Wolverine

Am I crazy, or is 2009 turning out to be the year of origin stories? We’re just in May, but already we’ve seen movies introduce more than 5 characters becoming superheroes or costumed vigilantes or street fighters or anime gods or what-have-you’s. X-Men Origins: Wolverine is the most recent of the bunch and, as the title indicates, is about how James Howlett—a mutant who can recover from any wounds and can make claws come out of his fists—became the iconic X-men character: Wolverine.

The movie takes liberties to several of its characters from their comic book roots: the most notable change is having Victor Creed (a.k.a. Sabertooth) become the half-brother of Wolverine. Readers of the comic may find that idea absurd and may even start boycotting the movie (by burning the posters, or downloading the alleged leak); personally, I didn’t mind. As long as it can tell a good story, I could give a rat’s ass if it alters the alignment, religion, gender of the characters it’s adapting.

And this now begs the question: did I like it? Well, that’s complicated. I can say that every time I see an X-Men movie, I end up wanting to read the comics (and then I’d read the Wikipedia pages and abandon that plan almost as soon as I started it; seriously, there’s no way I can make sense of the story anymore without earning a Master’s Degree in Marvel-ology). If the goal of the movies were to lure in new readers, then I suppose they did a job well done. X-Men Origins: Wolverine is no different in this regard, but while I enjoyed it, I ultimately felt that movie isn’t the most ideal medium for this kind of story. If it were a pilot episode of a TV series, then it would’ve been great.

What led me to believe in this is in the amount of characters the movie tried to cram in its story. I understand that they were here to pander to the fans of their comic book counterparts—why else was Gambit here?—but should there be so many of them, when they do essentially nothing but move the plot forward? Their brief appearances would’ve been fine as teasers had there been any succeeding episodes following this one, but this isn’t a TV series. It may take years—as opposed to a week—for its Emma Frost, Gambit, Deadpool, and Sabertooth to become well-developed characters, or it may never happen.