One of the criticisms levelled at the first film was the half-hearted approach it took towards establishing a truly compelling origin story. For example the promise of getting a look at Wolvie’s childhood in 1840s Canada was undermined by cramming it into a brief pre-credits sequence, whilst any real scrutiny of the character’s motivations usually ended up playing second fiddle to the string of bruising action sequences.

Indeed, director Gavin Hood came out after the film was released and explained that with such a wealth of subject material at his disposal, deciding what should and shouldn’t be included was a dizzying task.

“The truth is, what freaked me out a little when I was doing my research was that I was looking for the definitive origin story of Wolverine,” he explained in an official Fox Q&A. “And, of course, any of you who know the comics know that doesn’t entirely exist because this guy’s been written about for 40 years by many different writers, different illustrators. we had to make the choices that were right for this movie.”

However, with a sequel now approved, producer Lauren Schuler Donner was keen to stress that the follow-up would fuse a closer bond with the comic books, particularly those penned by writer Chris Claremont.

“I think it’s our responsibility to remain true to the source material,” says Donner. “There are other influences and other factors that make us deviate from it, the first of which being transcribing it to the screen, but we certainly are fully aware of the fan base and try in every way possible to stay close to the source material. I think in Wolverine it was a little bit different because there was a lot of different source material, a lot of different legends…there were some choices we had to make. But certainly in Wolverine 2, in the Japanese saga, we will stay very close to the source material. I think it’s just best that way.”

“Japanese saga?” Sounds like we know where the plot is going to take us then…