Australian Odeon

Hugh Jackman's final appearance as Wolverine, which has been released to financial success and critical acclaim, is a purposefully dark and pared back film. Logan features none of the usual 'Planet in Peril' plot points, instead focusing on the personal relationships between Logan and Charles (Professor X) and Laura, a young mutant who has more in common with Logan than he'd like to admit. I was 12 when the first X-Men film was released in mid-2000 and having grown up on the animated series which aired during the 90s I was tremendously excited to see a live action adaptation. A decade and a half of X-Men films followed, with varying degrees of quality and financial success, but always with similar, child friendly tone and content. They also all involved Wolverine to some extent. In fact the only film set in the X-Men universe not to feature Hugh Jackman as Wolverine in any way is Deadpool, which instead broke the fourth wall and started referencing Hugh Jackman directly.

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There exists a plethora of opportunities for young fans to see Wolverine in action in films appropriate for their age, so it makes sense that for Jackman's last time wearing the claws the film would be aimed more at the generation that first saw Wolverine on screen back in 2000. Characters must grow and evolve within franchises or they are doomed to die and the best way to achieve this is to take their cues from the audiences watching them. The violence, which is extreme for any film let alone a mainstream comic book movie, is reflective of the brutal alternate future in which the story unfolds but also a natural progression for a film series whose central character has always been a rage fuelled death machine (he kills close to 20 men in the school invasion sequence in X2, albeit bloodlessly).

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In his 17 year-long depiction of Wolverine, Hugh Jackman has explored more aspects of a comic book character than any other actor has managed. Whoever takes on the role next has the near impossible task of trying to find an angle which was not previously fleshed out by Jackman in one way or another.