Logan (film)

Logan is a 2017 American superhero film starring Hugh Jackman as the titular character. Based on the Marvel Comics character Wolverine, the film was directed by James Mangold, who co-wrote the screenplay with Michael Green and Scott Frank from a story by Mangold. It is the tenth installment in the X-Men film series and the third Wolverine solo film following X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) and The Wolverine (2013). The film takes inspiration from the "Old Man Logan" comics storyline by Mark Millar and Steve McNiven, follows an aged Wolverine and an extremely ill Charles Xavier who must defend a young mutant named Laura from the Reavers led by Donald Pierce and Zander Rice. In addition to Jackman, the film also stars Patrick Stewart, Richard E. Grant, Boyd Holbrook, Stephen Merchant, and introduces Dafne Keen in her film debut as Laura.

Discussion for the film began following the release of The Wolverine in 2013, with Mangold in negotiations to write the treatment for the film and Lauren Shuler Donner returning to produce. After updates followed that December to May 2016, principal photography began that May, and ended that August, mainly in Louisiana, New Mexico, and Mississippi. The film was designed to look like it takes place in the near future, with slight updates to technology and the social environment, with heavy influences from the Western genre, akin to a Neo-Western.

Logan premiered at the 67th Berlin International Film Festival on February 17, 2017, and was theatrically released in the United States on March 3. It was praised by critics for its action scenes, emotional depth, performances, and Mangold's direction, becoming the best-reviewed film in the X-Men franchise. The National Board of Review named Logan one of the top-ten films of 2017, and the film was also nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay at the 90th Academy Awards, becoming the first live-action superhero film to be nominated for screenwriting. Grossing $619.2 million worldwide, it became the third-highest-grossing R-rated film at its release. Jackman and Keen reprised their roles in the film Deadpool & Wolverine (2024).

Plot

In 2029, no mutants have been born in 25 years, and an aging Logan suffers as his healing ability is failing, slowly poisoned by his adamantium skeletal grafts. Working as a limousine driver in El Paso, Texas, he and the mutant tracker Caliban take care of the elderly Charles Xavier, in an abandoned smelting plant in northern Mexico. Xavier suffers from dementia that causes him to have destructive telepathic seizures, one of which killed several of the X-Men years prior.

Logan reluctantly agrees to escort Gabriela López, a former nurse for biotechnology corporation Alkali-Transigen, and a young girl named Laura to Eden, a supposed refuge near the American-Canadian border, but finds Gabriela dead. Upon returning to the plant, Logan is confronted by Donald Pierce, Transigen's cyborg chief of security, who had killed Gabriela and was looking for Laura, who had stowed away in the back of Logan's limo and has powers similar to his. She, Logan, and Xavier escape from Pierce and his Reavers, but Caliban is captured. Pierce tortures Caliban into tracking Laura. Xavier and Logan watch a video on Gabriela's phone, revealing that Transigen created Laura and other children from mutant DNA to become weapons. The children proved challenging to control and were to be executed, but Gabriela and other nurses helped some escape. Xavier reveals to Logan that Laura was created from Logan's DNA and calls her Logan's daughter.

In Oklahoma City, Logan discovers that Eden appears in Laura's X-Men comic and tells her it is fictional. The Reavers arrive, but Xavier has a seizure that incapacitates everyone except Logan and Laura, who kill the mercenaries and injects Xavier with levetiracetam. As they flee, Dr. Zander Rice, the head of Transigen, arrives to help Pierce. Logan, Laura, and Xavier help farmer Will Munson and his family after a traffic incident, accepting an offer of dinner at their home, where Logan drives off enforcers from a corporate farm. Rice unleashes X-24, a violent, mindless feral clone of Logan in his prime created as Transigen's ultimate weapon. X-24 kills Xavier and Will's family before capturing Laura. Caliban sets off grenades, killing himself and several Reavers but only injuring Pierce. Logan is outmatched by X-24, but Will pins X-24 with his truck before dying from his injuries. Logan and Laura escape with Xavier's body. After burying Xavier, Logan passes out. Laura takes him to a doctor and persuades him to prove that the site in North Dakota is not Eden. They find Rictor and other Transigen children preparing to cross into Canada. Laura finds an adamantium bullet that Logan has kept since he escaped from the Weapon X facility, which he once considered using to commit suicide. Logan decides not to accompany them, to Laura's dismay.

When the Reavers ambush the children, Logan takes an overdose of a serum given to him by Rictor that temporarily enhances his healing abilities and boosts his strength. With Laura's help, he slaughters most of the Reavers before the serum wears off. As Pierce holds Rictor at gunpoint, Rice tells Logan, who killed Rice's father years ago at the Weapon X facility, that no new mutants have been born in the USA due to genetically engineered crops created by Transigen and distributed through the food supply. Logan, having found a gun, shoots Rice dead and injures Pierce. X-24 fights Logan as the children combine their powers to kill Pierce and the remaining Reavers. Rictor uses his powers to flip a truck onto X-24, but X-24 frees himself and impales Logan on a large tree branch, mortally wounding him. Laura loads Logan's revolver with the adamantium bullet and shoots X-24 in the head, killing him.

Near death, Logan tells Laura not to become the weapon she was made to be, and after she tearfully acknowledges him as her father, Logan dies peacefully in Laura's arms. She and the children bury Logan, with Laura reciting as his eulogy the closing speech from Shane, which Logan, Xavier, and she had watched in the Oklahoma City hotel. Before the children depart, Laura tilts the Cross on his grave marker to create an "X".