So what's the Wolverine about? For those comic book fans, The Wolverine is basically the tale of Mariko Yashida and Wolverine. Except without the sad ending at the end. Yet.
Quick plot rundown. So Wolverine's been suffering apparently since he had to kill Jean Grey; who apparently does not come back to life so often in the film version, and he's been living the life of a hobo drunk. And yet somehow, he still gets to keep his killer abs. Wtf is up with that? Anyway, a mysterious (read*cliche*) japanese woman comes to get him saying that someone he saved back in WWII wants to meet him to say goodbye as he's dying of old age. Wolverine ends up going to Japan to meet Yashida who reveals he wants to give Wolverine a gift cause he saved his life so many years ago. The Gift of Death that is. Yeesh -_-. Seriously, Yashida must be the WORST salesman in the history of the world. Htf did he even build up his mega corp?
So anyway, Wolverine understandably says F U to the offer and Yashida 'dies' that night. Now Wolverine has to protect Yashida's granddaughter Mariko from the thugs chasing her and figure out why exactly they're chasing her and what's going on.
Overall, the story is kind of meh. There are too many things that don't really add up through the course of the film. Like Mariko's actions for one thing. Her first reaction when she's being attacked by Yakuza trying to kill her is to run away by herself; away from all her bodyguards, and to some deserted vacation home. By herself. Congrats woman, you're a dumb-ass, the obligatory damsel/dumbass-in-distress cliche. Sure she's supposed to be some knife-throwing champion but she seems to get taken down pretty easily most of the time.
Then there's Yukio, the other Japanese female in the show. Dear Hollywood, not everyone in Japan has to get highlights or dye their hair to show they're edgy. Please stop using that as a visual cue. Also, didn't help that halfway through the film, she decided to use the same color scheme as ronald mcdonald and I basically couldn't unsee that realisation once I had it. Overall, pretty useless as well. She kicks enough ass until she needs Wolverine to save her.
Then there's Viper. Who can heal arrow wounds by shedding her skin. Which really really makes no sense. But overall the movie makes no sense though it tries very very hard to. There's the part where young Yashida is telling Wolverine he needs to hold japanese swords with two hands because that's how they were used and later on when Wolverine fights the cheap Iron Man knock-off and captures one of the guys adamantium swords, he tries to use it with one hand but it doesn't light up for him. But when he uses it with two hands, suddenly the thing comes alive. Wtf is with that?? The iron man knock-off uses it with one hand with no issues. Am I to somehow believe that it magically needs Wolverine to use it with TWO hands to work?
The action scenes were pretty badly choreographed and just a bit too over-the-top. It just felt like the producers were thinking 'how can we make this the BEST action flick ever' and just kept trying to one-up each other. However, it ends up being so over-the-top it's ridiculous instead of being cool. As for the directing, it's pretty lazy. There was one scene where I saw the gangsters running across the road, only to be hit by a car. Except before the car EVEN reach him, the guy was already folding his body in preparation to be hit. Considering I wasn't even paying attention and I spotted that, how on earth did the director not notice such an obvious mistake? And then there are the instances when the ninja were assaulting this heavily guarded household. Despite the fact that there are ninja directly in his field of vision, on top of this low-roofed, one story Japanese house, the bodyguard has no idea they're there until they stab him in the back. Mm...really?
Overall, The Wolverine is better than the original but it's really a far cry from the more recent batch of Marvel films, like Thor, Iron man, Captain America, etc. I would even say the reboot of Spider-man was somewhat better than The Wolverine. Which is a pity since Hugh Jackman CAN act; unlike another mutant I can name *HalleBerry*, it just seems to be that the scripts are lazily written and the director poorly chosen.
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