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X-Men Origins: Wolverine Blu-ray Disc Review

Brenden — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 02:04:25 +0000

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE (2009, Blu-ray released September 15, 2009 – MSRP $39.99)

A friend of mine dragged me to see X-Men Origins: Wolverine in the theatre this past summer. I was completely prepared to despise it, having read some early reviews and watched enough previews and specials to tell me that this film wasn’t for me. It pretty much delivered exactly what I expected – mindless action loosely connected through ridiculous plot threads and plastic characters. Imagine my surprise when I discovered a lot more to like about it upon my second viewing of the film, on the Blu-ray disc!

This is not a great movie by any stretch of the imagination. It might not even be good. But there’s a lot of fun to be had. And Hugh Jackman is so absolutely watchable in the character that even at its worst, Wolverine ends up being a pretty good time. Unless you’re a fan of the comic books, that is.

You see, I used to read X-Men. And I, like every other comic nerd in the 80s, thought Wolverine was the shit. I was delighted when I found myself loving Bryan Singer‘s interpretation of the characters in the X-Men films. They came across as real people, for the most part. They reacted honestly. The work felt sincere. I didn’t think it could be done but the character of Wolverine in particular had been brought to life so successfully that it became hard to imagine anyone but Jackman in the role. Cut to 2009 and things just don’t feel right anymore. Jackman is still amazing but the movie doesn’t feel genuine nor does it echo what made the character special in the comic. When I was growing up, Wolverine was a man of mystery. And that was a lot of his appeal. He was a man without a past who lived by his wits and his fists (or in this case, claws) much like the Clint Eastwood‘s of Hollywood adventures past. And that selfish, cocky front he would paint would only reveal his softer core after a long process. The lead character in X-Men Origins: Wolverine is one without claws (figuratively speaking, of course). Without any bite or mystery whatsoever. He’s soft and laid bare and with that, so much less compelling than he could have been.

Upon my second viewing of the film, I discovered that if I was able to distance myself from my expectations of the character, from what I knew of his comic book incarnations and from the potential the X-Men films had promised, X-Men Origins: Wolverine is actually quite a fun film. In particular, the first half of the movie works. And almost any scene between Wolverine and Sabretooth (Liev Schreiber) is a sheer delight! The whole mess starts to fall apart after Wolverine gets his metal claws and goes on a road trip, where he runs into random mutant after generic mutant. What a missed opportunity! Instead of allowing us to experience the character struggling with the tragedy of the “experiments” conducted on him, trying to piece himself together and regain the humanity that was robbed from him, we get a couple of scenes of mild discomfort, some glib remarks and crap-load of fight scenes. That being said, if you’re just looking to watch Hugh Jackman act like a badass for a couple of hours, you’ll enjoy the hell out it!

X-Men Origins: Wolverine looks and sounds like a million bucks on Blu-ray! This is almost reference quality material. When you want to show off your home theatre set-up, you could do a lot worse than popping in this disc. And the soundtrack will give even the slickest system a work-out. Wow! This is amazing stuff. With a great sense of ambiance and directionality, the 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack is one of the finest I’ve heard on Blu-ray to date.

There are a ton of special features on the Blu-ray disc but none of them really floated my boat. Perhaps I wasn’t invested enough in the film to care but if I had to pick the most compelling extras, I’d shoot for the commentary track from producers Lauren Shuler Donner and Ralph Winter. They easily out-chat director Gavin Hood, who offers up nothing more than a running description of what you’re seeing on screen in his commentary track. Donner and Winter are a lot more engaging to listen to and have a lot of stories to tell. I also found the “The Roots of Wolverine” featurette kind of fun. It’s a sit-down chat with X-Men creator Stan Lee and Wolverine creator Len Wein. Pretty funny guys with a lot to say. There are also a handful of deleted scenes you won’t care about, some puff-piece studio featurettes, a cool IMDB look-up feature and a whole lot more.

Read a full run-down of the Blu-ray disc and all of its special features here: X-Men Origins: Wolverine Official Blu-ray details announced

[VIDEO] X-Men Origins: Wolverine Blu-ray Special Features Sneak Peek

Brenden — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 19:33:26 +0000

We’re less than a week away from the day Fox unleashes the X-Men Origins: Wolverine Blu-ray upon the world (read our full run-down on the disc here). If you can’t wait to get your hands on it and check out all the special features, we’ve got a little sneak peek at what you can expect, in the special features preview video below.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine will be available on Blu-ray next Tuesday, September 15.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine Official Blu-ray details announced

Brenden — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 13:02:34 +0000

All right. I know. I’ve posted most of this stuff before. But you see, most of that news was either speculation or condensed information. But this is the real deal, straight from the horses mouth. According to Fox, you can take it to the bank that this is the final word on the X-Men Origins: Wolverine Blu-ray disc.

