Having left the X-Men after the death of Jean Grey (Famke Janssen), Logan (Hugh Jackman) is now living as a hermit in the Canadian wilderness. He is haunted by dreams of his past and visions of Jean. (In the X-Men comic books, Scott Summers was the one who went off to live as a hermit and was haunted by memories of Jean, but since Scott was killed off in X-Men: The Last Stand, Logan was the one who got this story and the visions of lingerie-clad Jean, despite never having been in a truly romantic relationship with her.) Logan is drawn out of hiding by Yukio (Rila Fukushima), a mutant who can predict when people are going to die. Yukio works for Ichiro Yashida (Haruhiko Yamanouchi), a Japanese industrialist who first met Logan during World War II. Logan saved Yashida’s life when Nagasaki was bombed.
Logan and Yukio return to Japan, where Logan discovers that Yashida is on the verge of death. Yashida and Dr. Green (Svetlana Khodchenkova) have apparently developed a way to transfer Logan’s self-healing powers to Yashida, but Logan refuses to cooperate, explaining that immortality is a curse. When Yashida dies, Logan finds himself at war with the Yakuza and also without his power of self-regeneration.
The Wolverine isn’t bad. Even though Logan is no longer as interesting a character as he was when he made his first film appearance in X-Men, the film features some of the best action sequences to be found in the entire X-Men franchise. The extended fight sequence that takes place on top of a bullet train is especially exciting, and it holds up even when you watch it a second time. Unlike the previous X-Men film, The Wolverine makes good use of its characters. The Silver Samurai may be a lesser villain in the comic books, but in this movie, he was one of the few opponents who seem able to match Logan’s combat skills. For the most part, the movie respects the lore of the comic books without getting bogged down in mythology.
Wolverine finally makes peace with himself at the end of this movie. Of course, as soon as he does, Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart show up with a new mission for him. A hero’s work is never done.
Decades before he joins the X-Men, James “Logan” Howlett (Hugh Jackman) is just another mutant with retractable claws and a super-healing ability that essentially makes him immortal. With his half-brother Victor Creed (Liev Schreiber), Logan fights in wars throughout the centuries. When both Logan and Creed (who share Logan’s healing abilities) survive being executed by a firing squad, they are recruited by William Stryker (Danny Huston) to serve as members of Team X. Eventually, Logan tires of being an assassin and goes off on his own. However, both Stryker and Creed have plans for him and all the other mutants that they’ve captured or killed over the years. Several familiar characters appear—Scott Summers (Tim Pocock), Gambit (Taylor Kitsch), and the Blob (Kevin Durand) amongst others—but none of them have much of the personality that made them popular to comic book readers. (Just imagine including Gambit in an X-Men film but not Rogue.) Those who made it to the end of the film were given a Patrick Stewart cameo, albeit one that used CGI to de-age Stewart and make him look like an automaton.
With the majority of the X-Men either dead or cured at the end ofX-Men: The Last Stand, it only made sense to spin Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine off into his own series of films. Unfortunately, 20th Century Fox didn’t understand that the thing that made Wolverine so interesting as a character was that his past was shrouded in mystery. Their first Wolverine film revealed his origin and it turned out to be not that interesting. X2 had been filled with so many hints about Wolverine’s past that the origin story didn’t feel as if it was telling us anything that we hadn’t already figured out. Even the many fight scenes between Sabretooth and Wolverine felt dull because it was established that both of them were essentially immortal and impervious to pain.
Today, this movie is mostly remembered for featuring the first appearance of Wade Wilson, the mercenary who will eventually become Deadpool. There’s very little of Deadpool to be found in this film’s version of Wilson. He tells a few jokes before getting his lips sewn shut. Imagine introducing a character who is affectionately known as “the merc with a mouth” and then rendering him silent for the majority of the movie. In Deadpool 2, there’s a scene where Deadpool goes back in time and kills this earlier version of Wade Wilson (or Weapon XI as he’s called here). The audience I saw the film with cheered.
Just as the world seems to be finally on the verge of accepting mutants, industrialist Warren Worthington II (Michael Murphy) announces that he has developed a shot that will suppress the X-gene, therefore “curing” mutants of their mutation. Magneto (Ian McKellen), Mystique (Rebecca Romijn), and a host of other mutants break out of prison to try to stop Worthington from offering up his cure. Meanwhile, at Charles Xavier’s school, Rogue (Anna Paquin) wonders if maybe she should take the shot and become a “normal” person.
Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and Logan (Hugh Jackman) have an even bigger concern than Magneto and the cure. Jean Grey (Famke Janssen), thought to have died at the end of the previous movie, has returned but has given in to her dark side, the so-called Phoenix. She’s already destroyed Scott (James Marsden), and it doesn’t take her long to disintegrate Professor X. Can Logan and the Beast (Kelsey Grammer) rally what’s left of the X-Men to defeat both Magneto and the Dark Phoenix?
I can still remember seeing X-Men: The Last Stand on the day that it was first released. As an X-Men fan, I was excited to see how the Dark Phoenix storyline would be adapted for the big screen. It’s difficult to put into words how disappointed I was when Jean killed Scott. That one scene told me that X-Men: The Last Stand was not going to do the story justice. In the comic books, Jean and Scott’s relationship was the heart of the X-Men. When Jean became the Dark Phoenix, she proved herself capable of destroying an entire planet, but she couldn’t bring herself to kill Scott. She chose to destroy herself rather than him. (Marvel being Marvel, Jean was resurrected a few years later.) The X-Men films never really knew what to do with the characters of Scott and Jean. They weren’t as flamboyant as Logan or even Rogue, but fans of the comic knew who Scott and Jean were and understood their importance to the series, and having Jean destroy Scott showed that, unlike the previous two films, the third X-Men film was not being made for the fans.
A large part of the problem was that director Brett Ratner didn’t seem to be interested in the characters. X-Men: The Last Stand is a collection of action scenes with none of the small character moments that made the first two films memorable. Kelsey Grammer is a welcome addition to the cast as the Beast. (The Beast always was basically Frasier Crane with blue fur.) Otherwise, this is the most forgettable of all the X-Men films.
Even though the Dark Phoenix saga is one of the key X-Men storylines, it’s never really been given its due onscreen. A second attempt to tell the story, in Dark Phoenix, also failed to capture the drama and emotion of Jean’s transformation. The X-Men are now officially a part of the MCU, so I imagine the story will probably be told again. Maybe the third time will be the charm.
After Nightcrawler (Alan Cumming) causes a national security crisis by teleporting into the White House, Colonel William Stryker (Brian Cox) is given the authority to invade Professor Xavier’s School and investigate its connection to the mutants. Stryker, who not only wants to investigate the mutants but also destroy them by manipulating the same technology that Xavier uses to find them, just happens to be an old enemy of Logan’s (Hugh Jackman). In fact, Stryker is responsible for Logan fusing the adamantium to his bones. That’s a hell of a coincidence.
A sequel to X-Men, X2 tells a bigger and more complex story than the first film. Professor Xavier’s students are spread out by the chaos. Rogue (Anna Paquin) sees prejudice firsthand when Bobby Drake (Shawn Ashmore) is betrayed by his own family. Pyro (Aaron Stanford) is tempted to reject the X-Men’s philosophy of coexistence. After being underused in the first film, both Scott (James Marsden) and Jean Grey (Famke Janssen) are key players here. Magneto (Ian McKellen) and Mystique (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos) return, this time temporarily allying with Professor X (Patrick Stewart) to stop Stryker. Logan has his own reasons to go after Stryker. Surprisingly, X2 is not only bigger than the first film but it’s also better. The actors are more convincing in their roles, the action is more exciting, and director Bryan Singer capably juggles all of the different parts without losing the plot. He even manages to ably set up the Dark Phoenix Saga. In the first film, the X-Men had it almost too easy when it came to battling opponents like Toad and Sabretooth. This film has not only Brian Cox’s William Stryker but also Kelly Hu’s Deathstrike.
Those of us who were shocked when X-Men turned out to be good were even more shocked when X2 turned out to be even better. For a little while, it seemed like there would never be a bad X-Men movie! Later, that’s the way a lot of us would also feel about the Marvel movies. Those were good days.
I saw X-Men on the first day that it opened in theaters. Actually, I saw it twice.
The first time I saw it was by myself. I had been planning on waiting to see it in the evening with my friends Johnny and Kyleigh, but I actually found myself with a few hours to spare, so I decided to go ahead and see it. I watched it in the later afternoon and, after that showing got out, I met up with Johnny and Kyleigh outside the theater and went straight back in.
It’s hard to describe what a big deal the X-Men movie was in 2000. This was before there was a new Marvel movie or show every three months. It was also at a time when comic book movies, following the failure of Batman and Robin, were no longer considered to be a sure thing. Johnny and I were lifelong Marvel fans and, having survived the trauma of The Phantom Menace, were very much looking forward to the X-Men movie. We knew that both Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen were the perfect choices for Professor X and Magneto. Anna Paquin seemed like a good choice for Rogue. But would Hugh Jackman, an actor neither of us had heard of before, be able to bring Wolverine to life?
Even though we both rolled our eyes when we heard that Rogue’s name was apparently Marie, Johnny and I were shocked at how good X-Men was. Today, we take it for granted that comic books can be turned into movies, but in 2000, X-Men took us by surprise by being well-acted, well-directed, and surprisingly entertaining. Kyleigh was not a fan of comic books in general and she liked the movie considerably less than we did. (“Dr. Wheelchair” was her name for Charles Xavier.) But for Marvel fans, X-Men was the anti-Phantom Menace.
Looking back, the plot felt like it could have been lifted from the pages of the comic book. Sen. Robert Kelly (Bruce Davison) is leading a national political movement against the mutants. Magneto has created a machine that will induce mutations in human beings. (The movie opens with a flashback that establishes Magneto as a survivor of the Holocaust. Today, everyone knows his backstory, but in 2000, people were stunned that a comic book movie could also deal with reality.) Magneto and Professor X both try to recruit Rogue to their side, and Wolverine, as Rogue’s protector, reveals his claws and reluctantly becomes a member of the X-Men.
When X-Men was first released, Hugh Jackman was the big question mark, but he turned out to be the perfect choice for Wolverine, even if he did seem to be too tall for the role. Jackman was tough and surly and somehow, he looked credible with claws. He was everything that fans like me wanted out of Wolverine and, once he showed up, I knew it was going to be a good movie. Not surprisingly, Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen were perfect for Xavier and Magneto, as was Anna Paquin as Rogue. Though they’re overshadowed by Stewart, McKellen, Jackman, and Paquin, the other members of the X-Men are played by James Marsden (Scott), Famke Janssen (Jean Grey), and Halle Berry (Storm). Ray Park plays Toad, Tyler Mane plays Sabretooth, and Rebecca Romijn-Stamos excited male viewers everywhere by playing the naked and blue Mystique.
A lot of time has passed since 2000. An entire Marvel Cinematic Universe was created that did not initially include the X-Men, though that has since changed. Bryan Singer is no longer on the A-list. But I still always look fondly on the day that I watched X-Men twice.
“What has happened to the world? You have every convenience and comfort, yet no time for integrity.” — Leopold
Kate & Leopold is one of those romantic comedies that sneaks up on you with its old-school charm, even if it doesn’t always stick the landing. Released in 2001, it catches Hugh Jackman right after his breakout as Wolverine in the first X-Men film, during that early stretch of hits leading toward epics like The Fountain, giving him a chance to shine in pure rom-com mode before the superhero world fully claimed him. It’s a time-travel tale starring Jackman as a 19th-century duke and Meg Ryan as a modern-day exec, and while it’s predictable in spots, it delivers some genuinely sweet moments amid the silliness, boosted by his fresh, pre-typecast appeal.
The setup is pure fantasy fodder. Leopold, the third Duke of Albany, lives in 1876 New York, tinkering with an elevator prototype that accidentally rips a hole in time. His descendant Stuart, a bumbling scientist played by Liev Schreiber, drags him to the present day. Leopold lands in modern Manhattan, bewildered by cars, skyscrapers, and people who don’t stand when a lady enters the room. Enter Kate McKay, Meg Ryan in full quirky career-woman mode, who’s too busy chasing a promotion to notice the fish-out-of-water nobleman crashing at her place. Her roommate Charlie, a slacker pianist, thinks Leopold’s a method actor at first, leading to some fun roommate hijinks.
What works best is Hugh Jackman’s effortless charisma as Leopold. He nails the role with wide-eyed wonder and impeccable manners, riding a horse through Central Park to chase a mugger, whipping up gourmet meals from sparse ingredients, and delivering lines about life’s simple pleasures—like how food must taste good to nourish the soul—with total sincerity. It’s disarming. Leopold isn’t just a pretty face; he’s a walking critique of 21st-century rudeness. When he calls out advertisers for peddling tasteless margarine or marvels at how folks wolf down burgers without savoring them, you can’t help but chuckle. His old-world chivalry clashes hilariously with New York’s hustle, like when he stands every time Kate leaves the table, leaving her exasperated but secretly charmed.
