The biggest mistake I will make during this review is watching the vastly superior X2 while I am writing it. Then again if I wait long enough FX will be showing the abysmal The Last Stand so maybe then I will look more fondly at X-Men Origins: Wolverine. Sadly, the biggest sin of Wolverine was that it didn’t offend me enough to write an angry review. It was middling in every way.
Hugh Jackman has always been great in the role of Wolverine. Nothing changes here other than he is built like a brick shithouse and has better facial hair than in past X-Men movies. The biggest compliment I can give this edition is that the majority of casting was on the money. Liev Schreiber may have been the highlight of film as a less growly and more talkative Sabretooth. Plus his fingernails were my favorite special effect, which is not saying a lot since much of this movie came off cheap looking. 10 years later and you still can’t get the claws right? Exchanging Brian Cox for the younger Danny Huston was a nice choice for William Stryker. It was also sweet to see that after years and years of fan casting Ryan Reynolds was picked to be Deadpool. My final applause goes to Kevin Durand as Blob, who the hell knew that he would come off that well on screen? Praise does not extend to Will I Am because it is Will I Am and it was ridiculous. Also Gambit was a bit of letdown but I don’t want to place all of that on Taylor Kitsch. Outside of Wolverine, Sabretooth, and Stryler everyone else was just an extended cameo.
Like I mentioned earlier nothing was offensively bad, this covers even the storyline. This was Wolverine’s origin story and they kept it close enough to the comics that I can’t get worked up about any alterations. Now the same can’t be said for some of the random ass characters that were thrown into the Weapon X plot. Outside of Blob (which is not that bad since he is a villain) the original squad was fine but the Cyclops and Emma Frost inclusion was stupid. There is so many many many better stories that can be told with The White Queen and what they chose to do was just irritating. The choices made when it comes to Deadpool I’m still on the fence about. Every dumbass change they made can be easily explained away if they give him his own sequel. That doesn't mean I trust Fox to get it right the next time around.
I ended up writing more than I expected about X-Men Origins: Wolverine; I guess knowing the material like the back of my hand means lots of nitpicking. Maybe the biggest issue of them all was that in a big dumb summer action flick, the action wasn't all that good. If the fight scenes were awesome it may have covered the flaws but we weren't that lucky. Disappointing all around.
6 out of 10
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