{"id":25232,"date":"2013-07-29T13:01:44","date_gmt":"2013-07-29T17:01:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/?p=25232"},"modified":"2013-07-31T00:34:18","modified_gmt":"2013-07-31T04:34:18","slug":"the-wolverine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/2013\/07\/the-wolverine\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cThe Wolverine\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Bob Garver<\/p>\n

\"\"\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It has been four years since Hugh Jackman\u2019s Wolverine got to carry a movie in the pile of cinematic garbage that was \u201cX-Men Origins: Wolverine.\u201d The entire \u201cX-Men\u201d franchise would be a joke right now if it hadn\u2019t creatively rebounded with the (mostly) Wolverine-free \u201cX-Men: First Class\u201d two years ago. \u00a0I have to question the wisdom in letting him stand alone again, but then again there\u2019s no denying that he\u2019s the face of the franchise. Many critics argue that he shouldn\u2019t be, favoring other mutants with \u201cbetter\u201d powers, but it\u2019s a harsh fact that we\u2019re expected to find him terribly interesting. The good news for \u201cThe Wolverine\u201d is that fans aren\u2019t likely to find it as appalling as \u201cOrigins.\u201d The bad news is that it\u2019s such a hollow victory to be considered better than \u201cOrigins.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure that the Wolverine of the comics is a complex, well-defined character, but the movie version basically limits him to three traits: he\u2019s surly, he has those metal claws, and he\u2019s indestructible. The bad guys have to keep coming up with loopholes for that last one for there to be any conflict. But I guess it\u2019s better to have him face new challenges than to dig through his bloated backstory again.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 The new film sees the ageless Wolverine travel to Japan so he can say goodbye to the dying Yashida (Hal Yamanouchi), whose life he saved during the bombing of Nagasaki. Yashida, a technology magnate, offers Wolverine the chance to remove his powers and live a normal life. Wolverine declines, but someone slips him something that drains him of his powers anyway. Of course as soon as he starts to lose his powers, he gets sucked into a deadly mission to protect Yashida\u2019s granddaughter Mariko (Tao Okamoto), who is set to inherit her grandfather\u2019s company much to the consternation of her father (Hiroyuki Sanada).<\/p>\n

Other characters include Rila Fukushima as an eye-candy bodyguard. Judging by her bright red hair, that candy would be Twizzlers. Will Yun Lee is a lovesick ex-boyfriend of Mariko who is determined to protect her even though he doesn\u2019t even know what side he\u2019s on. Svetlana Khodchenkova is a secondary villain called Viper, a chemist who kills men with kisses. The character is a lame ripoff of Uma Thurman\u2019s Poison Ivy from 1997\u2019s \u201cBatman and Robin\u201d, a comic book film somehow even more despised than \u201cX-Men Origins: Wolverine.\u201d Then there\u2019s the main villain, a character from the comics who I\u2019m told is portrayed all wrong. The film drops many easy hints as to his identity. Several scenes before he was revealed, I was calling out, \u201cHave they seriously not figured it out yet?\u201d<\/p>\n

The scenes that are supposed to garner audience reactions are clumsy. The best example is a scene where Wolverine recovers from an attack and says, \u201cI\u2019m Wolverine.\u201d The scene recalls Batman\u2019s first use of \u201cI\u2019m Batman\u201d in 2005\u2019s \u201cBatman Begins.\u201d But the difference is that in that scene, Batman said it as a surprise, and we got the impression that it was the first time he had used the name; so in that context it was original. Wolverine has been Wolverine for five films now and this isn\u2019t a prequel. There is nothing surprising or original about him saying his name at this point.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been hard on \u201cThe Wolverine,\u201d but it\u2019s not all bad. I got a kick out of an action sequence on the Tokyo Bullet Train. And when I say \u201con\u201d the train, I don\u2019t mean \u201cin\u201d the train (George Carlin would be proud). It\u2019s also worth noting that there\u2019s a refreshing brightness to the movie, as opposed to the drowsy dimness of \u201cOrigins.\u201d \u201cThe Wolverine\u201d represents a step up for Wolverine, but a step down for the \u201cX-Men\u201d franchise. The next film promises to feature a team effort, let\u2019s hope that everybody can pull together and make a better film than this.<\/p>\n

One and a Half Stars out of Five.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Wolverine\u201d is rated PG-13 for sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, some sexuality and language. Its running time is 126 minutes.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Contact Bob Garver at rrg251@nyu.edu<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Bob Garver \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It has been four years since Hugh Jackman\u2019s Wolverine got to carry a movie in the pile of cinematic garbage that was \u201cX-Men Origins: Wolverine.\u201d The… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[108],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25232"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25232\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}