You know what was a great prequel movie from 2009? J.J. Abrams’s Star Trek. I absolutely love that movie, it’s honestly my favorite from both the Star Trek and Star Wars franchises. It’s such a packed, exhilarating, funny and moving reboot, one that I can easily watch over and over again multiple times. Star Trek also had something in common with UP, another great movie from 2009: it had a musical score by Michael Giacchino that reduced me to tears within the first ten minutes. The sacrifice of George Kirk in the prologue of Star Trek was so moving, it’s no wonder Chris Hemsworth became Thor on the back of his limited screentime there.
But some people hate it and think it’s a bastardization of the franchise that brought us Voyager, Enterprise and um, The Motion Picture. They’re wrong, but I know how they feel. I remember a terrible prequel movie from 2009 called X-Men Origins: Wolverine. After renting and watching it, my brother and I turned to each other and declared, “That wasn’t canon.” We loved X2, and we both knew Wolverine did not lose his memories because of an adamantium bullet. It was frustrating to see Wolverine’s traumatic origin story turned into a pale, focus group-tested version of X-Men 4.
Ultimately, what can we say about it ten years later? That, well, at least the Wolverine trilogy got its bad entry out of the way, unlike the original and First Class series? That it’s a shame this was Liev Schreiber’s only pass at Sabretooth, or thank God that it was erased by Days of Future Past? Or that it’s only useful as the answer to the pub trivia contest questions, “What was the first Deadpool movie called?,” “Which superhero did Troye Sivan play?,” or “What was Multiversity Comics founded to talk about?”
Here’s another trivia question for you: do you know what comic book movie killed my interest in comic book movies before Thor was released?
It was X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
‘Nuff negativity – let’s listen to some good music from Lil Wolverine instead:
