Marvel's Wolverine: PS5 Review

Developed by Insomniac Games
Published by Sony Interactive
Platform: PS5

The character of Wolverine has always anchored the X-Men franchise.

Ably bought to life by Hugh Jackman in the movie franchise, the gruff cigar-chomping loner became the focal point of the series as he adapted into the world of mutants and their treatment by others.

So perhaps it was a natural progression that Insomniac Games, the creators of the Ratchet and Clank series and also the acclaimed Marvel's Spider-Man would take on the character for the gaming world - even before a hack in December 2023 exposed the fact they were working on the IP.

But unlike most of the X-Men films, this one strays away from the lineage of Wolverine and his adamantium creation and veers more into the R-rated territory of James Mangold's highly acclaimed Logan.

Voiced by another Aussie, Liam McIntyre, the game throws you into the claws of the amnesiac Wolverine who's returned to help his former teammates Team X (chiefly Raven and Sabretooth) and finds himself slap bang in the middle of a quest to track down some kidnapped mutants who've been taken by Bolivar Trask.

GET DETAILS ON HOW TO MEET LIAM MCINTYRE AKA WOLVERINE IN OCTOBER

In many ways, it's a very generic and typical X-Men story that Insomniac Games has taken for the basis of its Wolverine game - but that's not to dismiss the humanity of what plays out and the continuing tale of segregation and mistreatment of those who are deemed different. It's a theme that Marvel's X-Men has explored for centuries in its comics and as such, Insomniac Games has managed to give it a solid spin with the emotional depth provided by a subtle amd grounded humane performance from Spartacus star Liam McIntyre.

Make no mistake, Marvel's Wolverine is a brutal affair - if you want it to be.

READ ABOUT THE FIRST TWO HOURS OF WOLVERINE HERE

Limbs are hacked off, blood soaks much of the action on the screen and the language certainly doesn't hold back, so long-term fans of Wolverine's gruffer and visceral edges will be happy at what unfurls. (Don't worry, all of that can be turned off in the Accessibility settings, a canny touch by Insomniac to ensure those who loved Spider-Man continue to get their share of family friendly edges.)

Claws combat is violent too, with a varying set of combos unleashing more and more ferocious and feral attacks - this is a Logan who moves like a beast, scampering on the ground in parts and whose more animal edges Insomniac Games has leaned into. From assigning different moves to the L2 and D-pad, Logan's got options to unleash a series of other attacks which can be purchased from upgrades and assigned throughout the game.

Like its lithe combat, this is also a game that lives and breathes, evolving fighting with its story as more unlocks become available. Suits, which can be made from materials found around the various biodomes Logan visits (thanks to his supersonic hearing ability) unlock extra health and can be regularly changed out during missions - there's an ever-evolving feel to the world Logan's in and it's a welcome touch from Insomniac.

READ AN INTERVIEW WITH PROJECT DIRECTOR JESS REINER-REED HERE

Not content to fashion their story around the treatment of mutants and further details (which are spoiler-heavy at this stage), the game also allows you to unlock core memories from Logan's mind after he's enabled into a Nightmare world by Nathaniel Essex, who aims to heal him. These Nightmare Trials as they're known help you shape more of an insight into Logan and range from achieving a certain number of kills in a timeframe to racing to an end-point. It's an interesting way to do things, even if it does occasionally feel like a series of Spider-Man timed-inspired minigames to propel the story along.

And it's nice to be out of the city too, with Marvel's Wolverine taking in heady locations and foreign lands. From the snowy wilds of Canada to the hustle and bustle of Madripoor, every vista sparkles with the atmosphere of its locale - and it gifts Wolverine with the kind of global feel that a Bond movie has as it moves from location to location, giving the story more of a global relevance.

Insomniac Games' ambition has come to the fore here as well, with big cinematic cutscenes full of blockbuster sturm and drang soaking proceedings. These are big set pieces that sit excellently within the brightest and best of the blockbuster ambitions; they're fluid, enthralling and entertaining, full of spectacle. Occasionally they give you a chance to interact with them via some QTEs (bizarrely which complete if you dont fire them or use the wrong button), but mostly they're there for your eyes and story progression.

