The Wolverine Has A Lot To Be Angry About

Back in October fans were thrilled when Fox released this teaser poster for the new Wolverine film:

For those taking notes, THIS is exactly what a poster should look like.  We know that we’re getting Wolverine, and we know based off the style of artwork he’s going to be in Japan.  It plays to both fans of the comics who know that Logan’s time in Japan made for some of his best stories, as well as those who aren’t familiar with his backstory.  Not only that, it’s an original piece of artwork that stands out amongst the slew of badly photoshopped posters that Hollywood likes to dump on us.

Now with summer almost upon us, Fox decided to release a pair of new posters intended to draw in audiences worldwide.  First up is the international poster.  This is the one that will be seen hanging in theatres outside of North America:

Well, it’s a Hollywood poster, that’s for sure.  Nothing original about it.  You’ve got Wolverine looking angry and if you look very closely in the background you can sort of make out Japanese lettering on one of the buildings.  It’s basically generic action movie poster #27:  “Hero on knees in rain looking angry”.  This is the poster that will let tell audiences that there’s a new movie coming out with that guy from the other comic book movies you’ve already seen.

So you remember how I said that the last poster was for international audiences.  Well here’s what Fox thinks North American audiences want to see in a poster:

Take a moment to laugh.  Then when you’re done, take another moment to realize just how horribly offensive this image is.  The teaser image gave us a silhouette of Wolverine with a decidedly Asian flair.  This final domestic poster gives us a poorly photoshopped image of Wolverine surrounded by what I assume are ninjas.  I say “assume” because all I can see are their eyes, yet none of them are looking at Logan even though somehow all their swords are pointed at him, and as we all know, if a ninja is going to kill you, he’s going to be looking you in the eyes.

So instead of sticking with subtle yet effective artwork, the studio decided to go with slightly racist, amateur hour photoshopping.  We can only hope the the film is more like the teaser poster than the final one, or we’re in for one rough ride.

On the plus side, we did get two brand new trailers for The Wolverine which you can check out right here on GEEKPR0N!