A mutant who never died, never aged, and never was destroyed—Wolverine, known for his incredible claws and healing factor, regrets his immortality. The sixth film of the X-Men series and the second of the Wolverine trilogy, The Wolverine, was directed by James Mangold. This movie helped the X-Men franchise recover from the damages of The Last Stand and X-Men Origins: Wolverine. It was the first time Wolverine was shown in Japan, where the comics have his remarkable adventures in Japan, and the writers chose this path. Characters like Silver Samurai, Yukio, and Viper appeared, and Logan overcame the trauma of The Last Stand. Today’s article is about The Wolverine, released in 2013. This film focused on Wolverine’s trauma, where he suffers from his immortality.
The story starts in the Nagasaki atomic bombing camp in 1945, where he saved the life of an officer named Ichiro Yashida by shielding him from the blast. Fast forward to the present, Logan repeatedly dreams of Jean, the mutant he loved most and had to kill. A mutant named Yukio finds him and takes him to Tokyo to Ichiro Yashida, the owner of Yashida Technology, who is dying of cancer. In Tokyo, Logan meets Ichiro’s son Shingen and his granddaughter Mariko. Ichiro tells Logan that he would take the curse of his immortality so that Logan can die. Logan did not want to pass this curse to his friend, so he refused, and that night, Ichiro’s doctor, Dr. Green, poisons Logan, but he thinks he is dreaming. The next day, Ichiro dies, and at his funeral, Yakuza try to kidnap Mariko, but Logan saved her, and both fall in love. Another problem starts, Logan’s body isn’t healing as quickly as it should. Yukio comes to Logan when the Yakuza kidnap Mariko. Then Logan uncovers Mariko’s fiancé’s and her father Shingen’s plan, realizing Ichiro left all his property to Mariko. Logan and Yukio use Ichiro’s X-ray machine, where Logan sees a robotic parasite suppressing his healing factor. Logan removed the device himself. He then killed Shingen and went to save Mariko. Ichiro’s bodyguard, Harada, comes to Ichiro’s birthplace, where ninjas capture Logan, and Dr. Green reveals her plan to extract his healing factor and introduces him to the Silver Samurai. Harada frees Logan, Yukio ends Dr. Green, the Silver Samurai awakens and cuts Logan’s adamantium claws with his adamantium katana and starts extracting his healing abilities, revealing that he is indeed Ichiro, who faked his own death. Mariko intervenes and strikes Ichiro with Logan’s adamantium claws. Logan regenerates his bone claws and killed Ichiro, overcoming his trauma related to Jean.
The movie, costing Fox $120 million to produce, earned $414 million worldwide, with an IMDb rating of 6.7 out of 10 and a Rotten Tomatoes score of 71%. This movie restored fans’ faith in Wolverine, and audiences demanded more solo Wolverine adventures. Hugh Jackman was going to wear Wolverine’s signature yellow costume even in an alternate ending filmed where Yukio gives Wolverine his yellow mask and gloves, but this scene was added as a bonus feature in the Blu-ray box. Watching the movie’s story, you might wonder how and where this costume fits, but in the upcoming Deadpool and Wolverine, this costume looks so natural that Hugh Jackman himself said he should have done this earlier. To prepare for this movie, Hugh Jackman contacted Dwayne The Rock Johnson for advice on bulking up. Rock suggested he gain one pound a week for the next six months, where he had to consume 6,000 calories a day. Later, Hugh Jackman believed he achieved the physique needed for the movie, something he didn’t have time for in the previous five movies. This time he had enough time to get in shape for his shirtless scenes, looking as ripped as possible, for which he adopted a dehydration diet where he didn’t consume any liquids 36 hours before shooting the shirtless scene, causing him dizziness and headaches, but he was happy with the end result. Throughout the movie, Wolverine does not use the name Wolverine until he kills Shingen, an homage to the Old Man Logan storyline where Logan does not use this title until his enemies force him to. In the movie, we meet two mutants, Yukio and Viper, and besides them, we meet Harada, who was Ichiro’s bodyguard. Here, Harada was human with fighting abilities, while in the comics, it’s the opposite—Harada is a mutant, and Yukio and Viper are normal humans with enhanced fighting abilities.
Jessica Biel was approached for the role of Viper, but she declined. The actress playing Yukio, Rila Fukushima, has short black hair similar to her real hair, but she was surprised to learn that she had to dye her hair bright red. James Mangold, the director, was surprised that 20th Century Fox let him do as he wished without any studio pressure to tie the movie to the X-Men movies, and Mangold set out to make a separate Wolverine movie. During production, the director connected the movie to The Last Stand’s Jean Grey storyline, and the movie became a sequel to The Last Stand, with the mid-credit scene directly connecting to its sequel, Days of Future Past.
Hugh Jackman had discussions with James Mangold about making the movie R-rated to advance two more cuts, but ultimately the movie was made PG-13 with as much violence as needed. The R-rating was basically because the director initially hired was doing heavy romantic scenes, which the studio did not approve, and a new director was brought in. The stunts shown in the movie were braver and more grounded, a first for the X-Men franchise, where stunts were made more practical and efforts were made not to rely too much on CGI in post-production like the previous movie X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
According to Hugh Jackman, the major theme of the movie was that Wolverine is surrounded by death yet cannot die because of his healing abilities—all his close ones, Professor X, Jean, are all dead, and that’s why he’s moved away from the mutant school. But in a place like Japan, where honor and traditional customs are highly valued, the character Wolverine is making his way as an outsider who accepts his curse and meets new challenges.
The movie was released in Japan a month after its wide release in mid-September because in August, the anniversaries of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic attacks are observed, making the movie’s release insensitive; thus, the release was delayed.
Famke Janssen’s cameo as Jean Grey was filmed in three days. According to Hugh Jackman, Wolverine’s most important relationship was with Jean, and she was killed in The Last Stand, but in this movie, her repeatedly appearing to Wolverine is very important so that he can confront himself.
This is the first X-Men movie to be in 3D and IMAX, with an extended version even in the 3D Blu-ray release with an unrated cut. In the movie, Yukio predicts how Wolverine will die, saying that when he dies, his chest will be open, and his heart will be in his hand. Technically, Wolverine cannot die like that; his healing factor would immediately give him another heart, but throughout the movie, Yukio fears this thing. However, when Wolverine dies later in Logan, his healing factor is weakened, his chest is open, and instead of his heart, his daughter’s hand is in his hands.
