This film is a prequel—about the origins of Wolverine (Hugh Jackman). It follows Wolverine and his brother, Sabretooth, from their carefree days fighting in various wars (Civil, WWI and II and Vietnam),to personality changes in Sabretooth (turning him into a sociopath) to the ultimate operation that gave Wolverine his Adamantium skeleton.

As a prequel it stinks because it honestly looks as if the writers didn't even bother to watch the earlier films. So, when time and time again the story completely contradicts the previous movies, I couldn't help but be annoyed. Who cares if Wade/Deadpool is little like his character—let's give his Cyclops' eyes! Who cares that several characters were much younger and appeared as teenagers in the first X-Man movie—let's have them be adults in this film that takes place BEFORE the first movie! Who cares that Stryker is not punished at all after he does innumerable atrocities—and the good guys had a chance to finally settle to score! Who cares that the dialog is god-awful and the characters take turns spouting nothing but macho clichés?! And, most importantly, who cares that unlike the other X-Man movies, this one is not the least bit fun or enjoyable! This is a very easy film to skip, as it just doesn't fit into the X-Man world and shows that given a great idea and excellent source material, bad writing and an over-reliance on action (and ignoring dialog and the idea of depth to characters) will spoil the film. Not horrible…but not at all good. As prequels go, I'd recommend "X-Man: First Class".

The first X-Men film was fun and well-made though with a beginning-of-the-franchise-not-yet-properly-finding-its-feet feel; X-Men 2 was very, very good indeed and an example of a bigger and darker sequel better than the original(even if it wasn't quite perfect either) and X-Men 3 The Last Stand while nowhere near as bad as its reputation was disappointing(after being so impressed by the previous two) and a step-back in the franchise. X-Men Origins: Wolverine had much going for it but while it is nowhere near a bad film it could have delivered more, considering that this was an origins prequel story. X-Men Origins: Wolverine does have good things, it's well shot and edited(if a little rapid in a couple of the fighting sequences),the special effects are nicely executed and not used too much and the dark, gritty style of the previous three films is wisely maintained, nothing overblown or static here. The opening sequence is robust and exciting and gives you the sense of "looks like we're in for a treat here", most of the action sequences have tension and thrills especially at the end(which also makes a real effort to tie up loose ends),Sabretooth/Victor and Stryker are well-realised and there are a few good performances. Wolverine may be too ambivalent character-development-wise but Hugh Jackman's charisma and grizzled demeanour is pitched perfectly, Liev Schreiber brings real meat, toughness and menace to Victor/Sabretooth and Danny Huston as the villain Stryker is both classy and ruthless and does them very effectively, Stryker avoids being too one-dimensional. Ryan Reynolds and Taylor Kitsch do what they can and are quite good.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine does suffer however from a lot of the same things that X-Men The Last Stand had. The script is very contrived and in a worse way than X-Men The Last Stand, emotional moments are forced, exposition and any explanations are underdeveloped and any bits of humour are on the broad side(X-Men 2 especially avoided this and had a much more even balance). The story has some good atmosphere and good scenes and has some tension, but it does try to cram in too much and things feel rushed and not as developed as they ought. Gavin Hood does reasonably admirably in the action but very like Brett Ratner he is surprisingly not as comfortable in the non-action scenes, in a way that the writing and story, that should give the film depth, are sacrificed by the action(again mostly very good, apart from ones that did lag and you couldn't always tell who was who). Apart from Sabretooth and Stryker (Wolverine was written much better in the first two films but Jackman's presence did make up for things),the characters are disappointingly written, especially Deadpool who had a lot of potential but disappears just like that and appears even more abruptly much later at a stage where you think they've forgotten all about him. Gambit was also treated fairly insignificantly, and other characters like Blob and Kayla(Lynn Collins' acting is wooden in this part) are pretty useless. It doesn't have the too many characters problem like The Last Stand did but it like that film doesn't develop or write the characters well but not as insultingly. On a side note one positive review said that they couldn't understand why The Last Stand and this got criticised for the characters and the first two get a free pass; actually the first two films have been criticised for under-utilising characters and bad acting in them, namely Cyclops and Storm, but at least they tried to respect the characters and not distort them or deprive them of personality like this and Last Stand did(and this is NOT coming from a comic-book purist, far from it, you don't even need to have read an X-Men comic to have this criticism). Harry Gregson-Williams' score has some excitement and induces some suspense but at other points it's too over-bearing and strident, of the X-Men films this film had the least effective score in my opinion. Will.i.Am being cast in an X-Men film would cause alarm bells and his performance is not any better, it felt out of place.

To conclude, could have been better but it's not that bad. 5/10 Bethany Cox

I'm no big fan of origin stories. I just want movies to get on with telling stories about established characters, instead of going through the motions with stuff we already know will happen. As it goes, though, X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE isn't too bad at all. It's a lightweight piece of fluff that descends into THE PHANTOM MENACE style inanity for the effects-heavy climax, but until that point it's a watchable film, trading on Jackman's easy charm and his engaging character.

There's plenty going on in the film as the story progresses, and some of it is interesting, the rest less so. Wolverine's attempts at a romantic relationship are a definite draw, but the scenes of his rebirth in Stryker's lab feel repetitive after we already saw much of it in flashbacks in the original X-MEN trilogy. There seem to be too many extra superheroes (Ryan Reynolds, Taylor Kitsch) added into the mix who don't really go anywhere and feel like an unnecessary presence. Occasionally the film veers into complete nonsense, like the boxing match with Kevin Durand in a fatsuit: something out of an excruciating Eddie Murphy comedy, not a superhero film.

Still, Jackman is good here; he seems relaxed, happier with the role than in the past. He's no great actor, but he has the kind of likability that made Van Damme a star back in his day. Liev Schreiber also contributes a strong turn as the feral Sabretooth, a villain with more depth than you might imagine, although Danny Huston is nothing more than a stock bad guy. Others, like Dominic Monaghan, are completely wasted. The film is well paced and the effects are occasionally impressive, but a lot of the CGI work is unforgivably shoddy (the bit with Schreiber jumping along a corridor is worse than similar scenes in BLADE 2, a decade previously). Nevertheless this stuff doesn't matter so much when you've got a film as easygoing and likable as this.