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"James Mangold has discussed The Wolverine&amp;#039;s emotional arc, hinting that the film is &amp;quot;about isolation&amp;quot;.  The 3:10 to Yuma helmer directs Hugh Jackman in his sixth appearance as Logan/Wolverine, for what is described as a standalone film, separate from 2009&amp;#039;s X-Men Origins: Wolverine.  Mangold also suggested to Empire that the film takes place outside of all previous X-Men continuity, rather than being a prequel as has widely been assumed. &amp;quot;Where this film sits in the universe of the films is after them all. Jean Grey is gone, most of the X-Men are disbanded or gone, so there&amp;#039;s a tremendous sense of isolation for him,&amp;quot; he said. It was rumoured earlier this week that Famke Janssen will make an appearance as Wolverine&amp;#039;s former love interest Jean Grey.  &amp;quot;[It] was very important that I land in a very specific place in his timeline,&amp;quot; Mangold explained of the film&amp;#039;s self-contained continuity. &amp;quot;I wanted to be able to tell the story without the burden of handing it off to a film that already exists and having to conform to it.&amp;quot;   He went on to explain that the psychological story he wanted to tell would not have been well served by an ensemble or team-based film, in the way that the first three X-Men films and X-Men: First Class were.  &amp;quot;The ideas of immortality reign very heavily in this story,&amp;quot; he said, &amp;quot;and the burden of immortality weighs heavily on Logan. For me, that&amp;#039;s such an interesting part of Logan&amp;#039;s character that is nearly impossible to explore if you have a kind of league or team movie.&amp;quot; The Wolverine will be released on July 25, 2013.  Watch Hugh Jackman discussing the film with Digital Spy below:  "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.digitalspy.com/movies/x-men/news/a433277/the-wolverine-is-about-isolation-says-director-james-mangold/>