The confusing bit for me is that there’s no hint of the alternate cut that director Gavin Hood mentioned to Home Media Magazine last week, and that we reported on only days ago. Maybe it’s an Easter Egg.

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE
(September 15, 2009 – MSRP $39.99)
Video: 2.39:1 1080p AVC
Audio: DTS-HD Master Audio

Special Features:

Read all about the UK Blu-ray release of X-Men Origins: Wolverine in our previously published article: UK to get X-Men Origins: Wolverine on October 19, Full Blu-ray Details Announced

[VIDEO] Wish List: Marvel Anime on Blu-ray – Wolverine, Iron Man and more!

Brenden — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 21:48:10 +0000

Ok. I really wasn’t expecting this. Marvel has teamed up with renowned Japanese animation studio Madhouse (Paprika, Tokyo Godfathers) and multiple-Eagle Award winning writer Warren Ellis to create four new animated television series to begin airing in Japan next year. The comic book publisher released trailers for two of the anime adaptations of their classic superhero stories last night at San Diego’s Comic-Con International. No word yet on what the other two shows might end up being.

Check out the incredible Iron Man trailer above, and Wolverine below! Let’s hope these make their way to Blu-ray some day soon…

X-Men Origins: Wolverine Blu-ray release date, details and Alternate Cut revealed

Brenden — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 20:18:42 +0000

Comic-con madness in full effect! By the time Monday rolls around I’m assuming we’ll have seen a lot more news like this.

Fox has revealed the release date and details of their upcoming X-Men Origins: Wolverine Blu-ray disc to Home Media Magazine. In addition to the standard list of goodies, director Gavin Hood states that the Blu-ray will allow you to watch an alternate cut of the film:

“There’ll be an alternate structure to the movie that we had at one point which is interesting in and of itself,” says director Gavin Hood. “Essentially, it involved delaying the discovery of how Wolverine came to walk away from his brother until much later in the film instead of it being up front. It was a structure that actually, on paper, felt really good, but when we put it together in the edit room, it felt as if we were holding out on the audience for too long in telling them how he came to [a life of seclusion].”

Here’s a rundown of everything we know so far. More details and package art should hit soon.

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE
(September 15, 2009 – MSRP $39.99)
Video: 2.39:1 1080p AVC
Audio: DTS-HD Master Audio

Special Features:

Read all about the UK Blu-ray release of X-Men Origins: Wolverine in our article here: UK to get X-Men Origins: Wolverine on October 19, Full Blu-ray Details Announced

UK to get X-Men Origins: Wolverine on October 19, Full Blu-ray Details Announced

Brenden — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:40:05 +0000

Like the headline says, you folks across the pond have been handed all the details and a release date for FOX‘s upcoming X-Men Origins: Wolverine Blu-ray disc. It’s a pretty safe bet to assume that we here, in North America will get a similar release around the same time so expect an announcement soon-ish.

Take note of the list of bonus features below. It seems that we’re not given a hint of the multiple endings seen in theatres. Is this simply an omission from the announced extras? Are the multiple endings buried within one of the features (like, are we going to see them in Wolverine Unleashed: The Complete Origins?) Or is it possible that we’ll see them all edited into the film, à la the home video version of Clue?

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE (UK Edition)
(October 19, 2009 – MSRP £28.99)
Video: 2.39:1 1080p AVC
Audio: DTS-HD Master Audio

Special Features:

• Commentary by Director Gavin Hood
• Commentary by Producers Lauren Shuler Donner and Ralph Winter
• The Roots of Wolverine: A Conversation with Stan Lee and Len Wein
• Wolverine Unleashed: The Complete Origins
• Weapon X Mutant Files (in 10 sections introducing the characters)
• The Thrill of the Chase: The Helicopter Sequence
• Ultimate X-Mode
• X Connect
• The Director’s Chair
• Pre-Visualizing Wolverine
• BD-Live (IMDB Feature)
• BD-J (PiP and Quiz)

X-Men Origins: Wolverine 2 Disc Blu-ray listed on Amazon, Makes Bestseller List

Brenden — Fri, 29 May 2009 12:49:14 +0000

Well, that was quick. X-Men Origins: Wolverine hasn’t even been in theatres a month and here’s the Amazon listing for the Blu-ray disc, posted and making the bestseller list! Despite being downloaded five trillion times and making a bazillion dollars in the cinema, the audience is still hungry for more of the ‘ole canucklehead‘s’ latest big-screen adventure and is ready to throw more money at Fox to get them some.

