Hugh Jackman's 2013 Sci-Fi Thriller Gets a Second Chance on Streaming

Hugh Jackman has played his iconic Marvel character, Wolverine, for over 20 years, but didn't make his MCU debut until 2024. While the actor hasn't confirmed whether he will appear in Avengers: Doomsday or Avengers: Secret Wars, he teased his interest at Disney's D23 event. As fans await confirmation of whether Jackman will return to the franchise before the upcoming X-Men reboot, they've started revisiting some of his earlier performances.

Jackman began his Marvel career in 2000, when he first played Wolverine in X-Men. Since then, he has portrayed the character 10 times, and while he was supposed to "retire" after Logan, he returned seven years later, co-starring alongside Ryan Reynolds in Deadpool & Wolverine. With Avengers: Doomsday just weeks away, three of Jackman's Marvel films, X-Men, X2, and Deadpool & Wolverine, were included in Marvel's "recommended viewing" list ahead of the upcoming superhero film. However, one Jackman-led superhero movie has been getting plenty of attention lately.

In 2013, Jackman starred in his second solo Wolverine film, The Wolverine, where he plays Logan, still haunted by Jean Grey's (Famke Jansen) death after being forced to kill her to save the world. One day, a mutant named Yukio (Rila Fukushima) finds him and takes him to Japan to meet Ichirō Yashida (Haruhiko Yamanouchi), a former Japanese soldier Logan saved during World War II, who offers to free him from his immortality. Recently, the film became a streaming hit on HBO Max, landing at No. 6 on the streamer's Top 10 Movies chart in the United States, between Project X and The Predator. Audiences have called The Wolverine an underrated X-Men film. It saw box office success upon its release, grossing $414.8 million worldwide and earning a 70% critics' score and a 69% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes.

Who Could Replace Hugh Jackman as Wolverine?

Recently, Marvel Studios announced its first wave of cast members for the upcoming X-Men reboot, which includes Sadie Sink as Jean Grey, Kit Connor as Cyclops, Christopher Abbott as Charles Xavier, Samara Weaving as Emma Frost, Inde Navarrette as Rogue, Maya Boyd as Storm, Adam Driver as Mister Sinister, and Asa Germann as Angel. As of now, Marvel has not revealed who will play Wolverine, and it has not confirmed whether the mutant will appear in the reboot.

Several actors have been rumored or speculated to take on the role of Wolverine. One of them is Taron Egerton, who revealed in 2022 that he had been in talks with Marvel Studios and teased that he might join the franchise. More recently, rumors have suggested that The Bear star Jeremy Allen White could also be in contention to play Wolverine, although neither the actor nor Marvel Studios has confirmed these reports.