wolverine, superman, space marines...a question....

[billc]

The new Wolverine movie is in production and images and trailers are starting to show up and I just have a question...is Wolverine really that interesting a character? I ask this because with his regeneration, his adamantium skeleton and his claws...it is difficult if not impossible to kill him and isn't he less interesting because of that. I think the same thing about Superman and the space marine characters from Warhammer 20k, characters who are so amped up that they are almost impossible to kill and seem to have no fear of death because of it. Wolverine seems like a neat character at first, but then I came to realize...he really doesn't have anything to worry about...and so he can kill at will without worrying about his own safety. Not so with characters like Batman or Spiderman...or even the immortal highlander character Duncan McCleod who, even though he regenerates and is immortal....can still die if his head is chopped off. Just wondering.

 

[Blindside]

Comic book and action movies demographics are aimed at teenage (and slightly older) males. So angry, bad attitude, anti-hero = perfect marketing.

And does anyone believe that those older action movie heroes, thinking of Rambo in particular here, were any more killable than Wolverine?

 

[Sukerkin]

I have said the same about Captain Scarlet - it was Captain Blue, who took many of the same risks but was mortal, who was the real hero.

 

[arnisador]

I was never so taken with Wolverine--but the kids seem to love the claws. It's a visceral reaction.

 

[rlobrecht]

As a person, Logan has a lot of issues, which allows people to relate to him as a hero. And as other posters have said, the claws are cool.

My wife likes Wolverine because of Hugh Jackman.

 

[sfs982000]

There is something about being the anti-hero that attracts alot of folks to Wolverine, it's the same principle with Bruce Wayne/Batman.

 

[celtic_crippler]

I always preferred Gambit, Batman, and the Eldar. :bangahead:

 

[arnisador]

I liked Colossus from the X-Men.

 

[Drasken]

Yeah I was always more of a fan of Gambit myself.

 

[Steve]

The secret to a good hero movie is a credible, threatening, interesting and engaging villain. I agree with you, Bill. If Wolverine isn't actually threatened, the movie lacks bite and the character becomes very flat. I guess my simple answer is that whether or not Wolverine is interesting has very little to do with the character of Wolverine. It has everything to do with the villain and circumstances the character of Wolverine is exposed to.

I personally think that powerful characters like Wolverine provide a writer a huge opportunity. Because Wolverine is so badass, in order to expose his weakness or dig into his flaws, you have to go SO BIG. If I were writing a screenplay for Wolverine, I'd start by asking the question, what is Wolverine afraid of? Whatever that is, dayum. So, then, take that thing, multiply it by ten. Then write the script around that. And then you quickly realize that Wolverine isn't so badass, and the problem of his near-invulnerability becomes a strength in the story. The Achilles Heel story is compelling in large part because it was quite literally Achilles' only weakness.

 

[arnisador]

The way he came back after Nitro disintegrated him ("Civil War") was a breaking point for me. That's just too immortal.

 

[Mauthos]

Mainly agree with the Wolverine and Superman opinion, but with 40K Space Marines, not so much. Yes they are genetically engineered super humans, larger than life, hard to kill with impressive biology but they were created specifically to deal with the threats of a universe filled with lots of nasties.

I read the black library books and there are several of them which constantly show the Marines being massacred by other alien life forms, Orks for one are ridiculously tough and tend to attack it overwhelming numbers. Necrons are basically terminators with the most advanced weaponry around and are able to tear through space marines with ease and of course daemons tend to have their way with Marines all the time, but really want to corrupt them more than kill them.

So in my humble, rather geeky, opinion, I don't think Space Marines are in any way as tough or immortal as Wolverine or Superman, after all even the majority of the Primarchs were killed off or corrupted.

 

[billc]

With the space marines, for me, they have no fear, at all. I think that is more of what makes them less interesting to me than say Gaunt's Ghosts. If you are genetically designed to have no fear, live only to fight, have nothing to lose in their lives, and dying holds no meaning, I think that makes them less interesting. I at one time really liked the space marine concept, but reading the books made me realize they aren't as interesting as the characters who fear death, and have things they sacrifice when they continue to do their jobs.

 

[punisher73]

A very interesting storyline was when Magneto was fighting with the X-Men and Wolverine was set to attack Magneto. Magneto stripped all of the metal out of Wolverine's body and nearly killed him. It taxed his healing factor so much that he was the same as other people. It was during this storyline that you discover that Wolverine's claws were actually bone that the adamantium covered and not something that they created when they made him. It really went into Wolverine's psyche and confronting that he was indesctructable and what that meant.

I think that is one reason why Superman always had his Kryptonite and Achille's had his heel. There is always the one flaw, that one vulnerability that makes the hero just like us.

 

[billc]

The new trailer for Wolverine is here...

http://hotair.com/archives/2013/03/28/video-the-wolverine-trailer/

It is probably all over the place now...

 

[Rich Parsons]

The new Wolverine movie is in production and images and trailers are starting to show up and I just have a question...is Wolverine really that interesting a character? I ask this because with his regeneration, his adamantium skeleton and his claws...it is difficult if not impossible to kill him and isn't he less interesting because of that. I think the same thing about Superman and the space marine characters from Warhammer 20k, characters who are so amped up that they are almost impossible to kill and seem to have no fear of death because of it. Wolverine seems like a neat character at first, but then I came to realize...he really doesn't have anything to worry about...and so he can kill at will without worrying about his own safety. Not so with characters like Batman or Spiderman...or even the immortal highlander character Duncan McCleod who, even though he regenerates and is immortal....can still die if his head is chopped off. Just wondering.

I have played Warhammer 40k, I have not been involved recently with the game is there a 20k version?

 

[arnisador]

I'll be at the movie!

 

[billc]

I thought that was the wrong number...I haven't played it in a while...it was the low fat version...