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Wolverine takes a dark turn – Metro US

Wolverine takes a dark turn

Hugh Jackman has made a career of leaping from genre to genre, proving he’s just as adept in big, loud action films as he is singing and dancing on a Broadway stage — or even hosting the Oscars.

But for most fans around the world, he’s best known for the iconic role that made him famous in the first place: Wolverine.

It’s a part he could have missed out on if he’d listened to his wife, who balked at the comic-book action in the pages sent over for Jackman’s audition.

“She put it down, saying, ‘This is ridiculous. You were at the National Theatre with Sir Trevor Nunn. You can’t be doing this,’” Jackman remembers with a laugh. “That’s the only time she’s ever been wrong, according to her.”

Now, after three incredibly successful X-Men films that helped revive the comic book movie genre, the nearly indestructible mutant with the sour mood and the razor-sharp claws is getting his own movie, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, in theatres Friday. And even though he’s stepping into the part for the fourth time, Jackman hasn’t gotten tired of him.

In fact, it was Jackman’s attachment to the character that encouraged him to also take on the role of producer. “I wanted to protect as much as I could the Logan that I saw,” Jackman explains. “I thought he got a bit soft by X-Men 3. I wanted to make him a little darker, keep a little more edge to him.”

He also hasn’t gotten tired of Wolverine’s signature muttonchops. “I’m so used to it now,” he says. “Without it, I feel a bit weird. But you know, it’s not a great look. You just look odd.”

Wolverine has always been a pretty macho character, but it turns out Jackman was never satisfied with exactly how macho he was until this film. “I didn’t want people to go, ‘That guy looks like he works out,’” Jackman explains. “I wanted them to feel danger, power. I wanted him to be veiny, animalistic.”

To achieve the look, the actor spent a year in training, packing on pounds through weightlifting, conditioning and eating. “If it turns out that we should all be vegetarian and there’s some kind of karmic debt to be paid for eating animals, I am some kind of gnat in the next life.”