'O Logan, Where Art Thou?', a.k.a. another Fox-Marvel movie misses the point

A few days of thinking about the new trailer to "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" that officially hit the web Monday have me downgrading the clip from my first impressions. In case you missed it, here's the trailer:

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE HD


There's a lot going on in this clip, but this appears to be a great example of how movies sometimes try really hard to be faithful to the comics and yet somehow still get it completely wrong. These clips show interesting bits and pieces of the character's comic book history, starting with "Origin" and progressing to the pivotal Silver Fox-Sabretooth story that first appeared about 20 years ago in Wolverine #10. So far, so good.

What's most problematic is the introduction of William Stryker and the implication that Logan turned to the Weapon X program intentionally to get back at Sabretooth. Stryker was made part of Logan's past in the franchise-best "X2," but this particular change is a major one for the character that significantly alters his entire motivation and points out just how much the character has changed (and not necessarily for the better) in his nearly 35-year history.

The first real definition of the character came at the hands of Chris Claremont, who wrote Logan almost esclusively from 1975 to the early 1990s, and evolved Logan from a wild man whose instinct for mayhem won out over brain power to the famed "failed samurai" of the Frank Miller-drawn 1982 miniseries. Much of the character's appeal to fans came from Claremont's resistance to nail down an origin or a past for Logan — in retrospect, a great idea for the way it teased fans used to having every aspect of a character's life and motivation fully laid out before them. Logan himself stated on many occasions that he cared not a whit for who was responsible for what happened to him or for digging up his lost memories. He lived in the present, and eventually a little bit for the future.

But Wolverine's popularity couldn't keep writers from trying to fill in Logan's past. Barry Windsor Smith's "Weapon X" was the first, but while it portrayed the event of how Logan got his claws it was wisely light on the details of who was responsible. What was definitely clear was that this was done to him against his will — and the trauma it caused largely responsible for his lack of control over himself and his lost memories. This still worked within the overall X-Men universe, as the forces that experimented on Logan against his will was another example of the mutant-human conflict.

So having Logan turn to Stryker and willingly undergo the Weapon X procedure and join Stryker's special team is a radical change. Instead of a wild loner, or victim of experimentation, Logan's now motivated by his desire for revenge on Sabretooth. This is a more conventional character, but that's not surprising given the direction the comics (and the movies) have been taking for years now. Fox could have made a much more distinctive movie if they'd gone the Japan route — but it appears that's the last thing the studio expects from its superhero franchises.

Looking at the rest of the trailer, the sheer number of mutants appearing in this film is impressive, though in danger of treading on the comics' unfortunate tendancy to connect everyone to everyone else at every opportunity by throwing in Emma Frost and what looks like a young Storm. (Young Scott Summers is apparently in the movie, too.) Gambit looks good, though I'm still not sold on Liev Shrieber as Sabretooth. And the final line Jackman delivers just lacks the kind of aggression you'd expect from the character.

In the meantime, we've got "The Spirit," which is increasingly looking like niche fare (I haven't seen it yet), and "Watchmen," which is becoming so big a movie that it likely will affect how Hollywood treats superhero movies for years to come — for good or ill.