The WolverineFollow

Oh, I agree. I'm just saying that it doesn't make the film "terrible", just not as good as it could have been if they'd allowed for maybe 3-5 minutes of extra screen time for dialog/interaction. It does make me wonder if this was a poor time decision and they did film the bits required. I guess what I'm trying to say is that the overall film and story was good, but (as I stated at the very beginning) it seemed like they cut out key parts of scenes that would have made it a lots less confusing. Part of me wonders if they did that intentionally because they didn't want people to know *any* info about what the different folks were doing until the very end, which made things problematic in terms of reveals because of the linear manner in which various parts of the plot were "dispatched" (hehe).



That's what was kinda frustrating about it. There were two glaringly obvious scenes where they could *easily* have added just a tiny amount additional dialog/action which would have cleared up everything:

SpoilerWhen Logan and Yuriko go to the Ministers place to confront him (in their own unique... idiom), he blabs some information whilst trying to save his hide. All they had to do was put in a desperate line of dialog like "Don't kill me! Shingen wanted to kill Mariko to take the inheritance, but I ordered them to just capture her instead! <insert begging and pleading>". Would have added like 20-30 seconds to an already existing scene and required no changes to the overall direction or outcome of the story.

SpoilerSame thing I mentioned earlier. I suspect they did actually film more of the full plot involving Mariko and Yashida and it included the information which explained why Harada switched sides, but it got cut because they didn't want the reveal regarding who was in the suit to occur yet. This is honestly a toughie, since there's no way to explain his change of heart without the full reveal. By the time they were at that point, it would have required significant reworking of the story to find a way to accomplish this due to events which occur later which make it somewhat difficult to explain things after the fact.

The reason I suspect they originally did film it that way is because there's a seriously abrupt cut. Viper brings her into a room with the motionless Silver Samurai suit, begins hinting to Mariko that the reasons she was selected to inherit weren't what she thought, then the suit starts moving, all ominous like, Mariko looks up at it and starts moving like she's about to say something, or ask something, then <cut>. It was as blatant a mid-scene cut as I've ever seen in a film.

Don't get me wrong, these are signs of either poor planning, or poor post production work, or I suppose nosy production execs demanding changes that don't actually fit with the story as written/filmed (or some combination of all of those). That's not an excuse, but in the grand scheme of things, the problems with the film were relatively minimal. It's not nearly as bad as Io9 makes it out to be (and honestly, that's a relatively tame FAQ from them anyway). There were just a couple of "huh?" aspects to the film that made it difficult to follow as you were going along, but once you saw the entire film and thought about it, actually did make sense. There was just barely enough information to figure things out.




Yup. Which is why I said this is a problem for an action film. There were sufficient details in the film to figure out what was going on and why, but you had to actually think about it. No one comes out and tells you why certain characters did what they did, but there is sufficient information for you to make some reasonable assumptions. SpoilerHarada's earlier dialog clearly indicates he's in love with Mariko. So the question isn't really "why did he switch sides", but "why was he going along with the plot in the first place". The obvious answer that he didn't know the full depth of what Yashida was planning can be assumed, but is never directly shown. There was even a scene earlier in the film that clearly established that Harada wasn't happy about what they were doing, but felt he had no choice (and "clearly established" and "no choice" included overt threats by Viper in addition to his own oath of loyalty), so it was not unreasonable that one final thing could have tipped his choice. The Minister being the one with the Yakuza contacts was stated, as was the fact that he was the arranged fiance of Mariko, as well as the fact that Shingen wanted to inherit and wanted Mariko dead in order to make that happen. It honestly shouldn't take a genius to figure out why the Yakuza tried to capture instead of kill her (you just had to remember who they actually got their orders from). It certainly would have been more obvious with some additional dialog, but it wasn't totally necessary (unless you're writing for Io9 and looking really hard to find things to make fun of).




I really do think that the plot of The Wolverine was vastly more complex than that of the Avengers. It's why I said that the core problem was that they tried to write too complex a plot and so they ended out skipping or cutting short some of the explanatory scenes. There were a lot more moving parts and factions involved. Avengers basically had one bad guy, and a handful of heroes and their egos to sort out. Pretty darn simple really. The Wolverine involved 4 different major groups of antagonists, each with their own purpose/agenda, and each acting and interacting pretty much simultaneously with each other. Add in three different protagonists, each of which also has their own purpose and agenda, and who each fit into the various plans of the different antagonists in different ways, and things rapidly get complex.

I'm not saying rush out there and watch it right now. But I am saying don't make your decision based on the Io9 FAQ. The flaws in the film aren't nearly that bad, and the action and story are actually quite good. If you're at all a fan of Wolverine, or the X-men, I'd recommend seeing it. If not, wait for it to come on cable. It was certainly not so horrible that I felt I'd wasted my money or anything. Not even close. It just wasn't as good as it could have been, and it was frustrating because you could clearly see where they could have made it much better. Maybe we'll see those scenes on the Blu-ray or something.


Edited, Jul 31st 2013 7:27pm by gbaji

I think my new biggest question is Spoilerwhy did they completely reinvent the Viper/Madam Hydra character when the skillset and abilities already existed in June Covington? Viper isn't a mutant geneticist with corrosive saliva. She's just a wonky human. June can alter her DNA to suit whatever she needs it to pretty much, which would include corrosive saliva, and she's a geneticist on top of that. Granted, she's not a mutant either, but still. I'm chalking it up to June being too new or something. She's even a tall blonde babe, as opposed to Viper who shifts between green and black. Be warned the prior spoiler is nerdrage induced.

