Logan Pic Confirms Reavers' Involvement in Wolverine Sequel

CBR

By Rob Cave

Published Oct 18, 2016

With Donald Pierce and at least one Reaver now confirmed, is Hugh Jackman's Wolverine going to be able to survive his last solo film?

The photographic clues for Fox’s “Logan” are beginning to coalesce into some solid plot hints. Yesterday we saw our first glimpse of Stephen Merchant's Caliban in two separate pics, and now, the latest image, released on the film's Instagram account, seems to point towards a storyline from the late 1980s.

Labelled "Reaver," the new pic shows a bearded man sporting some serious hardware, and not just in the form of the scoped rifle he's carrying. If you look closely at the sniper's forearm and hand, they appear to be metallic, like some kind of hi-tech prosthetic. Could he be a cyborg?

Longtime "X-Men" readers will remember the human/machine hybrids known as the Reavers made their debut in 1988's "Uncanny X-Men" #229. Most of the original crew were swiftly despatched by our mutant heroes, but then ex-Hellfire Club member Donald Pierce reorganized the group and, in the iconic "Uncanny X-Men" #251, they captured and crucified Logan on a suitably on-brand St. Andrew's cross. It was an encounter Logan survived, but just barely, and he required the help of the young mutant named Jubilee to do so.

Now we know the new Wolverine movie has both Pierce and at least one Reaver, we might get to see other elements from the same storyline – although the presence of Stephen Merchant's Caliban and Sienna Novikov as X-23 suggest that the plot might be drawing inspiration from numerous other sources as well.

Further clues will undoubtedly emerge over the coming days as the stream of still images relating to the film, some more cryptic than others, seems set to continue. But what fans are really eager for is some moving images in the form of the film's first teaser trailer. Quite when that might materialise remains unknown.

Directed by James Mangold and starring Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Boyd Holbrook, Richard E. Grant and Stephen Merchant, “Logan” arrives in theaters on March 3, 2017.