Logan is sweeping through theaters this weekend, breaking records and wowing audiences with an epic swan song to Wolverine.
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While this character is important to comic fans, it’s film-version is equally heralded by many across the world. Hugh Jackman has spent 17 years building Wolverine into a beloved hero, and his work has made saying goodbye that much harder.
To honor the incredible run of Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine, we decided to rank all nine of the character’s performances. Some of them may have been small, but they were all memorable to fans of the X-Men.
Take a look through the slideshow to check out these rankings:
X-Men: The Last Stand
There was nothing Hugh Jackman could do to save The Last Stand, but he tried his hardest.
While Logan was still one of the film’s major characters, a lot of the biggest plot devices were centered around Jean Grey’s saga. This took a lot away from Logan, and made him a bit of a side note.
X-Men: Apocalypse
Wolverine’s cameo in X-Men: Apocalypse was totally out of place, and it really made the film feel disjointed as a whole.
That being said, when you zoom in and examine the scene on its own, it’s actually pretty cool.
This is the only chance we get to see the savage Wolverine from the Weapon X storyline. Jackman brought down the house with his take on the animal.
X-Men: First Class
First Class contains Jackman’s shortest portrayal of Wolverine in the X-Men movies, but it’s easily one of the most memorable.
As Charles and Erik go to recruit mutants for the X-Men, they approach Logan in a bar. Before saying much, the Wolverine shuts them down in the best way he knows how.
It was such a small scene, but the audiences roared upon seeing it.
The Wolverine
The Wolverine is an incredible film, but it seems to get overshadowed by the rest of the entries into the X-Men saga. This is mainly due to the lack of other characters that were introduced in the film.
While a ton of people didn’t get out to see this movie, the performance by Jackman was great. He showed he still had plenty of his athleticism, and he carried the entire film on his shoulders.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine
Many people regard this film as the worst in X-Men canon. That may be true, but let’s not discredit the performance turned in by Hugh Jackman.
Jackman took the character of Wolverine through all of the world’s wars, and allowed himself to appear beaten by the enemy of time. The only reason anyone believes the horrors of Logan’s backstory is the fact that Jackman was able to act well amidst a mess of a movie.
X-Men: Days Of Future Past
Even though he was largely-absent in First Class, Wolverine returned to the franchise to act as the focal-point of Days Of Future Past.
Jackman had to pull out some his best stuff here, as much of the complicated plot’s believability rested on Wolverine’s shoulders. He was the everyman in this situation, and the audience required a strong performance in order to connect to the film.
Not only was Wolverine the linchpin between the future and the past, but he acted as such between the audience and the movie. Great work from start to finish.
X-Men 1&2
It’s hard to separate Jackman’s performance in these two films, so we decided not to. Hugh Jackman was charged with bringing Marvel’s most popular mutant to life, and he did an incredible job.
It was difficult to take Wolverine’s tragic backstory, create a battered assassin, and then turn him into the hero of an entire team-up. The story-arc happens a lot in solo films, but not as often when there are tons of other characters involved.
The fact that Jackman was able to rise above the likes of his co-stars is extraordinary, and it’s no wonder he was given the character for 17 whole years.
Logan
Logan is a master class in acting, no matter which way you slice it. Patrick Stewart was devastating and hilarious, Dafne Keen was out of this world, but it was the tragic performance of Hugh Jackman that made this film an instant classic.
It was a daunting task – taking a character that has always been indestructible and slowly killing him off. The movie wouldn’t have worked without Jackman accessing the deepest realms of his emotions, and truly bringing everything he had to the table.
There is not a higher note Jackman could have left the Wolverine on, and fans will be eternally grateful for it.
