For the record: I don't want this movie to fail. In fact, it is doing gang-buster business everywhere. At a production cost of 150 million dollars it has already passed the 200 million dollar mark worldwide. Its success is assured and I'm gratified because, even though this movie is crappy, I want the brand to survive long enough for some good films to be made in the future. That's what I hope for and nothing that I write here is meant to discourage movie ticket purchases, which is fine since no one ever reads this blog anyway and there is absolutely no chance that anything on this site could impact a major blockbuster film. Still, it's my blog and I can feel self important if I like...and I like.
Okay, Comic book canon regarding the characters in this movie.
Wolverine: Originally Wolverine was just some Canadian agent with some gloves that had sharp bits glued on. There was no indication that he was even a mutant. The claws were never retracted, nor was there any dialogue or panel which revealed that they were anything more than pig-stickers that he slipped on before a fight. He wore a goofy-looking yellow and blue costume (which he still wears, by the way, because that makes total sense) that had little cat whiskers on the mask. Yes, he wears a mask even though his identity is of no consequence. He's not protecting those he loves. He's not scared the government will learn his true alter-ego. He works for the government and they know exactly who he is...up to a point and, frankly, nobody cares who he is because he just showed up for one issue of Hulk. That's Wolverine's intro. No real name, no back story, no significance of any kind.
Sometime later the character is introduced again in X-men, written by Chris Claremont. Suddenly he's a shadowy man without a past named Logan. He's got a healing ability that allows him to...heal. Come to think of it, I have that ability. Just the other day I cut myself shaving and within a few minutes the bleeding had stopped and a few hours after that the wound was virtually gone. A few days later it was as though I had never sliced my face open at all. I guess what I'm getting at is that Logan's power is to do what any other human can do...only somewhat faster.
In addition Wolverine has had metal grafted to his bones and metal claws pop out of either forearm. It is never suggested that this is part of his mutation. No one knows where he got these upgrades and no one really seems interested in finding out, least of all Logan. I'll have to say that if I woke up with unbreakable metal bones and blades popping out of my body I wouldn't give it a second thought. So, Logan is a freak and he doesn't care. Later, his metal bones are given an origin story of their own called Weapon X. This one off series explained that he was experimented on by a person or persons unknown to make him into a killing machine. They are surprised when he starts killing everyone. Mental Note: If I ever design a device or process that has a specific application, I will make sure that I don't just leave it lying around to be used by whomever whenever. I'm careful that way.
Later still Wolverine got retconned into a Canadian from the 1800's with bone claws that he did not have in the Weapon X story. Suddenly his half-brother is Sabertooth, who also has claws of a sort. This unmakes established Marvel comics stories from the 1980's and 1990's that showed Logan in ancient Japan or running with the Indian tribes pre-colonization. But, as we have established, I don't really care about that.
Sabertooth: Sabertooth first shows up in the pages of the Amazing Spider-man as a part-time bank robber/full-time dork. He is literally just a big guy in a lion costume who robs people and gets his butt kicked by Spider-man. That's it. No mutation, no powers, no interesting history.
After a fashion he shows up as a mutant with healing powers who menaces Wolverine now and again. Later there seems to be a father/son relationship there. Then there's not. Then there is again. Then they get a house in the village together and open a tea shop. Then they break up vowing to see other people but still be friends because, after all, life is about relationships and connections that can last forever. That last part is made up...I think.
General Stryker: This guy doesn't exist in the comic world. There is a collection of X-Men stories called God Loves Man Kills that feature a Reverend Stryker who hates mutants, but otherwise this guy is a total movie construct created for the plot of X-men 2. There is no back story to alter because he never existed before Bryan Singer's brilliant sequel.
All of the above is to show that I both know my comic book history and that I do not care. That's an important element of comic book movie viewing. The average comic has about 40 years of history behind it. There have been so many contradictory stories and wackadoo plot lines that no modern screenwriter could be expected to take them all into account nor would we want them to. At one point Batman was turned into a half-man half-fish creature. I don't want to see that. Superman once had a "Power Suit" and was made of electricity for some reason. That movie would suck.