Meg Ryan holds up her end too, bringing that familiar rom-com energy she perfected in the ’90s. Kate’s a high-powered market researcher obsessed with a big pitch for some farmer’s butter spread—ironic, given Leopold’s later meltdown on set. She’s jaded from a recent breakup with Stuart, prioritizing work over everything, but Leopold slowly cracks her shell. Their first real connection comes over a picnic where he waltzes her around a rooftop to a hired violinist, and yeah, it’s corny, but Jackman sells it. Ryan’s got great chemistry with him; you buy their spark even when the script strains. Liev Schreiber steals scenes as Stuart, evolving from jealous ex to unlikely matchmaker, while Breckin Meyer adds comic relief as Charlie, who learns to woo his crush by channeling Leopold’s authenticity.
The fish-out-of-water gags land most of the laughs. Leopold navigating subways, elevators (his invention, after all), and TV commercials feels fresh enough, especially since the movie leans into his culture shock without overdoing slapstick. There’s a memorable bit where he tours modern New York, gaping at the Brooklyn Bridge and declaring it a marvel, only to learn it’s named after his investment. Director James Mangold keeps things light, blending screwball elements with a touch of Somewhere in Time nostalgia. The score swells romantically, and the production design pops—Leopold’s Victorian tux against neon signs is a nice visual contrast. Early 2000s rom-coms loved these fish-out-of-water tales—like The Holiday or Two Weeks Notice—but this one stands out for its sincere take on manners as a cure for modern cynicism.
But let’s be honest: Kate & Leopold has flaws that keep it from greatness. The time-travel rules are fuzzy at best. Leopold has to return to 1876 or the timeline implodes—elevators stop working, chaos ensues—but it’s hand-waved with vague portal talk. Stuart’s asylum stint feels mean-spirited, and the third act rushes into melodrama. Some supporting bits drag, like the endless ad pitch subplot, and the pacing dips mid-film when everyone’s just hanging out. The plot’s contrived overall, with that bridge-jump climax feeling abrupt, but the earnest vibe carries through.
Still, the romance earns its payoff. Kate and Leopold aren’t insta-lovers; they bicker over integrity versus ambition, with Leopold pushing her to taste life fully and Kate grounding his idealism. Their Central Park chase and final ball scene in 1876 deliver genuine swoon factor. It’s not subversive—Kate ditches her career for corsets, after all—but it celebrates courtesy and heart in a cynical world. Compared to edgier rom-coms like When Harry Met Sally, this one’s softer, more fairy tale than reality check. Ryan’s quirky energy bounces off Jackman’s poise, creating sparks that feel earned, even if the career sacrifice lands a bit dated now.
For a 2001 release, it holds up surprisingly well. No cell phones dominate every scene, letting face-to-face charm shine. Jackman’s glow makes Leopold believable as a duke who’d invent the elevator, and Ryan reminds us why she was America’s sweetheart. It’s PG-13 for mild language and innuendo—nothing racy, safe for date night or family viewing. Critics were mixed; some praised the manners humor but called the plot preposterous, which nails it. Watch it today, and it’s a charming time capsule, as out-of-step as Leopold in a subway.
Ever since the Oscar nominations were announced, there have been a lot of people on social media complaining about Kate Hudson’s nomination for Best Actress. She was nominated for the musical biopic, Song Sung Blue, and the argument that I keep seeing, over and over again, is that the nomination should have gone to One Battle After Another‘s Chase Infiniti or maybe Eva Victor for Sorry, Baby.
To those people, I can only say, “Shut up and watch the damn movie.”
In Song Sung Blue, Kate Hudson plays Claire, a hairdresser and part-time Patsy Cline imitator who meets and marries Mike Sardina (Hugh Jackman), an auto mechanic who loves to sing and perform. (When they first meet, Mike has been hired to pretend to be Don Ho at a county fair.) Claire and Mike start performing as Thunder and Lightning, performing covers of Neil Diamond songs and eventually becoming something of a pop cultural institution in Wisconsin. (At their height, they open for Pearl Jam. The actor who played Eddie Vedder looks nothing like Eddie Vedder but you do have to appreciate a celebrity impersonation in the middle of a movie about celebrity impersonators.) Eventually, tragedy strikes. A car accident leaves Claire struggling with pills and her own mental health. Mike, who is 20 years sober when the movie begins, struggles with his sobriety. There are laughs and there are tears. In fact, there’s a lot of tears. I knew the details of the story before I saw the film but, having recently lost both my father and my aunt, I was still sobbing by the end of the movie.
