Along with the rumor that Brett Ratner might be direcing Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine spin-off movie comes details on where exactly Fox is taking the character in his solo outing.

In an interview with IESB, Fox President Tom Rothman revealed that Wolverine will be a prequel movie. The film will take place before the events of the first X-Men movie. So don’t expect any X-Men cameos. This is Wolverine from his more feral days, an angrier, more ass-kicking Wolvy… at least we hope.

This isn’t the first time Wolverine has been mentioned as a prequel. Hugh Jackman said something similar previously, and Rothman merely confirmed what Jackman has already said.

Normally I’m quick to declare anything with the word “prequel” attached to it a bad idea, but in the case of this character, there’s so much unexplored pre-X territory for them to mine, that if they do it right could be pretty good. Will they do it right? Well I guess that depends on who is in charge and whether or not X3 is any good. It starts with a decent script.