And it's here that Marvel's Wolverine presents an interesting paradox.

The game very much relies on its pattern of frenetic, adrenaline-fuelled combat before going for either stealth hunting or more contemplative edges (eg the Nightmare trials, choosing music in a bar) before ramping up the action once again to build to the end of a chapter. As a result, very occasionally, the staccato approach gives way to a feeling of a stop-start that affects the overall flow of the game. It's unfair to compare it to Spider-Man, but the connecting tissue here doesn't always gel as well as it could, no matter how playable and fluid sections are.

Most of the mechanics of the Spider-Man game in terms of combat have been ported over too and while they've been given a Wolverine shine over and polished with unique abilities, there's also a nagging feeling that game mechanics don't exactly feel transformational this time. (And a couple of uncanny crossovers with Spider-Man: Brand New Day lend the movie an unexpected surprise.) 

It's not that they're bad to play with or work poorly, more that there's not as much innovation as the previous Marvel formula. Although there's also an argument to be had that given how well these things work, why would you mess with a winning formula?

Overall, Marvel's Wolverine still offers Insomniac Games at its pinnacle, and given the game graphically pushes the limits, it's a thrilling experience when it all gels and one that's worthy of the Logan name and legacy.

Marvel's Wolverine releases exclusively on PlayStation 5 from September 15.

Oasis: Don't Look Back in Anger: Movie Review

Directors: Will Lovelace and Dylan Southern

How you'll feel about the latest Oasis movie will largely depend on how you feel about the band itself.

There's already been one Oasis documentary - 2016's Supersonic - which focused on the band's meteoric rise to fame in the heady days of 90s Britpop in the UK before fraternal frustrations caused the group to implode.

The latest documentary, written by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight, is more of a celebratory piece, heralding the return of the Gallagher brothers Noel and Liam and their triumphant return to stadium shows last year.

A flurry of images from the band's tumultuous past open proceedings, black and white shots of Liam's scornful and blistering stage presence, Noel's older brother ethos and bristling tensions between the pair. It all culminates in the infamous backstage fight at the 2009 Rock en Seine festival that scuppered the band, scattering them as they imploded.

Leapfrogging to the time the world was stunned they'd seemingly buried the hatchet and were about to embark on a series of tour dates where nobody knew if they'd come to blows again, Oasis: Don't Look Back in Anger doesn't really hold back on piling on the sentiment and plying everything with a degree of nostalgic sentiment and occasionally trite platitudes.

Whether it's Noel or Liam bigging each other up or pompously praising the band's back catalogue or fellow musician Paul "Bonehead" Arthurs, the film's got a kind of later-in-life approach to reflection on the bonds that draw po-faced people together and push them apart, albeit it through rose-tinted glasses.

If you're going in wanting a film that leads to their reconciliation, this is not the movie for you. And in fact, one scene sees them reveal nothing led to a reunion, they just did it - it's an almost dismissive approach to the meteoric rise the group had before their implosion.

Strangely, the film shifts to being a piece about what music means to their masses - and specifically, Oasis themselves. Whether it's the fan who survived the Manchester Stadium bombing of an Ariana Grande concert in 2017 and who's seeing them live for the first time (one of the more bizarre additions to the hagiography through fans' vignettes) or the Japanese fans who've bonded over Acquiesce, the myriad of outsiders portmanteau approach forms the basis of the periphery of this film.

It's not an entirely new conceit that Knight has dreamed up for the politely earnest movie and in truth, it sags in parts with the trite bon mots of "music saving lives" which are repeated throughout. Every generation has its band (and perhaps that's what the doco's trying to achieve here) but to those unaware of Oasis and their music, there's little to open up the flood gates as to what causes them such mass appeal.

IT's also a chance to see Noel at his most vulnerable as he reflects on how seeing fathers and sons unite at concerts affects him (a nod to his own past perhaps) and how Liam continues to be the consummate frontman who believes he cares because he doesn't give a flying f**k about everything around him. His swagger lives on and it's a relief to see that for him, nothing has changed at all. 

