10 Ways That Fox Can Make Sure The Wolverine 3 Is An Instant Classic

If the rumors are to be believed, it looks like Hugh Jackman won't be playing X-Men favorite Wolverine for much longer. While that could mean saying goodbye to the character on film for good, most likely Jackman will be replaced for future entries in the franchise. Either way, the actor reportedly doesn't have long left in the X-universe. One concern is the prospect that Jackman could end his term without a truly great Wolverine movie to his name. The Wolverine is promising in places but ultimately disappointing, while the less said about X-Men Origins the better. As Jackman winds down his X-Men tenure, his final movie - The Wolverine 3 - approaches. After two duds, however, it's more trepidation than excitement that we're feeling. According to Jackman, the next (final?) Wolverine film's script is finished, and the movie at present has a tentative release date of March 3rd, 2017. If Jackman's serious about quitting this time, it really will be his last chance to make a great standalone Wolverine movie. So, with that in mind, here are some tips for The Wolverine 3 team to make this one an instant classic. 10) Learn From Past Mistakes This one's simple: if Team Wolverine 3 want to make sure they're making the best Wolverine movie possible, they also need to look backwards for tips on how NOT to do a Wolverine film. Both X-Men Origins and The Wolverine made a good deal of money at the box office, but that alone doesn't ensure longevity; at this point, the pair have already largely been disregarded by both fans and critics for their poverty of quality. The flip side, of course, is that the people behind Wolverine 3 have to look to both Origins and The Wolverine for what worked, as well as what didn't. Origins might be for the most part a bomb, but it also contains one or two solid action beats. As for The Wolverine, the relocation of the character to a new setting and the quieter, more surprising dramatic moments both add to what makes the film feel fresh. There is bad, but the good needs to be acknowledged, too. 9) Don't Overcrowd The Character One of the many problems with Origins is the fact that those behind it seemingly felt the need to make the movie a who's who of X-Men side-characters. Really, there was no room to introduce Gambit, Deadpool and The Blob alongside new versions of Sabretooth and William Stryker. This was supposed to be Wolverine's movie, not an opportunity for Fox to roll out its leftover X-characters. To an extent, The Wolverine is guilty of shoehorning characters in, too (Viper, Yukio and Silver Samurai all have virtually nothing to do in the movie). If Fox want to make a Wolverine film, they should make it a Wolverine film. Having full confidence in the character and giving him room to breathe is the first step to creating a platform for his strengths, of which there are plenty - obviously, or Fox wouldn't want to make standalone films about him in the first place. 8) Give Him A Truly Formidable Foe To put it bluntly, Origins fucked up with Deadpool, and The Wolverine never really figured out what to do with any of its antagonists. It's what's kept the threat level in the standalone Wolverine movies so far so relatively low. And though it's difficult to know what kind of villain to pit against a virtually indestructible protagonist, as Wolverine is, the main X-Men movies have all the same somehow managed it before. X-Men showed us Rogue had the power to drain Logan's strength, X2 presented his match in Lady Deathstrike, while even the weak X-Men: The Last Stand threatened Wolverine with Dark Phoenix. Nothing and no one has yet made Wolverine look vulnerable in his standalones, however (not even the removal of his healing powers in The Wolverine was pushed hard enough). Wolverine 3 should amend that and raise the stakes. 7) Keep It Light One thing that has endeared audiences to Wolverine in the X-Men movies proper is his flippant, coarse sense of humor, and the way the films treat him as arch comic relief. See, for example, Logan raising a single claw like a middle finger to Cyclops, or abruptly telling a young Magneto and Xavier to "fuck off" in First Class. For the most part, this lighter side of Wolverine has been absent from his standalone movies. It's for too long been a desire of comic book films to 'go dark' and make their protagonists into moping, brooding figures who feel nothing but sorrow about their past. Wolverine is troubled, sure, but he's also got another, lighter side. His third standalone doesn't have to be a gag-fest, but it doesn't need to be quite so moody either - playing to the character's strengths also means recognizing that Wolverine's often The Funny One in the X-Men movies, too. 6) Give Jackman Something To Chew On Though Wolverine 3 would be served well by taking advantage of Wolverine and Hugh Jackman's comic strengths, throwing a bit of dramatic meat to the star wouldn't go amiss, either. Origins was incredibly short on heft, and while The Wolverine improved on that slightly, there's still a lot of scope for Jackman to show off what he can do - especially when he's proven elsewhere what a fine actor he can be. This is an Oscar-nominated performer, who's arguably at peak form when playing this character. If this is indeed to be Jackman's last hurrah as one of cinema's iconic superheroes, the Wolverine 3 team owe it to the actor to give him a weighty send-off, and they owe the fans Jackman at his best. Wolverine 3 doesn't have to be an Academy Award contender, but a bit of high drama doesn't go amiss in even the most action-orientated of superhero movies. 