Amph "You think you're the only superhero in the world?" - The Marvel Cinematic Universe

James Mangold's The Wolverine now has a release date: July 26, 2013.

 

When did he get a "the" attached to his name? From his first appearance in that Hulk issue, all the way through his stint in Claremont's X-Men, he was always called simply Wolverine.

 

This is just not so. In his debut in The Incredible Hulk #180, he introduces himself by inviting Hulk to "try your luck against -- the Wolverine!" #181 is even titled "And now. . . the Wolverine!" In Giant-Sized X-Men #1, he's introduced to us as "the Wolverine". In the Claremont series, while he's addressed by others and by the narrator as Wolverine, he often refers to himself as "the Wolverine" (for example, Uncanny #129, "Right now, you're the answer to the Wolverine's prayers!").

He's never been the Wolverine as often as Batman used to be the Batman, but he has been the Wolverine often enough that I don't mind them making that the title of the movie.

 

Wow. Thanks for the correction! I just do not remember that "the" being in there in the Calremont run at all. But I love being shown to be absolutely, flat wrong -- because it means I learned something!

 

It feels too early to be Ragnarok. If it turns out to be true, yay -- Simonson's run on Thor was what transformed me from a casual Marvel reader to a full-on fan, with no less than 9 subscriptions, in the early 80s, and Ragnarok was a huge part of that arc. But I get the sense that Thor needs to mature more as a character and a person before an "End of the World" storyline can become relevant or seem important to the viewer.

 

I don't know if anyone's pointed this out before, but it seems that in the final battle, Mr. Stark will be using a Mark of his suit that shows a circular arc reactor. So the question is, what will happen to the one that is currently keeping him alive, if anything? We know he at least has it for the beginning of the movie based on the trailer. Is it possible that he would keep the new arc reactor and the suit would just display the whole thing rather than the triangular part? Seems a bit unlikely... I wonder if Mark Ruffalo has had any luck in getting off his "Hulk diet" and eating normal food again?

 

Nice poster! I feel that Cap should be more prominent, considering his movie fared better critically and commercially than Thor. But Thor does look really, really cool in that image, so I mustn't quibble.

 

New trailer is very exciting - I no longer care about how good the movie is overall, as I'm now certain I'll have fun no matter what!

 

I understand that it is currently considered unseemly to gush over creative works derived from sequential art in the superhero genre, but...

HOLY GOD THAT TRAILER IS FREAKING' AWESOME!!!!!!!!!11!!1!!!!!ELEVENTY

I now return you to your regularly scheduled intellectual discourse.

 

Great fun! Intriguing that the Japanese trailer shows the alien threat in the opening seconds, while the US/Euro version is vague about the exact nature of the threat that has us "outgunned".

 

Looks like we might have our first poster for The Wolverine

 

Watchmen: yuck.

Let's look at the history of Marvel movies:
Spider-man and the Chinese Web--pretty poor. Didn't that end up being the pilot for a TV series that ended very quickly?
Doctor Strange--from the 1970s. About the only thing I can say in favor of it is that it caused a lot of uproar by offending mid-western religious types
The Incredible Hulk--pilot for the TV show that was less about atomic power and the cold war, and more about a new adaptation of THe Fugitive
Incredible Hulk TV movies--Bill Bixbi was still around and getting bored, so we had one with an awful version of Thor, one with Dare-Devil spliced in. They finished with "Death of the Incredible Hulk"--title was pretty much a spoiler.
And it was quiet for a while.
Then they made a direct to video version of The Punisher and Captain America. Both were pretty bad, but at least Dulph Lundgren as the punisher worked better than the awful Jade/Tarantino movie. Captain America suffered from a low budget and cheezy production values, but at least it wasn't boring.
There was a TV X-Men movie on FOX, but it was pretty forgettable. I remember it because it was about the same time as the FOX Doctor Who TV movie abomination.
X-Men came out after years of quiet. It was surprisingly good.
Naturally, X2 was immediately in the works. They tried to do a bit too much, and the movie has about 6 endings, but so did Return of the King
About that point we had Ang Lee's Hulk movie, which blew chunks and hoovered them back up again.
X3 gets a lot of bad press because it failed to live up to potential. It wasn't as horrible as a lot of the fan-boys whine, and compared to the first 2 it is disappointing, but it isn't that bad.
Spider-man suffers from horrible casting, costuming, and direction.
So did SM2
SM3, well, too many villains spoiled the plot. So horrible casting, costuming, writing, and direction. That said, still better than the abomination that is the broadway musical.
Iron Man came out about that time, and was brilliant. In spite of the hype blowing it out of all proportion, it was still an enjoyable movie.
A new Incredible Hulk came out the same year, and was as good, if not better, but got over-shadowed by Iron Man.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine also gets a lot of grief, but I enjoyed it.
IM2 was... pretty disappointing. Just hard to take seriously, did not have anything to contribute, and the effects were already been-there/done-that.
X-Men: First Class: wasted cast, horrible design work, low-grade FX (now if it had been made back in 1990, it might have impressed), and pretty blah overall. In fact, I'd rank this as the least impressive or interesting of all the X-Men movies.
Thor: Such a mess I don't know where to start cataloging the disaster. Boring story, bad editing, utter non-sense and drivel thrown in to appease those that might be offended by the notion that their children are watching a movie about a pagan god, and special effects weren't up to much either.
Captain America: I know where to start with this one: The Director. Joe Smith can capture mood and atmosphere of a time period, but he has no understanding of pacing or what to do with a super-hero movie. This one is boring as boring can be. And we get cheated from seeing Captain America really being in action--it is all done in one big, sloppy, messed up montage.
Avengers: haven't seen it yet. Waiting for the DVD.

 

Just saw The Avengers. Thought it was only OK. But I am now more excited to see Thanos in the sequel than I was to this movie. After the creds it was just the team sitting around a table eating.

 

Can't believe I forgot Blade (and sequels)--that was the first one that really showed Marvel that they could make a decent movie if they tried hard enough.
Never heard of the Hasslehof Fury. Have to look that one up.

Well, I can only hope that Avengers will somehow make up for the overwhelming suckage that was created by Thor and Captain America, and the mediocre IM2.