Movie Review – The Wolverine (2013)

In 2009, Hollywood created a stand-alone Wolverine film called X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

As we know, Wolverine continues to be one of the most popular of the X-Men characters, and his origin could have made for an interesting story.  The problems though were that the film X-Men Origins: Wolverine failed to tell a good story and refrain from cheesy clichés.

Despite the flaws and other problems with the story, the film still made a ton of money, and Hugh Jackman did an outstanding job of performing as the comic book character.  This was a sign that the audiences wanted more of the character, something better than what we saw in the 2009 film.

The answer was resolved in the 2013 film, The Wolverine.

Set after the events in 2006’s X-Men: The Last Stand, The Wolverine is a film that takes Logan to Japan to meet with an old acquaintance from World War 2.  This quickly proves to be Logan’s most difficult challenge yet as not only is he stripped of his power of regeneration, but he also has to battle with the Yakuza as well as ancient warriors that date back hundreds.  It’s Logan versus the ninjas, samurai, and the warrior way of life as he battles to save lives, starting with his own.

Directed by James Mangold, The Wolverine stars Hugh Jackman in the lead role of Logan / Wolverine.  Co-starring in the film are Tao Okamoto as Mariko Yashida, and Rila Fukushima as Yukio.  The film also features Famke Janssen as Jean Grey.

The Wolverine begins in 1945 in Nagasaki, Japan.

Logan (Hugh Jackman) is a captured American soldier being held in solitary confinement.  In other barracks near him are hundreds more American soldiers being held prisoner.  Suddenly the Japanese guards go on alert when they spot a B-29 Superfortress bomber flying over the city of Nagasaki.  The guards think that it’s another air raid.

One of the Japanese guards, Yashida (Hal Yamanouchi), frees the American prisoners at the anger to his superiors.  Logan notices this, so he tries to warn Yashida that the bomber is carrying a nuclear bomb, something that will destroy the entire city.  Just as the bomb is dropped and Nagasaki is destroyed, Logan gets Yashida to hide with him in his underground prison cell.  Logan uses his body to shield Yashida from the nuclear fire.  Afterwards, Yashida watches Logan’s body regenerate and heal itself from the horrendous burn scars.

Fast forward to today.

Logan is a loner and living in the woods near a town in the Yukon.  At night he dreams of Jean Grey (Famke Janssen), dreams that often turn into nightmares.  One day he encounters some hunters who torture a grizzly bear by using illegal weapons and failing to finish the kill.  Logan goes to a bar where he finds the hunters and makes them pay for their evil ways.

At the bar, a Japanese woman named Yukio (Rile Fukushima) finds Logan and helps get him out of trouble.  She tells him that she is there to take him to Japan to meet a client of hers, Yashida, somebody very wealthy and powerful who has been seeking out Logan for a long time.  Logan reluctantly agrees to travel with Yukio to Japan.  They use a private jet to fly from the Yukon to Tokyo, Japan.

In Tokyo, Yukio takes Logan to the home of Yashida.  The home is heavily guarded as there have been attacks against Yashida recently.  Inside the home, Logan is introduced to Yashida’s son, Shingen (Hiroyuki Sanada), and granddaughter, Mariko (Tao Okamoto).  Not only is Shingen a corporate rival of Yashida, but he is an avid swordsman and skilled at Kendo.

Yashida is now an old man and dying from cancer.  He has the latest technology to monitor his health and keep him as comfortable as possible, but technology can only do so much.  Yashida knows about Logan’s mutant powers, and how the power of regeneration can also be a curse as Logan cannot die from illnesses or old age.  As glorious as his mutant power sounds, it’s also his curse.  Yashida offers to transfer Logan’s healing powers into his own body, saving his own life and offering Logan a chance to live and die as a mortal man.

Logan refuses Yashida’s offer.  He later witnesses Mariko try to commit suicide by jumping off a cliff, but he stops her.  She does not tell him why she tried to kill herself.

That night, Logan has another dream that turns into a nightmare.  In his dream, Jean Grey transforms into Yashida’s physician, Dr. Green (Svetlana Khodchenkova), and she slips something into his mouth.  When he wakes from his dream and goes outside, he sees that Yashida has died and is being wheeled out of the compound.

The next day is a funeral for Yashida.  Something doesn’t seem right to Logan, and at one point in the funeral Yakuza gangsters try to kidnap Mariko.  Logan is shot with a shotgun, and he’s stunned that the wound does not heal nearly as fast as it should.  He has a difficult time fighting the gangsters and rescuing Mariko.

He and Mariko then run through Tokyo to try to flee from the Yakuza.  While they’re running on the streets, Kenuichio Harada (Will Yun Lee), an old friend of Mariko, uses his archery and ninja skills to pick off the enemies.  He helps Logan and Mariko reach the train station for a bullet train.

On the bullet train, Logan tries to clean himself in a bathroom when he notices that some of the Yakuza also boarded the train.  Another fight scene begins as Logan fights the gangsters while on the high-speed train.  The fight becomes even more difficult when they transition to the top of the train, where they not only fight each other, but they need to watch out for deadly obstacles such as overhead signs.