It is the job of a screen writer to take the best parts of a character from another medium and place them into a new configuration that makes sense for the big screen. Honor the work that has come before, certainly, but don't feel constrained by it. Most of it really does suck. Now then, to the movie review.
Wolverine is a stupid movie because it simply refuses to make sense or follow a logical progression of events. Going into such a movie one is asked to accept certain truths in order for the story to be told at all. If you've given your 8 bucks for a movie called Wolverine it can only be because you already understand that he is a mutant that can heal, has metal claws and wild hair that is never explained. That is a given. As a fan of comics and a movie goer, I don't ask much of such a film, only that it have some kind of story that I can understand. I want them to show me the character of my choice in a new tale that unfolds in an entertaining way. As weird as the concept is for the Wolverine movie, the same basic rules of storytelling apply. If things happen for no reason: that is bad. If characters say things out of context and never explain them: that is bad. If the plot involves completely unlikely scenarios that are never commented on by the characters: that, too, is bad. To-wit, therefore, Wolverine is bad.
We start with a young James Logan (James Howlett for you comic book nerds) who is sick in bed. It is the 1800's in Canada, James' father is killed by the groundskeeper which causes James to fly into a rage despite his sickly condition. He sprouts bone claws from each hand and promptly runs the groundskeeper through. His mother is horrified, the groundskeeper is eviscerated, and James' friend Victor (Dog, for those of you who read Origin by Joe Quesada, Paul Jenkins, and Bill Jemas) seems indifferent. Turns out that the groundskeeper was James' real father and that Victor is his half-brother. Both Victor and James run off into the night swearing to stick together as brothers should. And stick together they do through the entire opening credit sequence. They fight in the revolutionary war, the American Civil War, World War 1, World War 2, Korea, and end up in Vietnam where they are executed by firing squad...only it doesn't take.
This brings us to our first storytelling hiccup. Two men are taken before a firing squad. They are shot many times and do not die. The result? The two men are put in the brig. Apparently the U.S. Government doesn't know what to do with two unkillable soldiers in the middle of a war that is going badly. So, General Stryker shows up and offers them work as secret agents with special privileges. Given their situation, they accept the offer and immediately find themselves on an airplane with several other strange agents who possess various powers. There's a guy who can run really fast and shoot things while flipping through the air. We'll call him John Woo. Then there's a guy in a cowboy hat who we will call Cowboy Hat. Then there's Wade Wilson, played by that guy who was in Van Wilder and is currently in Scarlett Johansson (HEY-O!), who is some kind of sword master. We can tell this because he has a sword.
Their first mission is to go to an African nation and attack an office building. There's armed guards and such outside so it must be full of bad guys. I mean, they are Black and they do have guns. If I've learned nothing else from Hollywood it is that Black guys with guns are bad. Now, Cowboy Hat is Black and he has a gun, but he's with a group of White guys and an Asian guy so he must be okay. Anyway, they lay siege to the building fighting their way to the top floor where they ask some guy about a paper weight he has on his desk. Why they couldn't make an appointment, I don't know. But Stryker must know about the paper weight, so everybody has to die right now.
Soon they find themselves torturing villagers in the jungle. James doesn't like this and tries to put a stop to it, but the others are bound and determined to shoot unarmed people. James cares about them so much that he just leaves them all to die. Later he gets a job as a lumberjack. We flash forward seven years and James has a girlfriend, a house on a mountain impossibly far from town and good, honest work cutting down trees. Also, he enjoys buttered scones for tea and pressing wild flowers. Whether or not he wishes he'd been a girlie like his dear Mama is unconfirmed at this time.