As for Kate Hudson, she’s wonderful in the film and more than deserving of her nomination. Both she and Hugh Jackman give empathetic and sincere performances as the type of people who other movies would probably hold up to ridicule. They’re both eccentric and they both have their demons. Mike is haunted by his experiences in Vietnam and his daughter points out that Mike has essentially switched addictions, from alcohol to music. Claire struggles with depression even before the car accident that changes her life. They’re not flawless. They’re not perfect. But they’re beautiful when they’re performing together. As played by Hudson, Claire goes from being somewhat insecure to being someone who has definitely found her voice and when it appears that she might never perform again, it’s heartbreaking because the viewer understands exactly how much being on stage means to Claire.
As a film, Song Sung Blue runs a bit long but in the end, I was charmed by its unashamed celebration of Americana. Song Sung Blue allows us to enter a world where a bus driver can also be a talent booker and a dentist can double as an agent. It’s a world where anyone with the courage to take the stage and perform from the heart can be a star, if just for one night. It’s a crowd-pleasing film, one that says it’s okay to sometimes sing the popular song that everyone loves. “He has other songs!” Mike says whenever anyone demands that he start his show with Sweet Caroline but, in the end, everyone is really happy when he sings it. How could they not be? He and Claire sing it really well.
One final note about Kate Hudson. I’ve always felt that a lot of her films, for better or worse, were versions of the type of films that her mom could have starred in during the 1970s and 80s. And I do have to say that it’s easy to imagine younger versions of Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell playing Claire and Mike. However, Kate Hudson and Hugh Jackman make both the film and the characters their own. By the end of the movie, you’ve forgotten that you’re watching Kate Hudson and Hugh Jackman. You’re watching Thunder and Lightning!
Based (loosely, I assume) on a true story, 2018’s The Front Runner tells the story of a politician named Gary Hart (played by Hugh Jackman).
The year is 1987 and former U.S. Sen. Gary Hart is preparing to announce that he will be seeking the Democratic nomination for the Presidency of the greatest nation of all time, the United States! (YAY!) Hart is widely seen as the front runner, for both the nomination and the general election. He’s got the youth vote sewn up. He’s energetic. He’s supposed to be intelligent. We are told that he is handsome and charismatic. (I say “told” because, in this film, they seem to be informed attributes as Hugh Jackman is given a truly terrible haircut and his performance here is a bit on the dull side.) Hart announced his candidacy while standing in the Rocky Mountains. His wife (Vera Farmiga) is behind him, even if she chooses not to join him on the campaign trail. His campaign manager (J.K. Simmons) is welcoming new and idealistic volunteers to the campaign headquarters and encouraging them to remember that all of the difficulties of the campaign will be worth it after Gary Hart is elected president. As for the press, they’re investigating long-standing rumors that Hart is a womanizer. “Follow me around, you’ll get bored,” Hart says. So, two reporters from the Miami Herald (Bill Burr and Steve Zissis) do just that they catch a young woman named Donna Rice (Sara Paxton) apparently staying over at Gary Hart’s Florida townhouse.
“It’s nobody’s business!” Hart snaps, when asked about his private life and it’s obvious that the film expects us to take Hart’s side. The problem, as Hart’s campaign manager points out, is that a lot of people are volunteering for Hart’s campaign and have sacrificed a lot to help him out and now, if Hart doesn’t figure out some way to deal with the story, it looks like it was all for nothing. Even if Hart didn’t cheat with Rice, he still showed remarkably poor judgment in spending time alone with her in Florida while his wife was back in Colorado. The film argues that the press went overboard pursuing the story and perhaps they did. The press tends to do that and really, no politician has any excuse not to realize that. But, even if we accept the argument that the press acted unethically, that doesn’t exactly exonerate Gary Hart, though this film certainly seems to think that it does. To a certain extent, this film reminded me a bit of James Vanderbilt’s Truth, in which it was assumed we would be so outraged that Cate Blanchett’s Mary Mapes was fired for producing a story about George W. Bush’s time in the National Guard that we would overlook that Mapes and CBS news tried to build a major story around a bunch of obviously forged documents.
