X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)
- To accurately portray their role in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Hugh Jackman spent weeks conducting hands-on research and rehearsing directly with director Gavin Hood.
- X-Men Origins: Wolverine utilized mostly practical sets and locations to ground the story, a specific choice insisted upon by Gavin Hood.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine is a 2009 American superhero film directed by Gavin Hood, exploring the backstory of the X-Men franchise's most popular character. Hugh Jackman returns as Logan, tracing his journey from his childhood in 1845 Canada through his service in every major American war alongside his half-brother Victor Creed (later Sabretooth), played by Liev Schreiber, to his recruitment into Team X โ a covert mutant special ops unit led by William Stryker, played by Danny Huston โ and ultimately to the Weapon X experiment that bonds indestructible adamantium to his skeleton. The film was the first standalone Wolverine film and was intended to launch a series of X-Men Origins films, but its troubled reception altered those plans.
An unfinished workprint of the film leaked online a month before release, and the production suffered from well-documented reshoots and visual effects that were criticized as unfinished, particularly in sequences involving a young Cyclops and a widely mocked depiction of Deadpool that bore little resemblance to the comic book character. Despite these issues, Hugh Jackman's committed performance and the film's emotionally effective opening montage โ showing Logan and Victor fighting through the Civil War, both World Wars, and Vietnam โ demonstrated the character's cinematic potential. The film earned $373 million worldwide.
