Following Disney’s acquisition of 21st Century Fox, Marvel Studios now has the film rights to the X-Men characters. Kevin Feige hasn’t made any specific promises, but he has teased that mutants are on their way to the MCU’s slate is already pretty packed and the film industry is currently on hold, but it’s coming.
Hugh Jackman is remaining retired from the role of Wolverine, which means the character will be rebooted for the MCU. Here are 10 ways that the MCU’s version of Wolverine can differentiate itself from Jackman’s portrayal.
Cast A Shorter, Gruffer Actor
No Marvel fan will contest that Hugh Jackman made for the perfect Wolverine from a performance standpoint. He got the character and gave every movie his all. But he didn’t quite have the right look to play Wolverine. In the comics, Logan is short, stout, and gruff. Jackman is tall, chiseled, and handsome.
The MCU has had great success in the past with comics-accurate portrayals of characters, and the best way to differentiate the new Wolverine from the last one is to stick closer to the comics with the casting.
Team Him Up With Other Marvel Heroes
The most obvious way for the MCU to differentiate its version of Wolverine from Hugh Jackman’s version is simply to take advantage of the creative possibilities of the MCU. In Fox’s X-Men franchise, Jackman’s Wolverine’s team-ups were limited to other mutants.
In the MCU, he can team up with Spider-Man or the Hulk or Thor. The possibilities are endless. Wolverine is one of Marvel’s most prominent icons; the new incarnation of the character should be thrown headfirst into the MCU’s shared universe.
One Streamlined Of His Origin Story
As great as Hugh Jackman’s performance as Wolverine was, he was always let down by the franchise’s inconsistent timeline. Details of his origin story were constantly being changed in a franchise that insisted on rebooting itself after every crushing failure.
From the flashbacks in X2 to the incoherent script of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Wolvie never had one streamlined of his origin story. Most of the MCU’s characters do, though, so Logan’s origins are in safe hands.
R-Rated Solo Movies From The Offset
It’s fair to say that the MCU will make a few Wolverine solo movies, so that Disney can get some bang for its buck on the 21st Century Fox acquisition. Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine enjoyed one terrible PG-13 solo movie, one pretty good PG-13 solo movie, and one breathtaking R-rated solo movie.
It wasn’t the R rating alone that made Logan one of the best comic book movies ever made, but it was the R rating that gave Jackman and James Mangold the freedom to explore the darker, more violent side of the character – in other words, what makes the character fun – so the MCU should just make R-rated Wolvie solo movies from the offset. The X-Men team-ups should still be rated PG-13, for obvious reasons, but Wolverine’s solo movies shouldn’t.
Avoid A Romantic Storyline With Jean Grey
A huge chunk of Hugh Jackman’s arc as Wolverine was dedicated to his doomed romance with Jean Grey. From her transformation into Phoenix to the universe’s pesky habit of making terrible things happen to the people Logan loves, the Wolverine/Jean romance got plenty of mileage in Fox’s X-Men franchise.
If the catastrophic Dark Phoenix taught us anything, it’s that X-Men movies should focus on telling untold stories. Wolvie’s MCU arc needs to tell some new tales, and there are decades of untapped comic books to draw on.
Give Him A Classic Yellow Spandex Costume
The black leather suits given to the X-Men in Bryan Singer’s initial movies were always a point of contention for Marvel fans. In the comics, the team’s costumes are bright and colorful, and the new X-Men reboot should embrace that.
It’s not easy to make yellow spandex that doesn’t look silly, but if the MCU’s costume team can make a comics-accurate Scarlet Witch costume work, they can make a comics-accurate Wolverine costume work.
Confront Him With Previously Unseen Villains
The X-Men have a huge rogues’ gallery brimming with rich, interesting villains. The new X-Men movies don’t have to keep recycling the same villains – there are a ton to choose from.
The new version of Wolverine shouldn’t just fight a new version of a villain we’ve seen him fight before. Let’s see some new X-Men villains on the big screen: Mister Sinister, Omega Red, Daken.
Don’t Use Him As A Cheap Gimmick
the cameo appearance by young Wolverine in X-Men: Apocalypse? It stopped the movie dead and added nothing to the plot or the characters. It was just there because fans loved Hugh Jackman as Wolverine and didn’t care for almost anything else that was going on in Apocalypse.
In the MCU, Wolverine should never be forced into a movie as a cheap gimmick. The character deserves a lot better than that.
Start With An Older Logan
To say that Hugh Jackman went out on a high note with his stint as Wolverine would be an understatement. Logan was the perfect ending for his incarnation of the character, as a hero we’d seen as invincible for years became aged and fallible. The reboot shouldn’t build to another “Old Man Logan” pastiche; that would be derivative.
When Jackman’s arc began, his Wolverine was young and somewhat optimistic (at least for Wolverine), just starting out as a mutant. The new version of the character can start out old and experienced (although this might not fit in with the MCU’s established history).
Give The Other X-Men Room To Breathe
Wolverine became the star of Fox’s X-Men franchise, mainly because Hugh Jackman was so popular and the studio wanted to be able to put him front and center on the posters. But Wolverine is hardly the leader of the X-Men in the comics. He’s a side character who butts heads with his fellow X-Men, particularly Cyclops.
The new crop of X-Men movies should give interesting on-screen incarnations of characters like Kitty Pryde and Rogue and Nightcrawler more time to develop.
