X is “violent, angry, out of control, and very risky”.
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For the uninitiated, Logan is based loosely on Mark Millar’s 2008 miniseries “Old Man Logan”, set many years in the future.
The success of the Rated-R smash-hit Deadpool caused concern about the future state superhero movies. Logan is the kind of movie that shuts up elitists who can’t fathom a comic book movie transcending popcorn entertainment, or offering up personal connections to superbly crafted characters.
Or at least that was the word coming out of early press screenings.
Mangold’s tight shots on Logan’s battered face serve as a reminder that we’ve seen this hero grow from a smart-alecky scene-stealer in 2000’s X-Men to the battered warrior in this, Jackman’s ninth film.
The film is set in 2029, when mutant births are in severe decline for an unknown reason.
Abandoning the norms, we are met by a glasses-wearing, reading Logan who spends his time texting Professor X. All Logan wants to do is scrape together enough money to buy a boat so he and Charles can live out their days at sea. Or, you know, less shit times. It’s heart-breaking to watch the once great Professor X reduced to an nearly prison-like existence born out of the fear of what his sick mind might do to the world. It also introduced Dafne Keen as Laura, a young girl with a mysterious past who comes into their lives.
The evolution of the Wolverine franchise into Logan is an epic example of where superhero films needed to go. There’s no spectacle like that in Logan, but there’s something even more satisfying in watching the whole movie turn into a attractive, bloody tragedy.
Laura (newcomer Dafne Keen) is to “Logan” what Eleven is to “Stranger Things”. She brings danger and violence back into their lives, but also goal. He poisoned her at a young age to awaken her mutation. We don’t need to add sidekicks so we can sell an action figure.
On finding the right actress for X-23: “That was one thing I was a pain about. We’re just trying to do it very differently and very viscerally”. This later results in a showdown between when a group known as the Reavers, led by Donald Pierce (Boyd Holbrook, chewing some scenery), show up at Logan’s makeshift home looking for the girl. This is a sadder, wearier Wolverine than the one familiar from the comics, but the actor has made the role his own. We want to think that they’ll be here forever. In contrast to this, Richard E. Grant’s Dr. Zander Rice unfortunately is lacking in this area. And because of the R-rating, you get to see him really let loose and dig his claws into skulls during rage fits because that is what a Wolverine is supposed to do.
“For me that was one of the big additions I brought to the table, this decision to try to make the film about family and to try to insert Laura and the pressures that would put and the idea about Charles ailing.”
Laura, on the other hand, is a complete mute who can kill with little more than a flick of the wrist. I’m assuming Logan will get a 15 from the BBFC, but I’d wager there’s been a weighty conversation about whether an 18 is more appropriate. Humans are no longer giving birth to them, and the ones left have mostly died out. Longtime fans are going to love and appreciate this approach to the character but casual comic book moviegoers might find it hard to stomach.
The savagery is not simply gore for gore’s sake; it’s a crucial part of Logan’s themes about the mental and emotional toll all that violence takes on the man who inflicts it. And with just a few minutes of screen time, Logan masterfully presents more fully-developed black characters than the whole of the MCU. “Having done this, I just wanted to, for me, what was the most flawless and definitive version of that character”.
Jackman is now struggling with skin cancer and is undergoing treatment for it.
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“It’s both the most violent film in the series and the most sentimental one. Given that the film went into production well before the earth-shaking events of November 2016, it all feels frighteningly prescient”.
