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Logan: The Wolverine

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Hugh Jackman in Logan: Wolverine. (Times Media Film)
Hugh Jackman in Logan: Wolverine. (Times Media Film)

What it's about:

In the near future, a weary Logan cares for an ailing Professor X in a hide out on the Mexican border. But, Logan’s attempts to hide from the world and his legacy are up-ended when a young mutant arrives, being pursued by dark forces.

What we thought: 

When is the last time you walked out of a superhero film and was just speechless? Okay, probably Deadpool, but despite also being another R-Rated superhero movie, Logan is something completely different.

Since the first full trailer was released, expectations were already set at an all-time high for the X-Men franchise, and not only did they deliver but they delivered the best unfettered performances we’ve ever seen from Hugh Jackman and Sir Patrick Stewart. Both are retiring their iconic on-screen alter egos, but boy did they go out with a bloody bang.

Not too far in the future, most of mutant-kind has become almost extinct. A downtrodden Wolverine (Jackman) looks after a sick Professor X (Stewart) whose mind is slowly degenerating, but when a young mutant (Dafne Keen) asks for their aid, they find themselves being hunted by a ruthless military corporation. 

First off, I can’t believe this movie got green lighted by Fox. After the debacle that is X-Men: Apocalypse, it didn’t bode well for the franchise, despite the insane success of Deadpool. The X-Men comics are pretty dark in general, and it would seem that audiences, and Hollywood execs, are finally ready for that R-Rating. Logan followed the bloody trail left by Deadpool, but instead of dark humour and baby hands, Logan gave us an emotionally charged drama that in my opinion deserves Oscar recognition. The action scenes were blood-spattered and great, but it wasn’t just for the sake of gratuitous violence. It’ll be hard to talk more about the fantastically choreographed sequences without spoilers, but just know that a severed head never looked so impressive.

And then there was the acting. Holy crap it was good. It’s as if in all the previous X-Men movies someone had leashed Jackman and Stewart’s talents, but took it off and let them run free in Logan. Who knew adding curse words could do such wonders for an actor’s performance. The first time Stewart says the F-word you are so taken aback it’ll take you a while to recover, but the further you get in the movie the more real it gets. Stewart-Xavier always had a certain elegance and stability that made him seem almost non-human, but here we see a powerful man reduced to a shell of his former self, slowly losing the one thing that made him special. For anyone who has a family member that is going through something similar, this will be rough to watch. Jackman however is not outperformed, and his portrayal of Wolverine’s devotion to Professor X is just as heartbreaking. The two actors pushed each other beyond their own limits, and it’s even sadder to think that we will never see them in these roles again (fingers crossed for a DeadpoolxWolverine crossover!)

The acting gods didn’t stop there. They also gave us newcomer Dafne Keen, another child prodigy that held her own at 11 years old against her way older co-stars. She took many cues from Wolverine though still made his iconic death stares her own. She doesn’t speak for half of the movie, but said everything she needed to say with her face alone, and that is a rare talent. I also quite enjoyed Boyd Holbrook (Narcos) who plays the villain, even though his character was less important to the story.

As a superhero movie that takes its time before throwing you into an explosion extravaganza, Logan is a masterpiece that will hit you in emotions that you thought had died a long time ago. It shows a world that is post superheroes, and that world is actually okay. The people who suffer are the superheroes themselves, licking the wounds of decades of battle without anything to show for it. Even an immortal super-soldier like Wolverine feels the effects of time, and it’s these themes that make this movie one of the best.

P.S. Watch out for the sly Deadpool easter egg #pleasegiveusacrossover

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