but since superhero movies are quite common now, I thought I should start reading up on them, and I got sucked into many of the X-Men characters, and I thought it might be interesting to see a movie about Wolverine's Origin.....It is clear that Gavin Hood did not read the same things I did. that is my first problem with this movie. It's wrong. Star Trek made the alternate reality thing work, but Wolverine just fucks up.
Problem 2: It made no sense. It has a relatively simple plot. Get revenge. Unfortunately, Even the simplest of things can be done wrong. Is it as senseless as something like Transformers? No. But when I find myself shouting at my computer screen (i mean theater screen, because i saw it in theaters, not on my computer) "Why are you doing that?!" then there is going to be a problem. I suppose the idea itself made sense, but the bad dialogue just sorta made things screwy.
Problem 3: Wolverine becomes a lumberjack.....
CHARACTERS
I should point out that this movie is subtitled Wolverine for a reason. Wolverine is the only freaking character. All it is essentially, is Wolverine going through life, and everyone around him dying...and I mean EVERYONE. Very few characters get more than 5 minutes of screen time, and only about 3 scenes do not include Wolverine. I guess it isn't that bad since it is supposed to focus on Wolverine, but still, when you set up a bunch of interesting characters only to kill them off 10 seconds later, its kinda a dick move. Also the movie is barely 90 minutes. toss in a half hour of character development in some other people.
Hugh Jackman is Wolverine is definitely one of the best things in this movie though. He does amazing things with the role, and I think he just gets screwed over by bad writing. Jackman clearly understands the character better than most, and is really dedicated to the role. Percival Ulysses Cox, forgive me, But Hugh does an amazing job.
Liev Schreiber gives a good performance as the evil half-brother of Wolverine known as "Sabertooth". He makes for a good villain, and provides good conflict with Wolverine as well as motivation for revenge. He also gets some character development but not all that much. I didn't really understand why he did evil stuff, he just sorta did....but I suppose that is the point; that he embraces being an animal whereas Wolverine tries to fight it, but sometimes takes him over (hence his revenge need).
Danny Huston is passable as Stryker, the man who starts the Weapon X program and dicks over Wolverine a couple of times. He is also the villain in X2 (played by Brian Cox). Stryker suffers the problem of many of the characters with lack of motivation and character development. He just seemed to be the guy who fucks shit up.
Weapon X team
Will i Am is not much of an actor, but its ok since he (like everyone else) doesn't have much of a role. Screen time=about 10 minutes (The most of the group).
Kevin Durand is good as the Blob, though I liked him better as Keamy on LOST. Oh well. The Blob is also the only character in the Weapon X group who doesn't die. Screen time= about 7 minutes.
Dominic Monaghan plays Bolt. i think he is a great actor but but he doesn't have much of a role. (i liked him better on LOST as well). Screen time= about 5 minutes.
Daniel Henney plays Agent Zero...he's Asian. Screen time= about 7 minutes
Ryan Reynolds plays Wade Wilson. My oh my. Of all the X-men characters I read about, Wade
Wilson/Deadpool was by far my favorite. He is like Dr. House if he was a mercenary. The character is clever, cool, and just overflowing with awesomeness....In the movie, the writing is so bad, he can't say anything funny. In the comics: he makes witty comments. In the movie: THEY SEW HIS MOUTH SHUT!. How could you be more off?! In the comics: He is an individual who follows orders from himself and others only by killing the thing they want him to kill. In the movie: He is a mindless drone who just follows orders...AND THEY SEW HIS MOUTH SHUT!. Ryan Reynolds is an amazing actor, perfect casting, great character, but they destroy everything about him! Screen time= 2 minutes
oh yeah, and Wolverine has a wife or something. Screen time= about 4 minutes.
OVERALL
This movie didn't have anything. There was practically zero substance. Sure, there was enough action to keep me amused for the same amount of time a cat is interested in a ball of yarn, but even that could have been done better. it was supposed to be a story about Wolverine but there was practically no story to tell. If you want a good origin story that has 10 characters, you need at least 2 hours. But it doesn't matter that there even was an origin because barely any of it matters. I'll tell you why. At the end, he is shot in the head with an adamentium bullet and loses his memory...AND THEY SEW DEADPOOL'S MOUTH SHUT! (right before his character gets killed of course.) All the characters get killed off too. Why?! they have stuff to do in the later years. Why are you killing these guys in the origin story. It would be like killing off the joker in the first Batman movie...point is, if you erase the memories, as well as the people in the memories, did it even need to happen. it's like that great philosophical question: If a tree falls down in the woods, and no one is there to hear it, does anyone care?! NO!
rating 3.5/10. Good Acting, cool action, but bad dialogue and story and character development.
P.S. Gambit lives and gets about 4 minutes of screen time.
P.P.S. Gambit plays for keeps.
P.P.P.S. THEY SEW DEADPOOL'S MOUTH SHUT!

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