Little is revealed about the X-Men Origins: Wolverine 2-Disc Set in the Amazon listing. We know it’s going to be $39.99 and contain a digital copy (yay…) and we can safely assume the release date will fall squarely in the late October-Early November range. If I were to take a guess at the special features on the disc (I say disc, singular, because we all know what that the second disc is only a DVD-ROM with the digital copy) I’d be shocked if we didn’t see a commentary track with director Gavin Hood, possibly producer/star Hugh Jackman and Lauren Shuler Donner, some deleted/extended scenes and the multiple secret endings. Anything else Fox crams on the disc will be a surprise! We’ll keep you posted as information about this title trickles in…

X-Men Blu-ray Package art and full Details

Brenden — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 15:18:30 +0000

Looks like all 3 films in the X-Men series will be available in triple disc versions individually (SRP $34.99) or packaged together in a box-set (SRP $79.99) on April 21st. Each film appears to contain the special features of the previously available DVDs along with a ton of new stuff. Details below:

X-Men – Disc One – commentary by Bryan Singer and Brian Peck, behind-the-scenes footage (Poland Prison Camp, Senate Chamber, Cage Fight, Battle in the Snow, Xavier’s Office, Logan, Jean & Scott/Classroom (extended scene with optional commentary), Mystique/Senator Kelly, Magneto’s Lair, Bedroom, Senator Kelly Dangles, Cerebro, Train Attack, Magneto vs. Cops, Map of New York, X-Jet, Storm vs. Toad/Wolverine Battles Mystique, Statue of Liberty, Sabretooth vs. Wolverine and Plastic Prison), 6 deleted/extended scenes with optional commentary by Singer and Peck (Storm Teaching Class, Logan Notices Jean and Scott/Rogue, Scott and Storm in Classroom, Extended Bedroom Scene with Logan, Jean and Scott, Bobby Walks Rogue to Dorm/Xavier and Jean in Cerebro, Xavier and Jean in Office and Ready Room), an Easter egg blooper, the Fox Special The Mutant Watch, Bryan Singer interviews (Why He Made X-Men, Bringing X-Men from Comic Book to the Big Screen, Directing Actors, Learning from Actors and The Challenges of Making a Studio Film), 2 animatics (Liberty Head and Train Station), 2 art galleries (Character Design and Production Design), 3 TV spots, a music promo, D-Box enhancement, BD-Live Wolverine Exclusive and HD Marvel Universe trailers.

X-Men - Disc Two – Disc Intro by Bryan Singer, 3 The Uncanny Suspects featurettes (Hugh Jackman’s First Reading, Hugh Jackman’s Screen Test and Character Still Gallery), 3 X-Factor: The Look of the X-Men featurettes (Cyclops Costume Test and Visor, Storm Costume Test and Toad Makeup Test), 4 image galleries (Hardware, Locations, Magneto and Xavier’s School), 3 Production Documentary Scrapbooks (Multi-Angle Train Splitting, Multi-Angle Fight Rehearsal and The Prime Minister of Canada), 5 The Special Effects of the X-Men animatic/film featurettes (Senator Kelly Effects Breakdown, Liberty Head, Toad vs. Jean Grey, Wolverine vs. Mystique and Wolverine vs. Sabretooth), 2 Reflection of the X-Men featurettes (Ellis Island Premiere and Premieres Around the World), 3 trailers (in HD), 9 TV spots and 12 Internet Interstitials.

X-Men – Disc Three – Digital Copy

X2: X-Men United – Disc One - commentary by Bryan Singer and Tom Sigel, commentary by Lauren Shuler Donner, Ralph Winter, Michael Dougherty, Dan Harris and David Hayter, Generation X: Comic Book History featurette, D-Box enhancement, BD-Live Wolverine Exclusive and HD Marvel Universe trailers.

