James Mangold Says The Wolverine Isn’t A Prequel

It’s been well-assumed that upcoming Marvel movie (and X-Men spinoff) The Wolverine would be a prequel. Well, that’s not true, apparently, and that’s coming from the mouth of somebody who should know: director James Mangold.

The film, which takes cynical, often ill-tempered anti-hero Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) to Japan, has been promised as a sort of film noir with Japanese aesethics, by its director. By that, we hope he means samurai swords, neon lights and Yakuza gunfights, instead of vending machines that sell used school girl panties.

Of the film as a stand-alone, then, Mangold has this to say:

“Where this film sits in the universe of the films is after them all. Jean Grey is gone, most of the X-Men are disbanded or gone, so there’s a tremendous sense of isolation for him.”

“That’s something that for me was very important, that I land in a very specific place in his timeline. I wanted to be able to tell the story without the burden of handing it off to a film that already exists and having to conform to it. The ideas of immortality reign very heavily in this story and the burden of immortality weighs heavily on Logan. For me that’s such an interesting part of Logan’s character that is nearly impossible to explore if you have a kind of league or team movie.”

What do you think? Are you glad The Wolverine is going to be a self-contained entry?

Let us know in the comments section below.

Source: Empire