One of the year’s most highly anticipated movies was released on March 3 and hauled in $88 million just in its opening weekend.

“Logan” stars Hugh Jackman as Logan (The Wolverine), Patrick Stewart as Charles Xavier (Professor X), Dafne Keen as Laura (X-23), Boyd Holbrook as Pierce, and Stephen Merchant as Caliban. Hugh Jackman’s final performance as Logan was his best work yet, and maybe he’ll be nominated for an Oscar next year because of the complexity of his role. Jackman had to play a broken-down Wolverine, one we’ve never seen before in his past 17 years as the character. Patrick Stewart plays the wise and sometimes hilarious Charles Xavier, also giving his final performance as Professor X. It’s hard to watch characters you grew up with have their final act.

“Logan” centers around how Logan has dealt with hard times like when his girlfriend, Jean Grey, was killed as chronicled in previous X-Men movies. Except, in this movie, he finally snaps. He has always been a mutant that heals quickly from brutal injuries, but now that he’s gotten old, his wounds — both physical and mental —  don’t heal as easily. The film takes place in 2029, a couple of years after X-Men Days of Future Past (2014’s X-Men movie) which took place in 2023. At this point, Logan doesn’t care if he dies, but there is one thing that’s holding him back — a promise he made to Charles that they would purchase a boat and live the rest of their days at sea. However, Charles Xavier now has Alzheimer’s and has frequent seizures throughout the movie. So dangerous are these seizures that Xavier is kept outside the country so he doesn’t hurt others.

For those of you who don’t know, Charles Xavier has mind powers that can move objects, find where things are, and can affect the objects around him. Because he’s gotten so old and tired, it’s now hard for him to control all the power that he has. So, he has frequent seizures.

Caliban is also in the area they keep Professor X. He helps out when Logan isn’t around – mostly when Logan is making money to finally get the boat they’ve always wanted. Caliban is a mutant that can track other mutants. He does have one weakness though, he can’t go into the light or else he’ll burn up when his skin comes into contact with light.

The group ends up tangled in a situation between mutants, one of which has powers just like Logan. They try to save the nine year old girl from captivity throughout the movie.

The movie was by far the best X-Men film ever, if not the best Marvel film of this century. It showed Logan at his worst by showing him drunk, with a gun to his head, and desperately trying to get away from his problems. Throughout the movie, he learns that, even in the middle of the ocean, he would never be able to run away from his problems.

It was pretty sad to see Professor X and Logan so beaten down from all the years they’ve been together on the big screen. Charles has always been more of a humane person than Logan, persuading him to do the right thing all the time. But, this time, Logan was so lost that he wouldn’t even listen to him. He went from extremely selfish to as selfless as you can imagine in the end of the film.

The film went to extremes with its goriness like Logan and X-23 sometimes hitting people in the face with their blades, which was extremely gory. Logan once took his blade up someone’s chin and another through their eyes, which was disgusting. There were a lot of action scenes that had me on the edge of my seat because of this. The X-Men in the movie were just killing machines, like the surprisingly killer nine year old, X-23. Every time they were in danger, they just killed. I liked how Marvel went to a new area of jaw-dropping action, including Logan driving a car that dragged a broken fence behind it, and still made an amazing movie like they always do.

Logan has been getting phenomenal reviews. Some even say that it is Hugh Jackman’s best movie ever. Rottentomatoes.com gave it a 92%, MetaCritic.com gave it a 77, and IMDb.com gave it a 8.6/10. Overall, the film will leave X-Men fans very pleased and possibly even make new X-Men fans. Hugh Jackman made the best out of his final outing as Logan as did Patrick Stewart.

Feature image courtesy of http://nfornerds.com.