By this point, everybody knows what happens at the end of a Marvel movie. (And this contains spoilers so please turn back if that offends ye.) So, patiently, we waited through “When the Man Comes Around” by Johnny Cash as the credits rolled by at the end of Logan. It wasn’t really anticipation as much as expectation. Not a single person in my theater on the Thursday night showing budged from their cushy, red pleather reclining chairs. These were diehards, here on the first possible night for the public to witness this critically praised X-Men spin-off. They all copped tickets weeks ago. So, together, silently, we waited — patiently — until the credits stopped.
Patiently, we waited through “when the man comes around” by Johnny cash and tk as the credits rolled by. It wasn’t really anticipation as much as expectation. Not a single person in my theater on the Thursday night showing of Logan got up from their lush, red pleather seats. These diehards here, on the first night of public showing of this critically praised X-Men movie, copped tickets weeks ago. So we waited. Patiently.
“You wouldn’t,” came a voice from the row behind me, filled with disbelief.
To my right: “They played us!” It was a disappointed dude, not-really-mad-about-it-but-still, who, along with the rest of the audience crept up from his seat with resignation as the house lights came up slowlyly.
There’s no post-credits scene at the end of Logan. We should have known, though. It was sort-of “reported” by film rumors sites, and it turns out that the real surprise was a new Deadpool teaser.
Everything about the marketing of this indie-styled movie has led us to that plain truth, which we — at least nobody in my theater, anyway — still don’t want to accept. Maybe it was because Logan was so damn good. We wanted a tease of more to come. It’s emotionally gripping; try to resist your eyes from welling up at any number poignant, hurt-people-need-family moments. It’s thrilling, at times beautifully shot across a variety of landscapes, and crucially for Marvel fans, fatalistic. Even Hugh Jackman said before the opening that he’ll never play Logan again.
Knowing that this was likely the the final Wolverine movie with Jackman, audiences probably hoped for a post-credits scene that would hint at the future of Laura, aka X-23, movingly portrayed by Dafne Keen (b. 2005) — who can emote being numb-hurt better than most — but were left hanging.
Logan didn’t play us. We played ourselves by expecting a post-credits scene, which is something, it should be noted, that even the privileged critics don’t see when the film screens for them. The glimpses have always been fan-first Easter eggs. But the probability of there being one after this particular movie was always about as high as Logan getting out from under that pile of perfectly sized, smooth stones near that idyllic body of water. We just didn’t want to admit it was over.
