If it bleeds, we can kill it

Rating: 7/10 (28 July 2013)

This is better than the last go around, but not without a truck load of missed opportunities to do something much better than this.
The Wolverine took me to a nice return trip to Japan without the bad airline food and turbulence sitting in coach for 14 hours, but I wished they would have had more for me to do when I got there. Rila Fukushima was a master stroke in casting but damn near wasted with lots of useless dialog and Tao Okamoto doesn't really have much to do. But along with Pacific Rim's Rinko Kikuchi, I'm glad these great actresses from Nihon are getting the play they deserve. It would be nice if they had more to do than pull upright chop sticks from the soba. Like the actors, rich Japanese references were all tossed as background noise and not put to much use in what is essentially a chase movie.
Even with the Jean Grey angle, there was a better story in here someplace. Essentially, the filmmakers hinted at it but never pursued better ideas in any seriousness. The themes in The Wolverine lead to many interesting questions which would have made a more powerful movie. "How does one kill one who cannot die?" or "Is immortality actually another form of death?"
It would have been nice to see a Marvel movie actually try and develop a character for once instead of two more hours of Hulk-Smash scenes. Oh yeah and the Viper villain was just trash. She fell out of Power Rangers or something. Totally out of tone with the rest of the movie.
Yes, it could have all been better. But I'll say this, it was a heck of a lot better than the last go around. I'll take that kind of progress over none at all.