A Blast From The Cast: Why 'Logan' Director Cut A Major Character's Death Scene

Warning: Spoilers ahead for Logan

As #JamesMangold's #Logan finally makes it onto home release, a whole treasure trove of Easter Eggs and commentaries can now be discovered in #HughJackman's swansong. As the near-perfect noir western, we trod the New Mexico desert with a smaller cast than the previous #XMen films and a more intimate conclusion to the #Wolverine trilogy. With barely a lycra suit or a glimmer of cheese in sight, Logan was the thinking man's #superhero film.

Logan opened our sunny soirée on a dusty locale, focusing on the downtrodden lives of Jackman's Logan, #PatrickStewart's Charles Xavier, and newcomer #StephenMerchant as Caliban. The albino tracker was later kidnapped by the nefarious Donald Pierce and used as a tool to discover Laura Kinney's X-23 — the final member of the film's lead trio. Caliban did get a triumphant return toward the finale and an "explosive" goodbye, but some may have been left feeling that it was more a whimper than a bang.

White Lightning

Speaking on the commentary for Logan, Mangold revealed his decision to keep Caliban away from the rest of the cast as he bowed out in a blaze of glory. The Blu-ray edition contains a deleted scene of Caliban's final moments, which failed to make it into the theatrical cut:

"The tricky thing about it was it felt a little bit to us like they shouldn't leave him there. They should take him with them. Why do they take Charles' body and leave Caliban's body? It felt like it was almost raising more questions. At the same time I felt bad cutting it because I also felt like it gave Stephen's character a kind of farewell."

The scene in question was the veritable bloodbath at the Munson farm, when a berserker X-24 (also Jackman) cut his way through a wave of innocents. We tragically saw Xavier perish at the claws of Wolverine's clone and the brilliant farewell to his character after 17 years. Losing Xavier undoubtedly took the shine off Caliban's death scene, but it was still left as a noble one.

In the age of plot holes and nitpicking viewers, you can see why Mangold may have decided to cut Caliban's scene short, and keeping the death off-screen still keeps Logan's heart at the center of the film. Seeing Caliban lying dying in the grass as Kinney and Logan make off with only Xavier's body would've played out a little awkwardly.

Giving us the brief glimpse of Caliban just moments before he explodes in a shower of heroism certainly keeps the action rolling. However, the scene could've also added some much-needed development for the character. Personally, I found Caliban one of the weakest parts of the film, with Merchant effectively playing an albino version of himself and awkwardly plodding around as the clumsy Brit.

With other deleted scenes involving ideas around Jean Grey and Sabretooth, it shows how much Mangold "trimmed the fat" to give us the shining final product that we saw in cinemas. If you want to see what we missed out on, you can check out all the Logan deleted scenes on DVD and Blu-ray now.