Including his memorable cameo in 2011’s X-Men: First Class, Hugh Jackman has played Wolverine in a whopping six films to date, with next year’s X-Men: Days of Future Past also featuring Jackman in a key role. That’s a lot of Wolverine for one actor, but it’s also enough time in a role to deliver something that strays away from genre conventions. With The Wolverine, Jackman and director James Mangold deliver a unique superhero film. The Wolverine follows the titular character, a.k.a. Logan, at a particularly low time in his life, as he realizes everyone he’s loved has died. When he’s summoned to Japan to visit a man he once saved years earlier, Logan has to decide whether or not he wants to be the Wolverine. The Wolverine is, fortunately, a vast improvement over 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine. The action sequences are in some ways simple compared to other superhero films from this year, but they work in their relative simplicity. One impressive directorial decision: many of the conversations in Japan that don’t involve Wolverine are spoken in Japanese, an unusual but welcome choice.