And yet, there are some astoundingly funny moments. 

From the arrival of frontman Liam Gallagher to the first day of rehearsals after others wonder what will happen (Liam simply storms in, shows no interest in banter, rouses the band off their seats, delivers his vocals and then promptly leaves to everyone's surprise and relief) to some genuinely touching and laugh-out-loud moments between the pair, Oasis: Don't Look Back in Anger does capture some of the reasons why their live shows have been so acclaimed in amid a continuing trend of nostalgia bait tours. (Another more surprising sequence touches on the death of Gary "Mani" Mountfield of the Stone Roses, leading to a few sage words from Liam about why none of the past actually matters.)

It's surprisingly cathartic and the music performances showcase the band at their blistering best (and give access to all of us who weren't able to see them in 2025) as well as demonstrating the multi-generational appeal of the Manchester natives.

Central to it all though is a universal approach to how time and music heal all. 

The handsomely shot doco chooses not to grill Liam and Noel on why and how it went wrong way back when (which is both its strength and a nagging annoyance given how guarded they largely feel on the important matters), instead preferring to offer a tale of redemption and reunion, all wrapped up in a message of forgiveness and all-access emotion and the power of music to its fans, visceral live performances and a sense of mid-life release.

It's not entirely clear what the rock'n'roll bad boys of the 90s would make of themselves - or this - now because unless you're a fan of the band and their raucous past, it's hard to see this has a wider audience - no matter how many fans espouse the group's brilliance or claim their reunion is like the Second Coming.

But for fans,it's an unmissable big screen experience. 

Practical Magic 2: Movie Review

Cast: Nicole Kidman, Sandra Bullock, Maisie Williams, Joey King, Stockard Channing, Dianne Wiest
Director: Susanne Bier

25 years after the first Practical Magic kept audiences spellbound with its tale of the tragedy of the Owens sisters (Kidman and Bullock), the sequel places fans squarely back into their world as the curse lives on.

This time around, based on Alice Hoffman's 2021 novel The Book of Magic, the film follows Sally and Gillian and a new generation of witches (Williams and King) as they look to try and break the spell that's bewitched their family for so long with heartbreak.

Runner: Movie Review

Cast: Alan Ritchson, Owen Wilson, Rodrigo Santoro, Leila George, Adriana Barraza, Peta Sergeant, Scarlett Crabtree, Geraldine Hakewill, Kate Box, Goran D. Kleut, Cecilia Toussaint, and Tommy Archer.
Director: Scott Waugh

Angel Studios takes a swerve away from its more contemplative faith-based fare for this action-led buddy comedy with a darkness at its heart that the filmmakers are too scared to show.

Reacher man mountain Alan Ritchson is Hank, a former navy SEAL who works as a runner in Brisbane, delivering whatever is needed as he tries to work thorough his sobriety and issues with his former wife and dead daughter.

However, on the day he celebrates his first year clear, he's given the job of delivering a medical parcel to a hospital. It should be a simple job as the cargo is a liver for a sick young girl (complete with thick Coca-Cola glasses, blonde hair and lisp), but the pick-up comes complete with a jabbering human element - its courier Ben (Wilson in vaguely irritating form.) 

But Ben and Hank aren't the only ones who want the liver - as a cartel group, headed up by a sneering caricature of a Cartel figure (Santoro) tries to steal the liver, one of the rarest in the world and blessed with golden blood. (No really.)

What transpires is something to behold - in both good and bad ways.

Runner mixes bloodless ultra-violence with the kind of quipping buddy Odd Couple road trip comedy you'd expect. But an extremely odd mix of tone meshed with some laugh out loud moments and some of the cheesiest action sequences and plot turns you'd see make it possibly a contender for somehow both the worst film of the year and yet also the most cheerily entertaining in every throwaway sense of the word.

