Logan

Movie Name: Logan
Year of Release: 2017

Director: James Mangold

Stars: Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Daphne Keen, Boyd Holbrook, Stephen Merchant, Richard E. Grant, Elizabeth Rodriguez, Eriq La Salle, Elise Neal, Quincy Fouse
Genre: Action, Drama, Sci-fi

Score out of ten (whole numbers only): 5
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Synopsis:

The Wolverine centered trilogy comes to an end, with another film directed by James Mangold, who tackled the previous "The Wolverine". This time around, the film takes place in 2029, and finds Logan/Wolverine taking care of an elderly Charles Xavier, who needs constant medication to keep his powers under control. Logan drives a limousine, while saving money so he and Charles can escape for a safe haven. This existence is disrupted by the appearance of a woman, wanting Logan to drive her and her small child to a safe area in North Dakota. Both Logan and Xavier soon discover that the young girl is an engineered mutant, who has a series of nefarious people on her trail. The young girl turns out to have powers very much alike Wolverine, and they slowly form a bond of trust, as they race to reach out North Dakota, where they aim to reunite with other mutants, and escape their captors.
As the Wolverine series comes to an end, it should be pointed out, that all three films function independently, and their common thread seems to be the character itself. This latest incarnation of the mutant character, references George Stevens' "Shane" (both literally and thematically), and it's built very much like a western/dystopian futuristic film (where the lonely central hero has to save the young girl, who in turn saves and redeems his soul). It's a film that takes time to develop the context of the narrative, further enhancing the characteristics and motivations of the main character (which at this point, have already been explored extensively in all the X-Men films and the individual Wolverine features). However for all its good intentions, the film doesn't define an effective villain figure, and again, feels like a generic film, devoid of a substantial stylistic approach or point of view towards the action or the central character for that matter. The film is successful in capturing the strong performances from Hugh Jackman, Patrick Steward and Stephen Merchant, all of whom are spot on, however this doesn't manage to make the film sufficiently compelling (even if it is an improvement over the previous iterations). This is again a case, where this iconic character needed a creative vision defining an arc for a series of adventures, as opposed to distinct films that somewhat try to tie with other narrative threads on the X-Men series, failing on both levels, both as distinct storylines and tying plot points with other franchise films.