A lot of fans will be glad to see the back of Fox’s time in charge of the X-Men franchise after Dark Phoenix turned out to be one of the worst comic book movies in recent memory, following on from the hugely disappointing Apocalypse, not to mention whatever the hell’s currently going on with The New Mutants.
With the characters now finally in the hands of Marvel Studios, people are already excited at the prospect of seeing the mutants make their way to the MCU and face off with the Avengers, even if it isn’t expected to happen for a while yet. However, the one thing that’s always going to be viewed as ‘the one that got away’ is the fact that Hugh Jackman never got to suit up one last time and appear in the MCU.
Logan marked a fitting sendoff for one of the greatest characters that the comic book genre has ever seen, but there’s still some disappointment that Jackman never got to play in the Marvel sandbox, especially now that his arch-nemesis Ryan Reynolds will be bringing Deadpool into the franchise.
In a recent interview, Jackman admitted that he always viewed Logan as his swansong, but if Disney’s acquisition of Fox had happened earlier, then he would have jumped at the chance to share the screen with the likes of Iron Man, Captain America and the Hulk.
“Honestly, if seven years ago that had happened I’d be like, ‘Oh yeah!’, but i knew it was the right time for me to leave the party, not just for me, but for the character. Somebody else will pick it up and run with it. It’s too good of a character not to. It’s kind of like, you’re on your way home and your friend rings you and goes, ‘Oh, dude, a new DJ just came on and the music is awesome, are you going to come back?’. And you just say, ‘Sounds good, but… no’. They’re fine with someone else.”
To be honest, Marvel Studios are probably better off leaving Wolverine out of their X-Men reboot entirely. After all, Jackman will always be tied so closely to the adamantium-infused mutant that it would be a thankless task for any actor to try and step into those shoes only a few years after his final outing. But of course, that’s unlikely to happen and so for now, we’ll just have to sit tight and wait to learn who’ll take on the iconic role next.