3/10Every once in a while, a movie appears which plays like it was created within the bowels of a randomizing machine. "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" is indeed the latest offering from the Random Machine (which I'm beginning to think might be housed somewhere inside a 20th Century Fox building). Ranging from kind of stupid to mind-numbingly stupid, this movie really tested my patience. In all seriousness, if I hadn't seen this with other people, I would have walked out.
I am not one of those people who seeks to belittle comic book or superhero movies because I feel they are inherently inferior to more "serious" fare. I like a lot of them, the good ones and the campy ones, The Dark Knight and Blade II, Iron Man and Sin City, and even X3 to a degree. But sometimes comic book movies can veer into train wreck territory. Ghost Rider rests comfortably within the train wreck category, accompanied by movies like Catwoman, Punisher: War Zone, etc. Well they need to make room because here comes "Wolverine," sputtering and lurching its way into the pantheon of dumbass comic book movies.
I'll briefly mention some positives in this movie. I say briefly because there are very few positives. The acting is decent overall, except for Huston, who plays Stryker. Huston's delivery is consistently annoying, the way he whispers all of his lines no matter the situation. The six minutes of screen time that Ryan Reynolds has is probably the best part of the movie. It was certainly the only part that caused me to laugh with the movie (the alternative being laughing at it, which unfortunately happened quite a bit). I would like to know who made the decision to give Reynolds such limited screen time. It was perhaps one of the dumbest decisions ever made in any comic book movie that I can remember. Did they even test screen this? Everyone I've talked to about "Wolverine" agrees that Reynold's Wilson was the best part of the movie, yet he has less screen time than the old man (Pa Kent) who gives Logan the leather jacket. The only other positive I can think of is the opening montage which shows Logan and Victor fighting in various wars.
Now to the negatives. Where to start? Where to finish? The writing was abysmal. There were countless cliches in "Wolverine's" dialogue. From "I'm so cold" to "This isn't what we signed up for," the writers should be ashamed of themselves. They took the path of least intelligence at every fork in the road. And the story itself is truly awful. Besides the plot element of the Adamantium infusion, which was already sitting there like a hanging curveball for the writers to smack out of the park, the story was basically nonsensical. Nothing that happens really happens for any particular reason, except that it helps to set up the next (poorly done) action scene.
The CGI in "Wolverine" is awful as well. And while my judgment of the writing might be subjective, the effects I saw are terrible by any standard. How can Wolverine's claws look more real in "X-Men," which came out in 2000, than they do in "X-Men Origins: Wolverine," which came out in 2009!?!? I just don't understand where the $150 million dollar budget went. When the various characters leap around (which they all do, by the way, a lot - apparently every mutant has the power to leap and float), the effects look blurry and choppy. They reminded me of The Matrix Reloaded, where the fight scenes looked like PS2 cutscenes, except these effects were worse.
I could go on and on, but you get the idea. Every aspect of "Wolverine" reeks of laziness. Lazy writing, lazy plotholes, lazy visual effects, lazy directing, lazy cinematography, lazy editing, etc. Honestly, watching this movie felt like watching a rough cut that was maybe 75% finished and put out to meet a deadline.
I can't end this review without making a short list of the "facepalmingly" stupid parts of "Wolverine":
1) The Adamantium bullet - of all the ways to make Wolverine lose his memories, they chose this. How Stryker could know that an adamantium bullet to Wolverine's brain would interact with his healing factor to result in memory loss, I'll never know. All I know is that part was stupid. And I suppose he managed to hit the part of Wolverine's brain that controls memory because he's a neurological expert as well as an expert marksman. **rolls eyes**
2) Wolverine somehow blocks Weapon XI's optic blasts with his claws and the claws absorb the heat from the blast, heating up the claws and turning them red!!! Lucky for Logan the blast doesn't slip through the the gaps in his claws!! **rolls eyes**
3) Weapon XI's optic blasts tear through the concrete walls of the reactor like it's paper, but when he shoots Victor square in the chest, Vic's clothes don't even singe or tear. **rolls eyes**
4) The helicopter from the big action sequence blows up when it hits the ground, and then it somehow blows up again when Wolverine lights the trail of fuel. Did the helicopter have two fuel tanks or what? **rolls eyes**
5) The scene where the "special team" steals the meteorite in Africa. The guy from the Black Eyed Peas can teleport, but screw that, we're gonna show off how much the team can leap and float around. And Wolverine doesn't do anything to help; he justs stands there asking why they're there. **rolls eyes**
6) Kayla, Wolverine's love interest, tells Wolverine a pointless Native American myth for no other reason than to set up Logan choosing the name "Wolverine" later in the movie. However, the story did set up the most laughable line in the movie, "I thought you were the moon and I was your Wolverine. But you were the trickster and I was your fool." ROTFL and **rolls eyes**
7) Wolverine knocks Gambit out with an elbow to the face. Then he talks to Victor for a moment. Cut to Gambit RUNNING ON THE WALLS OF A NEARBY BUILDING OMG!!! Then he jumps down and lands behind Wolverine IN THE EXACT SAME SPOT WHERE HE HAD BEEN STUNNED BY THE ELBOW!!! Did he get up and run off just to make another grand entrance via leaping and floating? **rolls eyes**
8) Wolverine boxes the Blob for NO REASON!!! The filmmakers just wanted another action scene. It was like a terrible boss battle in a video game. The only reason Blob gave up any information was because Wolverine threatened him with his claws. So why did he box Blob in the first place? **rolls eyes**
9) Stryker sends Agent Zero after Wolverine. Wolverine kills Zero. Later Stryker reveals that the only thing that can stop Wolverine is Adamantium bullets. SO WHAT WAS THE POINT OF SENDING AGENT ZERO!!???!? Oh yeah, we needed another action sequence. **rolls eyes**
10) Stryker has to control Weapon XI with a basic DOS prompt with commands like "ATTACK" and "DECAPITATE." Really? You have the technology to splice about ten different samples of mutant DNA into one organism, Weapon XI, but you have to tell Weapon XI to attack via a DOS prompt? **rolls eyes**
There is much more that is wrong with "X-Men Origins: Wolverine," but just take my word for it that if you see this movie, you'll wish you hadn't.