Solid action and some well-choreographed bouts of kickass action see Ritchson barely flexing the kind of muscle he displays in Reacher, while Wilson doesn't exactly dig deep for his annoyingly upbeat road trip companion.

It's a curious mix of Christian ethics, racist stereotypes, gunshot violence where nobody is left with blood and cloyingly predictable plot twists that follows.

On top of swirling cameras, a cute Coca-Cola glasses wearing kid, sneering villains and kills that suggest violence but show nothing all create a film that is off to an unusual start when pre-titles credits declare that the Angels Guild, a community of 2500 members approve of what's about to transpire.

It's terrible in every sense of the word, yet in among the utter averageness of what transpires, both Ritchson and Wilson somehow manage to acquit themselves in a movie that aims high, fails miserably and yet somehow, you can't stop watching.

What's on DocPlay in October

Here's everything that's streaming on DocPlay in October 2026.

This October, exceptional documentary films from the 20th and 21st centuries premiere on the platform. Alongside two remarkable late-career works from Agnes Varda, the Oscar-winning The Times of Harvey Milk comes to DocPlay. New Danish doc Dear Tomorrow considers the loneliness epidemic in Japan, while Wisdom of Happiness (pictured) gives voice to the Dalai Lama as he approaches his 90th year. Respected veteran journalist Tony Jones makes his feature documentary debut with Sundance-premiering Sentient, which considers the impact of biomedical testing on animals - and their handlers. And from Aotearoa New Zealand, Wildboy follows a young man on a 15-year journey of self discovery.

5 October

Dear Tomorrow (Exclusive)

In Japan, loneliness has turned into a national crisis, encouraging the government to create a Ministry of Loneliness. Dear Tomorrow follows two individuals – Masato, and Shoko – struggling with isolation. Aware of their need for human connection, they embark on a journey toward healing and renewal. 

5 October

Wisdom of Happiness (Exclusive)

A deeply intimate and highly cinematic documentary featuring the Dalai Lama, who, at nearly 90 years old, offers practical advice for navigating the 21st century.

8 October

The Shepherd and the Bear (Exclusive)

High in the majestic French Pyrenees, a conflict is provoked by the reintroduction of brown bears amid a traditional shepherding community. The film follows an ageing shepherd struggling to find a successor as bears prey on his flock, and a teenage boy obsessed with tracking them down. A modern folktale examining humanity’s relationship with a vanishing natural world.

8 October

Wildboy

Brando, a young man with ADHD, embarks on extraordinary adventures in order to escape society and find purpose. At 18, he sets out to walk New Zealand’s coastline, and over the next decade, he tackles epic feats: skiing across Greenland, kayaking around Vancouver Island, and cycling across the Australian Outback. 

15 October

The Times of Harvey Milk

A true twentieth-century trailblazer, Harvey Milk was an outspoken human rights activist and one of the first openly gay U.S. politicians elected to public office. The Oscar-winning The Times of Harvey Milk (1984) was as groundbreaking as its subject. One of the first feature documentaries to address gay life in America, it’s a work of advocacy itself, bringing Milk’s message of hope and equality to a wider audience.

19 October

Sentient (Exclusive)

A moving journey into laboratory research on animals, exposing a hidden world in which it's not just the animals getting hurt. The debut feature documentary from veteran Australian journalist Tony Jones (AU), streaming exclusively on DocPlay after premiering at the prestigious Sundance Film Festival earlier this year.

26 October

Baby Doe (Exclusive)

30 years ago, Gail Ritchey, a young woman from a conservative Christian community in rural Ohio, gave birth alone and left her newborn in the woods. Now a mother of three, her quiet suburban life is shattered when DNA evidence links her to ‘Geauga’s Child,’ and she is arrested for murder - despite saying the baby was stillborn.

29 October

The Gleaners and I

By turns playful, philosophical, and subtly political, Agnes Varda’s The Gleaners and I (2000) is a warmly human reflection on the contradictions of our consumerist world from an artist who, like her subjects, finds unexpected richness where few think to look.

