For fans of the superhero genre, it’s easy to forget how different the world was when Bryan Singer gave us the first X-Men film in 2000.

The best superhero film in recent memory was Blade. The Batman franchise was irreparably destroyed by Joel Schumacher. Spider-Man as a theatrical vehicle was a joke with James Cameron as the punchline. Simply put, superhero movies were not a thing.

And then, a scrappy group of actors and a director using up his goodwill from a critically acclaimed thriller delivered what was - at the time - the best translation from four color panels to the silver screen, completely beyond our hopes and imagination. At it’s core, a perfect performance unexpected, the live action interpretation of a rage-filled, short, grumpy Canadian, as given to us by a tall, Australian song-and-dance man.

How strange it is then, ten X-Men movies later (including a solo trilogy for the aforementioned Australian as Wolverine), that the most effecting, and thematically brutal superhero movie yet comes in that actor’s send off - the final performance of Hugh Jackman in Logan.

Set in the year 2029, Logan shows us that there are no happy endings. Age has caught up to the titular hero, his life - and the adamantium inside him - is eating at him from the inside out. His fellow X-Men are dead, lost to the ages. All that’s left is him, his erstwhile father figure Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), and an albino mutant known as Caliban. They live just beyond the Mexican border, keeping their profile low as Logan - under his real name of James Howlett - keeps a job as a chauffeur in Texas. He works to get money to buy the prescription drugs that Xavier needs to keep his psychic abilities in check. No new mutants have been born in twenty-five years. The situation is, to say the least, grim.

But then as always - trouble finds Logan. That trouble is in the form of a young girl named Laura (the debuting Dafne Keen), who seems to have the same rage issues…and claws…of our hero. And of course, Laura has people looking for her, a group of cybernetically enhanced bounty hunters called The Reavers, lead by a charismatic man named Donald Pierce (Narco’s Boyd Holbrook). It’s all the elements needed for one last ride for our hero, and the journey begins.

Unabashedly R-Rated, Logan embraces the adult nature of its content from the first line of dialogue to the last bloody battle, giving the fans of the X-Men franchise the mature farewell that fans have wanted for Hugh Jackman’s version of Wolverine. If you loved the berserker rage scenes from X2: X-Men United, get ready to see the full force of an angry Logan…and to see the rage unleashed of his new friend Laura.

But what makes Logan stand out in the glut of superhero movies isn’t just the language and gore, it’s the film’s beating heart. This is a story of family - fathers, sons, daughters, and the sins of the past coming to light. If it weren’t for the claws and cloning nonsense, this could be an incredible indie film - and it’s shot and edited like one too, with director James Mangold (who also wrote the script), shooting the movie like a prestige drama - even if its one with mutant-on-mutant violence. The driving score by Marco Beltrami gives the movie a proper pace, but the true force of the film comes from the acting: the trinity of Jackman, Stewart, and the wonderful Dafne Keen is a joy to watch as a family unit, something that the X-Men franchise has always done a great job in, but is underlined here.

As with any superhero film, there are the flaws of the format - one plot twist is slightly abrupt and unnecessary, the resulting antagonist feels like one thread too many, but when it’s placed into a film this strong, the flaws are easy to ignore.

A love letter to a character, a thank you to the fans, a farewell to a superhero icon - Logan is many things, but above all else, it’s an excellently executed, mature take on the superhero mythos. Hugh Jackman brought us into the 21st century of superheroes, and now, he can hang up his hat proud. Well done.

Logan is in theaters now.