Wolverine is Superman 2 in disguise


The first full trailer for The Wolverine has been released, and it opens with an apology.

Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine is sorry. Not for the first Wolverine-focused X-Men: Origins film, which key creatives have acknowledged failed to live up to its potential, but to Jean Grey. Famke Janssen is back for a cameo as her character from the first three X-Men films and this trailer may well include all the footage of her that is in the film.

Scroll down to watch the trailer

Once Jackman follows Grey’s order to “wake up!” we realise we are in present day Japan, and we get our first chance to judge whether Sydney can double for the Empire of the Sun. For nearly every scene in this trailer, from the snowy village to the Japanese funeral was shot in and around the Australian city.

As for the plot Wolverine is promised an end to eternity. He can be made mortal.

Yes, that’s right, it’s Superman 2.

Only Zod has been replaced with the Silver Samurai and it doesn’t look like Wolverine is planning on kneeling before him.

Jackman has said that The Wolverine is not a sequel to 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine, rather it is a standalone film based loosely on a 1982 comic book Wolverine mini-series created by Chris Claremont and Frank Miller.

James Mangold, who directed Knight and Day and 3:20 to Yuma is the engineer driving this particular train, and with an ensemble cast including Japanese actress Rila Fukushima, model Svetlana Khochenkova, Will Yun Lee and Hiroyuki Sanada possibly his greatest achievement – so far – comes in one of the final moments in the trailer.

Mangold’s vision of the Silver Samurai makes Wolverine look like a chipmunk.

The Wolverine is released in New Zealand on July 25.

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– Sydney Morning Herald

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