Armageddon Expo 2026 reveals Supernatural stars and High School Musical reunion

Jared Padalecki heads a major Supernatural gathering, while High School Musical stars Lucas Grabeel and Bart Johnson reunite as Armageddon Expo returns to Auckland this Labour Weekend.

Armageddon Expo is bringing three major fan reunions to Auckland this Labour Weekend, with stars of Supernatural, Aliens and High School Musical joining a blockbuster international guest line-up at Auckland Showgrounds from October 23–26.

Leading the Supernatural contingent is Jared Padalecki, who starred as Sam Winchester throughout all 15 seasons of the hit series. He will be joined by Felicia Day, Kim Rhodes, Briana Buckmaster, Osric Chau, Matt Cohen, Samantha Smith and Alaina Huffman.

For another generation of fans, Lucas Grabeel and Bart Johnson bring High School Musical to Auckland. Grabeel starred as Ryan Evans across the hugely successful Disney franchise, while Johnson played East High basketball coach Jack Bolton.

The Auckland line-up also includes Giancarlo Esposito (Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, The Mandalorian), Anson Mount (Star Trek: Strange New Worlds), Christopher Lambert (Highlander), Christopher Judge(Stargate SG-1, God of War), Kirsten Vangsness (Criminal Minds), Charlie Bushnell (Percy Jackson and the Olympians) and New Zealand-born Lord of the Rings actor and stunt performer Sala Baker.

Armageddon Expo founder Bill Geradts says the strength of the guest list makes this Labour Weekend event something special.

“This is a pretty amazing line-up,” Geradts says. “Having Jared here with so many of the Supernatural cast is huge. Those fans are incredibly loyal and they’ve been asking us for something like this for years.

“Then you’ve got Lucas and Bart from High School Musical, Giancarlo Esposito, Anson Mount, Christopher Lambert, Christopher Judge and this fantastic Aliens group. Some of these are people fans have grown up watching, while others are in the shows and games they’re into right now.”

There is another major reunion in store for fans of James Cameron’s Aliens, with Jenette Goldstein, Mark Rolston, Ricco Ross, Cynthia Scott, Daniel Kash, William Hope and Carl Toop appearing together. The group includes the actors behind Colonial Marines Vasquez, Drake, Frost, Dietrich and Spunkmeyer, Lt Gorman and one of the performers inside the Xenomorph suit.

Gaming and voice performance continue to play an increasingly important role at Armageddon, with Auckland featuring its biggest gaming voice line-up to date.

Alongside Christopher Judge are David Bateson (Hitman), Erika Ishii (Ghost of Yōtei), Jason Spisak(Arcane), Andrew Wincott (Baldur’s Gate III), Lucie Pohl and Carolina Ravassa (Overwatch), Kenny James (Mario), Martin Copping (Call of Duty, Rainbow Six Siege) and Spartacus star Liam McIntyre, who plays Logan in Marvel’s Wolverine, releasing on PlayStation 5 on September 15.

“Gaming has become massive for us,” Geradts says. “It’s not a niche thing anymore. We’ve got parents who started gaming when they were young coming along with their own kids, mums and daughters, and plenty of grandparents as well.

“The characters matter, the stories matter and now the actors behind them are becoming stars themselves. Fans want to meet the stars of these games just as much as they want to meet somebody from a favourite TV show or movie.”

Beyond the guest line-up, the Labour Weekend event will include gaming, cosplay, trading cards, Artist Alley, K-pop, amusement rides and celebrity Dungeons & Dragons. YouTube creator Hilly Hindi from The Hillywood Show and Marvel Zombies artist Arthur Suydam will also appear.

Geradts says meeting the people behind favourite characters remains a big part of Armageddon’s appeal.

“At the end of the day, Armageddon is about being a fan,” Geradts says. “You come along, meet people you never thought you’d get to meet, dress up if you want to, play games, buy stuff and spend a weekend surrounded by thousands of people who are into the same things you are.”

Armageddon Expo Auckland runs over Labour Weekend, Friday 23 to Monday 26 October 2026 at Auckland Showgrounds.

Tickets are on sale now, with further attractions and events to be announced.