[THE CHALK-OUTLINE]
X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009): Breakdown by Rantbo
Wolverine gets his fourth movie following his adventures of screaming at and beating up various other Mutant cameos.
[THE EXECUTION]
In an attempt to hold onto the rights for their dismally bad movie franchise, FOX has released yet another X-Men oriented movie for the droves of comicbook movie apologists and tweenagers to get hyperactive over. This time around, Wolverine does the previously unthinkable and manages to actually get EVEN MORE screen time than in any of the previous films AND his name officially in the title, thus giving them the perfect reason to not feature any other actors on the main poster. Which is pretty impressive.
We follow his confusing origin story in a surprisingly well edited opening credits sequence that zooms us past a hundred or so years of his life in 3 minutes, successfully montaging out all the interesting events of the century (the Civil War, WWI, WWII, ‘Nam—Yet oddly not the Korean war) to get to the good stuff, which is presumably the late-70s early 80s 3 Mile Island “Meltdown” cover-up. Though you won’t be able to tell the time period, as everything from the technology to the clothes are circa 2008. So, you regrettably won’t get to see Logan in a bar kicking the shit out of coke-sniffing yuppies to the beat of Hungry Like The Wolf. The missed opportunities of this story are astounding. Anyways, Wolverine basically does all that crap you saw in the trailer, only it’s drawn out to involve a love story no one cares about, as we all know it never pans out and deliver a couple of more special effects shots of him fighting a hairy-faced Cotton Weary, that were previously un-released on bootleg. You’ll see Wolverine kill his dad, fall in love, get laced with adamantium and lose his memory. You’ll laugh, you’ll look at your watch, you’ll be pissed you wasted 2 hours of perfectly good masturbation time.
The Shit I Liked:
Hugh Jackman.
Not as Wolverine, mind, but as a guy that clearly gives a shit about his work. I truly believe he does love this character and for that, I commend him. It’s just that my ideal Logan is a 5’3″ burly redneck Canadian, not a 6’2 ½” lean hunk-of-beef Australian. In short, Jackman is just too god damned handsome.
Next, I liked the pretty blonde girl’s diamond encrusted rack. I’m not sure who she was, but she seems to have a similar ability to Emma Frost, The White Queen. Only she can’t be her, as in the movie the girl is sister to a Canadian Blackfoot woman named Silverfox. And Emma is not related to any such person. Plus, this girl turns her skin into a bunch of wedding ring nuggets and not a solid sheet. But, whoever this unoriginal nameless lass’s cameo was supposed to be, is besides the point of her stupendous and shiny jugs that bounce around, even though her skin is supposed to be one of the hardest substances on earth.
Gambit. Ever since I heard about the possibility of there being an X-Men movie, I’ve wanted to see this character brought to life. And while the actor playing him couldn’t perform the accent, looked like the lead singer of a screamo band and was given powers I never remember him having (since when has Gambit been able to change kinetic energy into confetti and glitter?), I still have to say, it was nice to see him almost be treated with a small degree of respect. Which is more than I can say for every other character I liked that these films have portrayed.
The Shit I Didn’t: a.k.a. Everything Else. Get ready for some free floating hostility…
Here is your mission, should you choose to accept it: find a piece of promotional art featuring Wolverine from any of the movies that don’t show his dumbass claws sticking out. And no fair editing.
Even the title annoys me. Wolverine wasn’t enough? Seriously? Marketing his ass to children and fan boys is all these films have ever been about, so why all the bullshit? The X-Men aren’t even fucking formed yet. A young Cyclops and Patrick Stewart’s goofy CG Head make an appearance, but in no way does this warrant putting X-MEN in the title. X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE is all you need. I can only imagine that this must have to do with FOX holding on to the movie rights by using the licensed word in the title, as if I didn’t hate them enough already after LIVE FREE and AVP.
Does every super-hero movie need a god damn wise old man speech? What the Hell kind of life lessons do the screenwriters think Logan has left to learn? For Christ sakes, he’s a hundred and fucking forty+… He IS the old man. No advice needed, he’ll figure shit out on his own and if he can’t, fuck him, all he needs to do is kill things and the monkey’s will clap.
