Wolverine

Remember that insane ‘90s cartoon crossover they put together to steer kids off drugs? My memory’s a little hazy from all the drugs, but we might have the next best thing. The voices behind Batman: The Animated Series and The X-Men are joining forces for a new animated series, with a little Ninja Turtle and casting legend Andrea Romano thrown in for good measure.

My recent list of the most dated parts of the original X-Men movie included things like Hugh Jackman’s comparatively non-huge, non-jacked-man physique, Wolverine’s non-stop smoking, and the heroes’ black leather costumes. The list also included the relative lack of Easter eggs; even with about ten major roles in the film, the first X-Men movie is, at least by contemporary standards, a small movie. There’s no sense of a wider Marvel Universe beyond the edges of the frame, there’re few appearances by (or references to) other mutants, and there’s no post-credits scene to tease future films. It is a movie unto itself.

You probably know that Logan is based on the Marvel Comics series “Old Man Logan” by Mark Millar and Steve McNiven. But did you know that Logan really came together when Hugh Jackman woke up in the middle of the night after a long conversation (and a few drinks) about Wolverine with Chappie director Neill Blomkamp? Jackman recorded a voice memo on his phone of what he wanted the movie to look like and eventually that became Logan. That’s just one of the facts featured in the newest episode of You Think You Know Movies!

The internet’s movie rumormongers did get a few things right about Logan, Hugh Jackman’s third and supposedly final solo Wolverine movie. They did correctly predict that Logan’ female clone, X-23, would co-star in the film. They also anticipated that the movie would be loosely based on a Marvel Comics storyline called “Old Man Logan.” Of course, after that rumor was initially posted, it was also publicly debunked by one site. You win some, you lose some.

When Logan finally fades to black, it brings Hugh Jackman’s 17-year run as Wolverine to a close. It is an emphatic and definitive ending, not just to Jackman’s Wolverine series, but also to the X-Men franchise as a whole.

In the tradition of ScreenCrush series like You Think You Know Movies and You Think You Know TV comes a new YouTube series: Top Five! Every month (or so; we’ve got a lot of other stuff going on), ScreenCrush editor and critic Matt Singer will count down a particular topic from the world of movies (and probably write these introductory posts in the third person).

When you go see Logan on March 3, you might want to keep your butt firmly planted in the theater seat after the credits roll, bub. In what is hardly surprising news at all, there is post-credits scene attached to Wolverine’s latest (and last) outing, and though we don’t know what it is just yet, it probably won’t be long before someone lets the cat out of the bag. Until then, feel free to speculate away.

The first X-Men movie opened on July 14, 2000. A child born early that year would have just turned 17 by the time the tenth entry in the X-Men series, Logan, hits theaters next month. That is fortunate – viewers are going to need a driver’s license to get into this movie, which possesses the hardest R rating of any American superhero movie in history. In the past, Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine would swing his razor-sharp adamantium claws and bad guys would simply fall to the ground. There was never any visible evidence of his brutality. There’s more graphic violence in Logan’s first scene – severed limbs, gruesome disembowlings – than in all of the other of the Wolverine and X-Men movies combined.

Celebrities really are just like us — well, Ryan Reynolds is, anyway. Like you, he also wants to see Deadpool and Wolverine reunite on the big screen, this time for a much better film. It took several years, but the tenacious actor’s commitment to getting a proper Deadpool movie off the ground finally paid off (in a huge way), which has Reynolds thinking that maybe it’s time for the Merc With the Mouth and Old Man Logan to get the band back together.

The third and, as far as anyone’s saying, final installment in Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine movies is coming out a mere six months form now, but so far everything about it has remained a mystery. We know that Jackman is in it, but we don’t know a whole lot more than that, aside from a possible R rating. We’re bound to get more news soon, but for now Jackman himself is the only one giving us any clues as to what his next movie will be like.