Logan ultimately wins the fight and kills the Yakuza, but he’s badly injured and in need of medical help.  He and Mariko disembark at the next train station, and they find refuge at a “love hotel” for couples.  After Logan passes out from his injuries, he later awakens after being treated by a veterinarian.  Now healed from his bullet and knife injures, Logan and Mariko head to Nagasaki where Mariko’s family has a home.

While Logan and Mariko were in the hotel, Harada meets with Dr. Green, and she shows off some of her mutant power.  Dr. Green is Viper, a creature who is immune to and can also spit poison.  Later in the film, she’s also able to shed her skin after it becomes damaged in a fight.  After using some acidic poison on Harada, he agrees to go out and locate Logan and Mariko for her.

Logan and Mariko arrive in Nagaski, and Logan has more flashbacks to the atomic bombing of the city.  He remembers how he helped Yashida survive in the underground bunker, and how Yashida was so grateful of Logan’s help.

As Logan adjusts to the simple life in Nagasaki, he and Mariko continue to bond and fall in love.  Meanwhile, Yukio, a mutant who has visions of the future, has a vision of Logan dying, so she goes to warn him.  Before Yukio arrives, Mariko wakes one morning and is kidnapped by the Yakuzi.  Logan chases after the Yakuzi and tries to stop them, but most of them flee with Mariko.  One of the Yakuza is still alive, and Logan tortures him to make him give up information.

Yukio then arrives and warns Logan about his upcoming death.  She had a vision of him holding his heart.  Logan shrugs it off, thinking that nobody has killed him yet after all of these years of fighting enemies.

Logan and Yukio find Mariko’s fiancé in a hotel with some hookers.  Her fiancé, corrupt Minister of Justice Noburo Mori (Brian Tee), reveals that he arranged to have Mariko killed as her grandfather decided to leave her in charge of his company and not her father, Shingen.  Logan then tosses Mori out of the window, not knowing that there would be a pool where he lands.

At Yashida’s estate, Mariko is brought before her father, Shingen.  It turns out that he has always been jealous of his daughter because she has so many more of her grandfather’s genes in her than he does.  He intends on killing Mariko until Harada arrives with his fellow ninjas.  They easily overtake Shingen’s guards.  Dr. Green is also there, and she uses her poison to torture and control Shingen.  Mariko is then kidnapped by the ninjas and taken away from the estate.

When Logan and Yukio arrive at Yashida’s estate, the place looks deserted.  They do find a note telling them to go to the research station in Yashida’s home town to find Mariko.  When they visit the medical office where Yashida was being kept alive, Logan notices that the strange creatures that were in glass jars are now missing.  Acting on a hunch, he lies on the table and uses Yashida’s equipment to scan himself.  Sure enough one of those robotic parasites is inside of his body.  It has lodged itself on his heart, and that’s why Logan cannot regenerate his health like he used to.

There’s no time to go to a hospital and have surgeons remove the parasite.  If he is to save Mariko, then he needs that parasite to be removed right now.  Yukio pleads with Logan not to do this, but he uses a claw to slice open his abdomen, and then he reaches inside of his body to get the parasite.

Suddenly Shingen appears in the medical office.  He and Yukio have a battle while Logan is trying to operate on himself.  The machines are knocked away and Logan has to operate in the blind.  The battle continues and Logan removes the parasite, but it kills him.  Yukio still fights on and guards Logan’s body as his regeneration power is reactivated, and his body repairs itself.  Shingen then defeats Yukio.  Just as he’s about to deliver a killing blow, Logan uses his claws to stop him.

Logan is now fully healed and ready to fight as the Wolverine.  He and Shingen have a lengthy battle, Shingen’s sword versus Wolverine’s claws.  Logan gets slashed and stabbed a few times, but his body quickly heals after each attack.  Logan wins the fight and allows Shingen to live and carry the burden that he tried to kill his own daughter.  Shingen betrays Logan and tries to kill him, but Logan kills Shingen instead.

Now it’s time to rescue Mariko.

When Logan arrives in Yashida’s home town, Harada and his ninjas are waiting for him.  Logan is forced to battle his way through the snowy streets in the small town, but the ninjas ultimately overtake him.  A poisoned-tipped arrow fired by Harada takes down the Wolverine, rendering him unconscious.

Logan awakens inside of the research facility, but secured to a chair.  Dr. Green taunts Logan to get him to extract his claws.  When he does, special clamps keep them extended.  Dr. Green explains that she is going to extract his regeneration mutant power.  To do so is going to require the Silver Samurai, a tall, robotic warrior made from adamantium.  The Silver Samurai is armed with swords made from adamantium that, when energized, can slice through that very metal.

Meanwhile, Mariko is being held by Harada, but she escapes from him and runs to help Logan.  She jumps in front of the Silver Samurai, causing him to miss hitting her with the sword.  This causes him to accidentally cut Logan’s chair, freeing him.