Soon they find themselves torturing villagers in the jungle. James doesn't like this and tries to put a stop to it, but the others are bound and determined to shoot unarmed people. James cares about them so much that he just leaves them all to die. Later he gets a job as a lumberjack. We flash forward seven years and James has a girlfriend, a house on a mountain impossibly far from town and good, honest work cutting down trees. Also, he enjoys buttered scones for tea and pressing wild flowers. Whether or not he wishes he'd been a girlie like his dear Mama is unconfirmed at this time.
So, James and girlfriend live in sin on a mountain happily until General Stryker shows up to warn James about Victor. Seems Victor has gone crazy...er and is on the hunt for former group members. Imagine if David Lee Roth was hunting down former members of that band he was in during the 80's. Not Van Halen, but the other one that had that song that was on that album. You know, he wore goofy tribal face paint in the video. Anyway, it's like that, but with mutants.
No reason is ever given for this hunt, which only seems to effect two of the former team members, but James doesn't seem too worried about things. And why would he be? It's only his psychotic brother who has grown into a murder factory with the same powers James has. What's to fear? Certainly not his own bloody murder or that of his woman at the hands of Victor. Let that be a warning, ladies. If your man is unconcerned about the serial killer at work in your town...you are doomed. Don't take a shower, don't go for a jog alone, don't even go into the basement. You're done like dinner.
Victor kills James' girlfriend. Surprise, surprise. In his rage, James goes after Victor who is helpfully waiting in a bar for him. They fight, Victor stomps James and leaves him for...mildly injured. That's another problem with the film. They keep showing Wolverine in peril that is by no means peril. The guy can literally heal any wound, so what could be scary about a gun shot or a good old fashioned ass-whoopin'?
Now James wants revenge...even more...so he seeks out Stryker who offers to put him into the Weapon X program that will make him indestructible and give him metal claws instead of gooney old bone claws. He accepts, is taken to a secret lab and made into a killing machine. All of that is fine, I guess, but the set isn't anything like the one they showed in three other X-men movies nor is it located in the same underground base. This one is at the top of a mountain and seems quite small. The other was a sprawling compound underneath a giant dam at Alkali lake. The whole second half of X-men 2 takes place there. Suddenly that's all out the window.
Long story already too long, Wolverine escapes the lab, leaps to freedom down a huge water fall and stumbles naked onto a farm where he befriends an old couple, destroys their bathroom and hides out in the barn. Then there is some more fighting with government agents who want Weapon X back, a helicopter explodes and then later Wolverine is in Las Vegas or Reno or something. He jumps around a lot. Cowboy Hat and another team member from the old days, we'll call him Fat Guy, run a boxing school. Wolverine shows up and demands to know where Victor is. You see, he can't find Victor, who wants to be found, but he can track down obscure people from his past just fine.
Fat Guy turns him on to a mutant from New Orleans who escaped from Victor previously, oh and Victor and Stryker were working together to entire time in an attempt to make James mad so that he would undergo the Weapon X process thereby becoming a walking abattoir who could then go forth and kill Victor. It's the perfect plan, really.
So it's off to New Orleans where this mutant named Gambit has adopted the philosophy of "Hide in Plain Sight" because Wolverine just walks into the first bar he comes to and there the guy is playing cards. Clearly Victor and Stryker don't want him back because all they would have to do is go pick him up at their leisure. Why they never look for him in the exact place they caught him the first time is anybody's guess.
Wolverine questions Gambit about the secret location where mutants are being held. Oh yeah, did I mention that mutants from all over the world are being held hostage...because they are. And it's up to our man/animal Wolverine to stop it. Victor appears and Wolverine and he fight it out, but just before Wolverine can serve up the Coup De Gras, Gambit leaps into the fray long enough for Victor to vanish in a puff of plot contrivance. Then Gambit runs up a fire escape but not before Wolverine can start chopping it apart with this claws. I guess Gambit is a slow runner because it takes Wolverine a while to get that thing chopped up.
After all that, Gambit agrees to fly Wolverine to "The Island" to save the mutants. Not only is Gambit a certified pilot, but he has his own plane standing by. What luck! And they fly across the country in a little Cesna until they arrive at...Three Mile Island. Dun Dun DUN! Soylent Green is People!