For a movie centering on massively violent times, places and situations, the film severs it’s own nutsack with how pussified it has to remain to stay a soccer-mom friendly PG-13. Practically all the action revolves around Wolverine and Sabertooth cutting people with their claws, yet the only blood I remember seeing is the stuff they used to stage a death. There wasn’t even any blood on the blades after they pull them out of people…
The bad guys are dumb. Example: They send their best agent after Wolverine the day after he escapes to get slaughtered in an explosion and literally THE next scene starts out with this…
“Zero never stood a chance. The only thing that’ll take him [Wolverine, duh] down is an adamantium bullet.”
Um, why the fuck didn’t they have this revelation in a precautionary pre-op sit down BEFORE they decided to spend half a billion dollars to create an unstoppable killing machine!? Let alone before they sent out their best shooter to be turned into human jello-mix? The gun and bullets were already made, so SOMEBODY in charge HAD to know this! I ask, is this just piss-poor writing, or are these villains supposed to be this stupid?
Deadpool = Ruined. Scott Adkins (UNDISPUTED II, THE SHEPHERD) plays the role for the second half of the movie, yet rather than showcase his natural powers and prowess, they give his character a teleportation ability, thus rendering his moves pointless and unimpressive. It takes skill to fuck up Adkins’ mojo, but they found a way.
They try, futilely, FUTILELY! they try to make this movie light-hearted with a bunch of elbow-nudging jokes every time a situation gets halfway serious. And while Sabertooth is certainly the worst perpetrator, Wolverine is hardy any better. He’s cracking fat jokes, pulling the middle-claw f-you move from part one and then there’s this nonsense…
This movie is clown shoes.
I could keep going, but this piece is getting long, so it’s time to wrap up. As the tally would suggest, this film falls way below-average on my badass-barometer. However, I am sure that when they make another one, I’ll pay to see it. If for nothing else, so I can find out how they explain William Stryker suddenly becoming Scottish and Sabertooth’s lobotomy and foot and a half growth spurt into Michael Myers. Seriously, bring it on. If they manage to write their way outta this corner and not come off looking like jack-asses, I’ll be genuinely impressed.
[HOW BAD-ASS IS THE MAIN CHARACTER?]
Huge Jack-Man is James Jimmy Logan Wolverine Weapon X Jr. The Third
“You look like a man fixin’ to do a bad thing.”
Wolverine is arguably (barely) the most grossly overrated character in comic history, and soon to be, if not already, super-hero movie history. When can we stop collectively sucking his dick? He came two decades ago, it’s over. Time to grab a washcloth, limp home, put on some band-aids and cry ourselves to sleep already. And I liked this character!—it was in 1992, but he was cool for a while. So, I can understand little kids thinking he’s still awesome, but guys in their twenties should have moved on to badasser-pastures by now. Like the Punisher. Five million opening weekend for WAR ZONE… WTF? American men need to get their priorities in check, but quick before future generation’s balls start evolving away at birth.
Like I said above, I dig what Hugh was trying to do here, but it’s too little too goofy. The humor and soft-core edge these movies require to wrangle in the kiddies has duct taped the character’s penis to his leg and no amount of healing power will grow back the skin lost should he ever pop a boner and unrestrain himself. Wolverine is a lost cause, but I knew this years ago. So, I can’t say I’m surprised that their idea of badass is having him walk away from an explosion in slow-mo, or wire fighting with a CG version of the long-haired boy-whore from THE COVENANT.
They only thing they seemed to do right was his normal day-to-day appearance. Logan wears leather, has mutton-chops, smokes stogies and rides an indestructible motorcycle. Also, he works for a portion of the movie as a Canadian lumberjack (the ONLY truly badass thing he does, IMO).
Powers:
-Has CG claws, that look like they were originally designed for WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT.
-Has a healing factor (God Mode Code Entered)
-Can fly around as if on a magical wire-pulley system. This, however, is apparently not too special, as everyone in the movie is able to this, mutants AND humans.
-And apparently he has the power to look 40 years old forever, as he has since the American Civil War in 1865… Fuck it, why not? Let’s role the dice again and see if he can cast some elemental spells for part five.
[THE BODY COUNT: 40ish 60*]
*According to a frequent poster of ours, gregg. Sounds about 20 too high to me, but I trust him.