What follows is a lengthy battle scene where Logan fights against the Silver Samurai.  Early in the fight, the samurai uses one of the swords to slice the adamantium claws from Wolverine’s right hand.  Harada has a change of heart and decides to help Logan and Mariko, so he fights against the Viper and Silver Samurai as well.  He is later killed by the samurai.

Logan uses one of the samurai’s swords to decapitate him.  He then knocks the robot down to a lower level, but the impact tosses Logan out a wall.  He has to climb up a piece of metal debris to get back into the research facility.  Just as he climbs into the building, suddenly the Silver Samurai comes back to life and slices the adamantium claws off Logan’s other hand.  The samurai then grips Logan’s hands securely so that he does not fall down to the cliffs below him.

While this is happening, Yukio has infiltrated the research facility, and she fights against the Viper.  Yukio wins the battle by wrapping a cord around the Viper’s neck, and then dragging her into an elevator shaft.  When the Viper’s body quickly rises, it strikes an elevator counterweight moving in the opposite direction, killing her.

In the other part of the building, the Silver Samurai’s suit uses special drills to drill into Logan’s hands where his claws used to be.  It’s revealed that Yashida is still alive, and he’s the person inside of the Silver Samurai’s suit of armor.  The suit is what’s helping to keep him alive.  Yashida explains that ever Logan saved his life during the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, he has been obsessed with Logan’s ability to regenerate, heal damage, and prolong his life.  It has been his lifelong goal to replicate that ability.

Once the samurai’s suit becomes fused with Logan’s body, the suit begins to transfer Logan’s regeneration power into Yashida.  As Yashida becomes younger and more youthful, Logan grows older and weaker.  This ends when Mariko uses one of Logan’s broken claws to stab Yashida in the head.  Logan is able to break free, and his health quickly improves.  He then rips open the suit of armor, regrows his original bone claws, and then stabs Yashida in the chest.  Logan then tosses Yashida down to the cliffs, finally killing him.

Once Yashida is killed, Logan collapses and has a final hallucination of Jean Grey.  He finally lets go of her and the circumstances around her death.

The following day, Mariko is officially in charge of the Yashida Corporation, and Logan leaves Japan.  Yukio insists on staying beside him as his personal bodyguard, wherever it is that he decides to go.  Logan accepts it and the two of them depart for an unknown destination.

The Wolverine ends with a short clip of Logan returning to the U.S. a couple of years later.  In the airport he sees a brief advertisement for Trask Industries.  Logan is then greeted by Magneto (Ian McKellen) and Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart).  Remember that after the credits in X-Men: The Last Stand, it was revealed that Xavier’s consciousness was transferred to a new body.  Magneto warns Logan that there’s a grave new threat to the mutant race.

So is The Wolverine a good movie?

Definitely!

This is a great film that finally does justice for one of the most popular characters in the X-Men comics.  Not only do we see Wolverine in his invincible mode, but we also see him as a mortal as well as against an enemy that uses weapons that can slice through adamantium.  There’s little doubt that in this film, Wolverine faces some of his greatest challenges yet.

I loved it that this film was set in Japan.  To me, Japan has always been a fascinating country, one of sleek futuristic technology as well as a timeless age of life dating back hundreds of years.  It’s a mixture of computers and samurai warriors, a place where one’s honor is significantly more important than a person’s ego.

You really need to see The Wolverine twice to get the most out of the film.  When watching it the first time you’ll probably be spending too much time figuring out what in the hell is happening.  The second time it’ll make more sense and you’ll notice more details.

My only problem with The Wolverine was the introduction where Logan is in a POW camp outside of Nagasaki, Japan.

First of all, the B-29 bombers were flying way too low.  The airmen already knew of the danger of the atomic blast in the Hiroshima bombing.  Those bombers should have been much higher in the air.

Second, there’s no way that Logan would have known that the bomber was carrying a nuclear bomb that would destroy the entire city.  Hiroshima was bombed a few days prior to that.  Unless he was just captured within a day or two, then it’s highly unlikely that he would have known about the top secret superweapons being used by the U.S. Army Air Corps.

Third, Yashida would have been blinded by the blast of the bomb.  He and Logan would have also been either vaporized or thrown for hundreds of feet by the shock wave that followed the detonation.

But this is a Hollywood film, and you know how Hollywood enjoys straying away from reality in order to tell a story.  Although the opening segment is important to the film’s story, it’s a very short segment that is vastly overshadowed by the other events throughout the movie.

The Wolverine (2013) – movie trailer

Forget about X-Men Origins: Wolverine.  The Wolverine is a significantly better film in nearly every aspect.

[Logan throws Noburo off the balcony of his condominium… into a swimming pool]
Yukio – “How did you know there’s a pool down there?”
Logan – “I didn’t.”

———————

Logan – [about rescuing Mariko] “I’m gonna get her.”
Harada – “We are grateful for your protection of Mariko. But there is one more sacrifice you must make for her family.”
Logan – “Go fuck yourself, pretty boy!”