Wolverine enters the base to confront Stryker and Sabertooth only to find that his girlfriend was never dead. Apparently those heightened senses that make him such a good tracker can't tell a dead person from a living one. Anywho, she's in a on the plot that we explored before. Seems Stryker has her sister and the only way to get her free from this mutant prison was to go and live with Wolverine for seven years and make him fall in love with her only to later pretend to die. That's some plan. Stryker is obviously the most patient man in the known universe. He knew all those years ago that he would want to use Wolverine for the Weapon X project and that the only way he could get Wolverine to agree to it would be to break his little mutant heart and have his older brother beat him up. But wait, there's more. Turns out that he didn't even really care about the Weapon X project, he just wanted Wolverine's DNA so that he could make Weapon XI. Dun Dun DUN again!
Now you and I both know that you can get DNA from a coffee cup or a hair brush. There is no need to dunk a man in a mineral bath and fill him with metal in order to replicate his cells. DNA is everywhere. For some reason, unknown to the audience and unknown to the screenwriter, Stryker felt the need to make things far more complicated. And there may be good reason for that. Maybe in comic book world DNA works differently than I think it does. In fact, I'll say that it must because Stryker is later seen injecting tissue from Cyclops into Weapon XI's eyes in an effort to give him laser vision and it works. The final act of the film involves Wolverine fighting Weapon XI, who has been given the powers of all the other mutants via osmosis, on top of one of the cooling towers at Three Mile Island. Turns out that the partial meltdown that happened in 1979 was actually the result of mutant combat and not a faulty steam valve. Not only that, but the combat destroyed the entire cooling tower and wasted a large portion of the power plant itself. You and I don't remember that happening because the mutants must have used their psycho powers on us.
"Wolverine" ends with a defeated Weapon XI plunging into the cooling tower as it crumbles and Stryker resigning to shoot Wolverine in the head with a special Adamantium bullet. You see, if you have a very hard armor it can only be penetrated by something of equal density. For example if you shot a steel bullet at steel plate it would easily puncture it. That's how matter works. Need to break through a wooden door? Why, just grab yourself a little piece of wood and smash that door down. Yes sir, when you thought this movie couldn't make less sense, it finds a way. It is persistent in its quest to suck, like a Terminator or a virus.
Stryker shoots our hero in the head, thus destroying his memories or something. Gambit flies away. The trapped mutants are saved by Professor X at the last minute and Wolverine wanders off to find out who he is.
You see, it is a terrible movie...a stupid movie. It establishes rules and then doesn't play by them. Like a toddler it wants its own way even if that way is unreasonable or foolish. Characters appear, do something and then are gone again without explanation. The schemes of our villain don't make sense to anyone not confined to a state mental institution. The resolution isn't even a resolution because everyone just sort of wanders off. Characters that were established as not knowing each other in previous films spend time together in this one. Sabertooth, a seven foot tall monster with wild hair and a mouth full of sharp teeth in the first film, is around 6 foot 2 with a buzz cut in this one. While I feel you can change things between media, comics to film, you can't change established scenarios and characters in the same film series. Imagine if the Godfather Part 2 had all new actors with different personalities but the same character names as the first film. All the action happens in Chicago and nobody seems to notice. Later Don Vito Corleone shows up after having died, but nobody freaks out. That's how Wolverine is. It violates comic book canon...so what? The problem is it violates itself and not in a sexy way like the internet ladies do, but in a way that costs you eight dollars and two hours of your time.
2 comments:
Ya know, I blame the Highlander franchise for a lot of this. I know that internally inconsistent continuities are nothing new, but I feel like the Highlander movies broke new ground in highly-marketable, blatant nonsense. The most recent ten years or so of comics movies could not be blamed by themselves for building edifices of b.s. on fertile land someone else claimed.
Matt, that is the funniest thing I've read all week. I love your sense of humor - you should totally have your own late night show.
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