Disappointment: Origins

I saw X-Men Origins: Wolverine today, bet you can guess me feelings about it. Remember how you felt after Batman Begins? That sort of feeling of exhilaration like you had just gotten off a rollercoaster that flipped you, dipped you and sent you racing faster that you thought was possible? Remember how you couldn't wait to see it again or for the sequel? How your first words comments were "wow"?

Spoiler alert - X-Men Origins: Wolverine has none of that.

They took the potentially the most badass character in the history of American literature (oh yeah English majors, throw up your arms and scream about that) and give him the same generic, cliched storyline you'd expect from a Vin Diesel movie. In fact, I think you could overly the plot of a Vin Diesel movie over this - "A Man Apart" or Generic Action Flick #62, as I called it in my review back in college.

In addition to that, they gave Wolverine the "Major League 2" treatment - hey kids, the world is nice and sunny, nothing bad happens, there's no blood and you shouldn't lose your temper. After taking out a helicopter and 2 armored vehicles Wolverine has a guy he's never liked right where he wants him. Does he go into his patented berserker rage and just obliterate him? No. He walks away and uses a cliche gas trail explosion trail to give us a MichaelBaysplosion (Robot Chicken reference), so the cameras can get a nice shot of Hugh Jackman walking forward with a huge wall of flames behind him.

It's frustrating honestly to see such a great and beloved character be disrespected. And to add inslut to injury, there's a mini Cyclops storyline weaved into the end.

Gambit was finally in a movie. Still can't decide what I thought of how they used him. Accent wasn't that good, and he didn't particularly top out on the old charisma meter either. The fact that he never had a scene where he was even talking to a girl is a big oversight by the writers and would make any casual viewer of the movie think that he's nothing more than "the guy with the cards". Congratulations, you've managed to take the 2 coolest X-Men and make them appear lame.

It's not Hugh Jackman's fault, he did a great job with the steamy turd script he got. Perhaps the writers could have focused more on originality and left out some of the pages that started with "[Jackman] stands in (insert generic scene description) with shirt off, thinking/showing off body". Just a thought.

Rating - 2 out of 5 stars
Cons - could have downloaded it and been disappointed for free, Cyclops, generic and cliche, tame
Pros - Terminator Salvation looks badass, acknowledgment that Gambit exists, Hugh Jackman