5) Allow The Director Some Autonomy If there's one thing to be learned from the Fantastic Four fiasco, it's that 20th Century Fox is not averse to letting multiple cooks get their hands to the broth. Whoever was to blame for that misfire, it's just the latest example of Fox creatives apparently stepping in with their own ideas, regardless of what ever the filmmaker's vision is. Execs constantly disputed Gavin Hood on Origins, and rumors suggest that Fox's control on The Wolverine forced the great Darren Aronofsky to exit the project early. Clearly, this kind of meddling didn't make for good results the last two times Fox wanted standalone Wolverine movies. Giving greater autonomy to directors who have a proven track record in knowing what the hell they're doing - directors like Walk the Line helmer James Mangold, who returns for The Wolverine 3 from The Wolverine - often makes for better movies. Hopefully this time Fox will have the confidence to loosen the reins a bit. 4) Use The Comics As A Blueprint In one sense, The Wolverine was heading in the right direction before 20th Century Fox's obvious tampering became an issue: if The Wolverine feels more focused and thoughtful than Origins (up until the godawful climax), then it's probably because it followed the storyline of one of the more celebrated Wolverine comics before it got taken off the tracks. The Wolverine started with great material, and ended up a better movie than Origins - but, somewhere along the way, odd and unnecessary changes were still made to scupper the movie. Wolverine 3's makers need to understand that a great comic book should act as a blueprint for a great film. Diverging too much based on too many ideas can result in a confused product, like The Wolverine, or a truly terrible one, like Origins. 3) Avoid The Bombastic Climax It's something the vast majority of modern superhero movies - and indeed blockbusters in general - are guilty of. No matter what's come before, no matter where the film appears to be heading, it seems it's a rule that the movie simply has to end with an explosive final action scene, one that tops everything previous, no matter how nonsensical. To see how detrimental this can be to a film, there are few better recent examples than The Wolverine: for the most part a smaller-scale, rougher, more soulful kind of superhero drama, that throws in a ridiculous twist and some half-assed bombastic action for the finale. Wolverine 3 doesn't need to be intimate all the time, but neither does it have to go out with a bang just because all the other movies are doing it. And if there is to be an explosive send-off, it at least needs to be organic to the story as a whole. 2) Add Some Thematic Depth There's a theory that audiences generally don't want heavy themes to go with their blockbusters, but it's not true: the best blockbusters just tend to sneak in the thematic depth while keeping the entertainment levels high. The Lego Movie and Mad Max: Fury Road, two of the best and most successful blockbusters of the past two years, are chock full of ideas. Thematic depth elevates Hollywood movies and keeps them from being just about themselves. Many would argue the best parts of The Wolverine are those that deal with concepts of immortality, unrequited love and human nature. Wolverine 3 needn't be Ibsen, but it would be a damn sight better if it had something to say - especially if it's Jackman's or even the character's swansong. There has to be something that viewers can respond to beyond explosions and superpowered fist fights. 1) Keep The Action Grounded If you think of the great action moments featuring Wolverine, you probably think of the rawer stuff. The bar fight in X-Men, plunging his claws into an enemy's chest in X2, clinging to dear life as he brawls atop a speeding bullet train in The Wolverine. Logan is no doubt a superhuman character, but he's at his best when he finds himself reacting as scrappily and desperately as any regular person would. Any action involving Wolverine has always been more compelling when it's been grounded. Compare his brutish, mano-e-mano fight with Lady Deathstrike in X2 to his green-screen heavy battle with a laser-eyed Deadpool in Origins. Wolverine's a very physical character - it makes more sense for him to be fighting rough-and-ready like a brawler than for him to be acting like just any old superpowered mutant.