Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on September 2013

Okay, condescending critic that I am, I went in expecting yet another pretentious, tediously overblown, save-the-planet exercise in CGI, but found instead a modest, surprisingly fun and refreshingly old-school superhero movie done on a human scale (if that’s the right phrase for a flick about an immortal ronin with retractable metal claws). This time, the action, of which there’s plenty, moves to Japan, because (1) there are lots of yucky yakuza, nimble ninja and smarmy samurai here to throw at our hero, and (2) the filmmakers are not unaware of their second-largest global market. The requisite violence is relatively coherent, including a very cool battle atop a speeding shinkansen. It’s the least cartoonish, if you will, of Marvel’s recent offerings, and plays more like a self-contained, J-noir crime story that happens to involve a gaijin superhero. Hugh Jackman anchors the film with an intense, character-based performance as Logan/Wolverine, and is backed up by Japan’s Rila Fukushima and Tao Okamoto as ass-kicking sidekick and damsel in distress respectively. The long-gone Jean Grey character frequently shows up in Logan’s guilt-ridden nightmares, mostly to give Famke Janssen something to do. In useless 3D.