X2: X-Men United – Disc Two – 2 History of the X-Men featurettes (The Secret Origin of X-Men and Nightcrawler Reborn), 3 Pre-Production featurettes (Nightcrawler Attack: Multi-Angle Study, Evolution in the Details: Designing X2 and United Colors of X), 6 Production featurettes (Wolverine/Deathstrike Fight Rehearsal, The Second Uncanny Issue of X-Men: Making X2, Introducing the Incredible Nightcrawler!, Nightcrawler Stunt Rehearsal, Nightcrawler Time-lapse and FX2: Visual Effects), 2 Post-Production featurettes (Requiem for Mutants: The Score of X2 and X2 Global Webcast Highlights), 11 deleted scenes (Extended Wolverine/Deathstrike Fight, Wolverine Kills the Intruder, Mystique in Stryker’s Files, Nightcrawler BAMF to Save the Students, Jean and Storm in the X-Jet, Jubilee at the Museum, Pyro Starts the Campfire, One of the Children is Sick After BAMFing, Rogue Helps the Children Escape, Professor X and Cyclops Escape and Arriving to an Empty School), a Characters gallery, 14 Locations and Sets galleries (Alkali Lake Dam, Cerebro, Dark Cerebro, Deathstrike’s Office, Drake Residence, Museum, Mystique & Laurio, Plastic Prison, Stryker’s Base, White House, X-Jet, X-Mansion, Mutant X-Rays and Nightcrawler Circus Posters), 6 On-Camera Graphics galleries (Museum, Plastic Prison, Ronny’s Room Posters, Stryker’s Base, X-Jet and X-Mansion), 5 The Unseen X2 galleries (Angel (Archangel), Danger Room Set Construction, Danger Room Set Design, Danger Room Storyboards and Sentinels) and 3 HD trailers.

X2: X-Men United – Disc Three – Digital Copy

X3: The Last Stand – Disc One – director and writer commentary by Brett Ratner, Zack Penn and Simon Kinberg, producer commentary by Avi Arad, Lauren Shuler Donner and Ralph Winter, 24 HD deleted scenes with optional commentary (Xavier Voice-Over for Main Titles, Jimmy in Laboratory, Alternate Version: Beast Meets Logan, Pyro Tells Magneto About the Cure Announcement – Clean Shaven Version, Pyro Tells Magneto About the Cure Announcement – Bearded Version, Alternate Version: Guard Yells at the President, Extended Fight Sequence at Jean Grey’s House, “Psychic Battle” Voices, Alternate Version: Bobby & Kitty Skate, Original Version: Jean Displays Her Power at the Encampment, Plastic Weapons Manufacturing, Hank Warns Trask of Magneto’s Plan, Original Version: X-Men Board the Jet, Jean Senses a Scared Little Girl, Magneto Asks Jean to Help in the Battle, Storm Creates a Wave, Beast Breaks a Neck, Bobby Freezes Phat, Alternate Version: Here’s Juggy, Magneto Tortures Logan, Extended Dark Phoenix Destruction, Alternate Ending: New School Year Begins, Alternate Ending: Rogue Returns and Alternate Ending: Logan Returns to Alberta, Canada), 2 HD Easter eggs (Beast Recites Shakespeare and X-Jet Lands in D.C.), D-Box enhancement, BD-Live Wolverine Exclusive and HD Marvel Universe trailers.

X3: The Last Stand – Disc Two – Brett Ratner’s Production Diary, X-Men: Evolution of a Trilogy, X-Men Up Close interactive gallery with stills and video, Generation X: Comic Book History, Fox Movie Channel Presents: Life After Film School, Fox Movie Channel Presents: Casting Session X3: The Excitement Continues (HD), Anatomy of a Scene: Golden Gate Bridge (HD), 7 HD Vignettes (Prophecies, X-Men Politics, Clothing vs. Costume, Make-up Chair Confessions, Weapons of Choice, On Set Effects and Learning to Fly), 4 HD Blogs (Production Teaser, Live from the Danger Room, MARVELous Cameos and Editing Magic), 20 Previz Animatics (Young Jean Grey, The Danger Room, Mystique’s Interrogation, Jean Rises from the Lake, Logan and Storm Look for Scott, Jimmy Meets Mutant Playmate, Angel Escapes, Mystique’s Prison Break, Jean Kills Xavier, Angel Lands at School, Magneto Talks to Jean in the Woods, Logan Fights with Spike, Multiple Man Decoy, Magneto Moves Golden Gate Bridge, Angel Joins the Battle, Angel Saves His Dad, Ash Burns Soldiers, Omega Muties Break into Lab, Juggernaut Chases Kitty and Dark Phoenix Finale), 2 galleries (Character Stills and Concept Art, Storyboards & Models), 1 Easter egg (Colossus Throws Logan Into the Camera) and 2 HD trailers.

X3: The Last Stand – Disc Three – Digital Copy

The Blu-ray Blog » Wolverine

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