About.com Rating

Bottom line:The Wolverine continues the story of the mysterious X-Men character with a gritty, somewhat dark film packed with action. Contains heavy violence throughout as well as language and sexual content.
MPAA Rating: PG-13, for sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, some sexuality and language
Guide age recommendation: 13+
Genre: Action
Runtime: 126 minutes
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Will Yun Lee, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Hiroyuki Sanada
Release Date:

The Wolverine - Overview

The Wolverine picks up the X-men story of Logan (Hugh Jackman), also known as Wolverine.

After the last major battle between regular humans and mutants (in X-Men: The Last Stand), a shell-shocked Logan has been hiding out in a forest trying to avoid getting himself involved in any further fights for justice. He's pulled back into the world, though, and all the way to Japan by Yukio (Rila Fukushima), the sort of adopted granddaughter of a powerful Japanese businessman named Master Yashida (Haruhiko Yamanouchi). As it turns out, Logan saved Yashida from the bombing of Nagasaki back in WWII, and the now dying man wants to say goodbye.

Logan travels to Japan with Yukio, and he discovers the real reason Yashida is so interested in seeing him. Thinking Logan will be sick of the curse of immortality, Yashida offers to allow Logan to transfer his powers to him in order to save his life and give Logan a chance to finally end it all.

Logan doesn't take the man up on his offer. But when Yashida does pass away, Logan finds himself embroiled in a new struggle as the protector of Mariko (Tao Okamoto), Yashida's granddaughter and heir to his empire.

Many people, including her own father, are not happy that she has inherited everything, and her life is in grave danger on many fronts. Together, she and Logan attempt to escape death and figure out exactly how far the plotting goes and what her grandfather was really up to as he neared his death. These tasks are made all the more difficult by the fact that Logan's powers of healing have mysteriously diminished, leaving him much more vulnerable than ever before.

The Wolverine - Guide Review for Parents

Logan's character, with his mysterious past having been explained in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, is now facing a dark and sad future. He has basically given up on life, but he can't die. His dark state sets up an intriguing backdrop for this action-packed film filled with suspense, danger and some decent intrigue. This is an edge-of-your seat type of comic hero film with more grit, intense violence and sexual content than many other superhero movies that are popular with families with older kids.

Logan sees his ex-love (the woman he was forced to kill in the last movie because her powers had spun out of control) in dreams, and most often, they are in bed together with her wearing a lingerie style nightgown. Their scenes are often intimate, and in one they get a little heated. In another scene a male is shown in his underwear enjoying the company of two prostitute types in sexy lingerie. The movie also contains some references to sex, a scene in which two characters begin to kiss and are shown later after presumably having had sex, and some references to prostitution.

Violence in the movie is somewhat more intense than many other PG-13 comic book based films (though similar to other films featuring the X-Men and Wolverine). Violence in The Wolverine gets a little intense, because Wolverine stabs innumerable bad guys through with his metal claws in the midst of fights that involve weapons such as guns, arrows, knives, and more. Another mutant kisses her victims which causes them to begin to burn/wither and eventually die if she keeps it going long enough. Some war zone scenes are also shown, as well as large-scale fights between groups of mafia and those trying to protect Mariko.

The movie contains several uses of profanity including one use of the "f" word. If you want more specific details about possibly offensive or scary content, please see the overview below.

The Wolverine - Content Overview

*May contain spoilers.

• Violence (Extreme): Scenes of violence occur throughout the entire movie in varying, but often intense degrees. Wolverine stabs many people with his metal claws. People are killed with weapons such as guns, knives, swords, poison kisses, and more. Some characters suffer painful injuries and deaths. Large scale destruction is shown including a war zone and smaller scale destruction resulting from various types of hand-to-hand and fighting with various weapons.
• Scary Scenes (High): Young viewers may be scared by scenes such as those listed under "violence." Some of the mutants, like Viper (a woman who has a snake-like tongue and burns her victims with her acidic venom), may be scary or unsettling to kids.
• Sex/Nudity (High): The movie contains several scenes which involve kissing and intimacy. Some nudity/partial nudity is shown, but nothing explicit is shown. A somewhat raunchy scene involves a man in his underwear playing around with two women in sexy lingerie, but they are all standing and nothing explicit is shown. Logan and Marika are forced to stay in a "love hotel" in a mars themed room, but they do not sleep together.
• Drugs and Alcohol (Medium): A few scenes in the movie show people drinking or holding drinks like beer or bottles of alcohol.
• Language (High): The "f" word is used once. The word "b**ch" is used a couple of times as well as the "a" & "s" words and milder profanity like "hell" and "damn."
• Disrespectful/Imitative Behavior (Extreme): Logan is upset that a hunter used a poison arrow on a bear, so he nails the guy's hand to the table with an arrow and pours a shot of alcohol on it. A girl shows off her skills with a sword by cutting several objects in a bar as well as people. Kids may be tempted to imitate or make-believe play fight scenes such as those shown in the movie involving mutant abilities and various weapons.

• Sad/Unsettling Scenes (High): Logan remembers love and wants to be with her. He experiences emotional pain from things in the past as well as the present, and he experiences a lot of physical pain during the movie and loses some of his powers.
• Movie Topics Kids Might Have Questions About: Mutants, super human abilities, death, war, killing animals, arranged marriages, Japanese culture, mafia, wills and heirs.

Disclosure: The studio provided a free screening of this movie for review purposes. For more information, please see our Ethics Policy.