Wolverine once tried to attack Galactus, without adamantium. He was a Skrull too. It gets odd at times in the Marvel universe.

Personally, I enjoyed the movie. I've always enjoyed the character though, despite a lot of crappy stories, and that does help.
Shame that Logan couldn't speak Japanese, but there's one thing that really bothered me: SpoilerWith his healing messed up, why didn't he suffer from adamantium poisoning?

Other than that, it's not a bad movie, with a very interesting mid-credits-scene.

The thing that is really confusing me about this series is why they are even bothering continuing the timeline after The Last Stand. With what they've done to the characters, they desperately need to follow in Sony's footsteps and reboot.

I mean, all the big names in the X universe are pretty much dead or their characters never got developed enough to lay the groundwork for future titles.

I mean, nearly all the classic X-men heroes were either killed off, or their characters never got developed enough to really make a movie on their shoulders (Shadowcat, Colossus, Beast, Angel, etc.). Then you have Nightcrawler, who just randomly disappears before the third movie. Storm's movie persona wasn't interesting enough to carry a future film, and Iceman wasn't interesting enough (and his story more or less done anyway).

And same for the villains. Either they were randomly killed off (Toad), were removed from the series some other way (Mystique), or they just plain weren't interesting enough to bother caring about (Juggernaut).

This whole series is a pretty classic example of Fox's incredible ability to mismanage...

I just want a damn reboot where they focus more on developing the characters and the conflict, rather than giving every possible mutant a cameo, killing them off, and then running out of stars to do something with.

It wasn't a reboot, it was just a prequel. Hard to use the same actors to show the characters as kids/teenagers/young men when they're 40 years older in the next movie. It may be a prequel series, but it's still just a prequel. You won't be seeing Storm, beast, etc. Or maybe you will in a while, but as kids. And casting is extremely limited because of what they did with the original trilogy.

On the other hand, Wolverine (who does not age) was played by Jackman in both.

Even though it's a "prequel", I consider it a "reboot". I don't recall the story supporting the original three movies. There were some conflicting story differences, i.e. Wolverine. Even if it were supporting of the first three movies, the characters do not have to be "children", just no less than a day younger than the first scene in the original X-men. So, every character can be back doing whatever.

Which was contradictory to the story anyway, i.e. Jubilee and Rogue being the same age. In any case, bringing the same characters back as originally portrayed wouldn't be too difficult to pull off in a prequel. Even if the times overlapped with the original series, as long as it doesn't contradict it, it's all good. This is what I believe is being done in the future movie anyway.



I don't recall seeing Gambit, only his name.



It's only more difficult in preventing contradictions, but definitely feasible. I understand the concept of "rebooting" and not having to worry about contradictions. I agree with you on that; however, I don't want to follow the same story line again. There's only so many times I want to see Batman and Spiderman become who they are. Likewise, there are only so many times I want see Jean Grey die. After that, get right to the point. At least with the prequel, it's a different environment.

I'm not against a reboot at all, but I would rather for them to do a 3 part prequel series leading into the reboot. That way, it doesn't seem like I just saw the movie.

I'm referring to the x-men movie series, not the actual story.



I understand that. The point is that the original cast in the original movie could be back in a prequel the day before the first day of the original X-men movie. Is that a good idea? I wouldn't think so, but as I said, First class didn't seem to support the original three movies anyway. So, they could do a "reboot" from the prequel, which was what I proposed. From First Class, they can grow older and re do the first three movies, but better. I would much rather from them to build off of First Class and reboot as opposed to simply starting over again.

He's in the first Wolverine movie. I just watched it again yesterday.

As to the story line, it appears that it will follow both First Class and Last Stand.



Edited, Aug 4th 2013 11:22pm by Almalieque

I think that a lot of this is academic. They *are* continuing the story as a single story. First Class was *not* a reboot. It was a prequel. The Wolverine is an intro into the next X-men film, and both follow the events in Last Stand. It's entirely possible that the next film itself includes changes to the past/present (cause of the whole time travel bits), but it doesn't look like they're going to do a reboot from a film making point of view.

If you stop and think about it, this next film allows them to retcon changes that they want *without* having a reboot. So all the problems of fixing things with reboots and whatnot really aren't problems.

X-Men Fist Class was not a reboot, it was a prequel. Days of Future Past will continue that prequel, but will also continue the core X-Men Trilogy & the Wolverine Flicks by way of time travel.

None of the movies are independent, except for the parts of X.O: Wolverine I choose to willfully ignore because they are awful.

Edited, Aug 5th 2013 8:52pm by Omegavegeta

I understand that First Class is a prequel, but it could be used as a reboot. If Days of Future Past *truly* follows the actual COMIC Days of Future Past plot, then First Class is a true prequel. However, if it doesn't, then the time travel only allows the directors to redo stuff without having to start completely over. In other words, reboot.

I know that they aren't independent, but if you watch them altogether, you have to ignore certain parts of the other movies. Only the first three movies are truly dependent. In any case, I prefer Origins over the last Wolverine movie.