Now, forty sixty SOUNDS awesome, but when you see it executed, it’s really just a big old mess. The kills are mostly done in sloppy wide-angle CG (big surprise) effects shots, featuring split second cuts of faceless men falling down or being engulfed in flame. And several scenes’ continuities are messed with in what I believe to be a psuedo-clever trick to make the audience THINK they saw more. For instance, the sequence in which Van Wilder runs into an office room with his windmill blade trick, the establishing shot clearly features at LEAST 16 men. Once inside, you see him take down about 7 and 2 are later shown to be hiding behind a desk. This leaves another 7 unaccounted for. Where the fuck did they go? I’m guessing to a movie with some balls.
Anyways, Wolverine kills something like 10 men. Sabertooth, 6. And the rest are offed by the supporting cast in the sloppy manner in which I described above. There are a couple novelty kills, but truthfully, I’m hard pressed to think of one, just one day after having watched it. And since [SPOILER] Scott Adkins’s death is revealed to be, not one [END] I won’t bother to rack my brain.
[MOST SATISFYING DEATH]
Little Old Lady
“I brought you some orang…”—PWTCHU!-PWTCHU-DEAD!
[DUDESWEAT AND MACHISMO]
The wife-beater, the painted on wranglers, the giant belt-buckle, the mutton-chops—the cigars. Wolverine is so macho that he forgoes manly, slices through gay and lands back on manly again.
Other than the so-manly-it’s-gay feral machismo emanating from Wolverine’s facial hair and biceps, there isn’t much else I can think of. Scott Adkins/Van Wilder does appear at the end, shirtless except for body paint, but they fucked up his mug with a Peter North sized pop-shot of make-up, rendering him hideous and pleasing to no man.
[EXPLOITATION AND MISOGYNY]
Not really. Diamond-Jugs is held in captivity to blackmail the other chick into tricking Wolverine into feeling emotions… But a bunch of men are captive as well, so the bad guys are equal opportunity enslavers.
However, two of the three woman in the picture die from gunshot wounds, so that says something. Sadly, just not enough to break-apart into something profoundly anti-woman or even mildly entertaining to write on about. Sorry, I tried.
[EPIC MOMENT AND BEST ONE-LINER]
My favorite moment is still when that little old lady got popped. I laughed out loud and had to rewind the scene. I knew that the bad guys were going to show up, but I did not expect it RIGHT at that moment. They blast her poor ass in the middle of offering a just happy-again Logan a glass of OJ and, bless her heart, it takes two slugs to bring her down. Thud. I haven’t laughed at an old person’s expense like this since RED DRAGON when Ralph Fiennes punched out that museum curator and ate a priceless painting.
Charlie From LOST: “I’m not afraid of you Victor. I’m not afraid of dying…”
Mr. Tooth: “How do you know?—You’ve never tried it before. ~GrrrOwl!~”
Charlie From LOST: “AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHgrrrrrHHHHHHH!”
[THE MORAL OF THE STORY]
Wolverine was more interesting when he had no past. And apparently motorcycles are impervious to explosions, crashes and 50 caliber armor piercing bullets while Wolverine is riding them. I don’t think Darwin himself could have predicted this level of human evolution.
[THE CHECKLIST: 19 outta 25]
[X] Athlete(s) Turned “Actor” [Scott Adkins]
[X] Clinging To The Outside Of A Moving Vehicle
[ ] Crotch Attack
[X] Dialogue Telling Us How Bad-Ass The Main Character(s) Is/Are
[ ] Ending Featuring An Ambulance, A Blanket or A Towel
[X] Factory/Warehouse
[X] Giant Explosion(s)
[X] Heavy Artillery
[X] Improvised Weapon(s)
[X] Macho Mode(s) Of Transportation
[ ] Main Character Sports Facial Accessory(s)
[X] Manly Embrace(s)
[X] Notorious Stunt-Man Sighting [Scott Adkins]
[X] Passage(s) Of Time Via Montage
[X] Politically Fueled Plot Point(s)
[X] Senseless Destruction Of Property
[X] Shoot Out(s) and/or Sword Fight(s)
[X] Slow-Motion Finishing Move(s)/Death(s)
[X] Stupid Authoritative Figure(s)
[X] Substance Usage and/or Abuse
[ ] Tis The Season
[ ] Torture Sequence(s)
[ ] Unnecessary Sequel
[X] Vehicle Chase(s)
[X] Vigilante Justice