(Of course, if Hart had been running today, I doubt the scandal would have ended his campaign. If anything, Donald Trump’s personal scandals seemed to play to his advantage when he ran in 2016 and 2024. To a find a 21st Century equivalent to Hart’s scandal, you’d probably have to go all the way back to John Edwards in 2008. Of course, Edwards was cheating on his wife while she was dying of breast cancer, which makes Edwards a special type of sleaze.)
As for the film itself, director Jason Reitman tries to take a Altmanesque approach, full of overlapping dialogue and deceptively casual camera moments. There are a few moments when Reitman’s approach work. The start of the film, in which the camera glided over hundreds of journalists reporting from outside the 1984 Democratic Convention, was so well-handled that I briefly had hope for the rest of the film. Reitman gets good performances from dependable veterans like J.K. Simmons and Alfred Molina. But, at the heart of the film, there’s a massive blank as Hugh Jackman gives an oddly listless performance as Hart. The film expects us to take it for granted that Gary Hart would have been a good President but there’s nothing about Jackman’s performance to back that up. It’s odd because, typically, Hugh Jackman is one of the most charismatic actors around. But, as Gary Hart, he comes across as being petulant and a bit whiny.
It’s an interesting story but ultimately, The Front Runner doesn’t do it justice.
What can I say about this 2004 action horror film that can do it justice at just how it perfectly represent what I call a “guilty pleasure”.
Van Helsing by Stephen Sommers (him being at his most Stephen Sommersist) was suppose to be a new action franchise with Hugh Jackman as it’s lead. One must remember that in 2004, Hugh Jackman was still at the height of his popularity as an action star with roles as Wolverine in the X-Men film franchise and, in another guilty pleasure of mine, Swordfish.
This film was suppose to catapult him to the stratosphere and taking the action star role from aging ones such as Arnold Schwarzenneger, Sylvester Stallone and Bruce Willis. Instead Stephen Sommers reached for that brass ring and failed, but did so with a mish-mash of horror properties blended haphazardly to give us a film that tried to be too much yet also not enough.
Hugh Jackman in the title role was more than game to try and prop up the film’s convoluted plot. Kate Beckinsale was stunning as usual and hamming it up in what I could only guess is here version of a Transylvanian accent. Even Richard Roxbrough in the role of Dracula, miscast as he seem to be in the role, gave a campy and scenery-chewing performance that his performance went past bad and circled back to being entertaining.
Yet, for all its flaws, I actually enjoy Van Helsing for what it was and that was a modern version of those Abbott and Costello mash-up with the Universal horror characters of the 40’s and 50’s. One cannot mistake this film on the same level as Nosferatu (Murnau, Herzog and Eggers versions) and Sommers definitely cannot be mistake for the three auteurs who had their own take on the abovementioned film. But Sommers does make thrilling, though some would say repetitive, action films.
Did I turn my brain off watching Van Helsing?
I sure did, but it still didn’t stop me from being entertained…and I cannot ever sat anything bad about a film with Kate Beckinsale in a tight black-red leather corset. It’s against some sort of law to do so.
Wow, this was tricky. The teaser for Deadpool & Wolverine was announced, but not shown, during the start of the Super Bowl. This has sent everyone onlilne to find it. Here, on Ryan Reynolds’ YouTube page (of course, he has one), this was posted minutes ago. Enjoy
Having left the X-Men after the death of Jean Grey (Famke Janssen), Logan (Hugh Jackman) is now living as a hermit in the Canadian wilderness. He is haunted by dreams of his past and visions of Jean. (In the X-Men comic books, Scott Summers was the one who went off to live as a hermit and was haunted by memories of Jean, but since Scott was killed off in X-Men: The Last Stand, Logan was the one who got this story and the visions of lingerie-clad Jean, despite never having been in a truly romantic relationship with her.) Logan is drawn out of hiding by Yukio (Rila Fukushima), a mutant who can predict when people are going to die. Yukio works for Ichiro Yashida (Haruhiko Yamanouchi), a Japanese industrialist who first met Logan during World War II. Logan saved Yashida’s life when Nagasaki was bombed.
