Hugh Jackman Talks 'Van Helsing'

Though VAN HELSING isn't a comic-book movie, Jackman still believes there is some cross-pollination, particularly among the potential audience. "It's not a comic book, but the people who are into comic books [will be] into VAN HELSING, and there are all those monsters," Jackman enthuses. "It has that same kind of folklore and fanbase—people who are fans of werewolves, FRANKENSTEIN and DRACULA. It's slightly different than comic books. I loved the script for VAN HELSING, so that's why I went into that."

As with X-MEN, Universal is looking for a franchise with VAN HELSING, and Jackman is already signed up for two films. He admits, however, that even though there's a lot of physicality in the X-MEN movies, VAN HELSING will likely have even more. "Probably more physical than [X-MEN 2]," Jackman estimates. "There's a little bit more action. There's a lot of horse-riding and wirework where I get lifted up. There are fight sequences on a huge scale. Wolverine is pretty intense—that scene with Kelly Hu took three weeks to shoot and that was hard work—but for me it was essentially on the ground or whacking into a wall. For some of the stuff in VAN HELSING, we're way up in the sky flying around, so it's a lot of fun."