What's so great about Logan?

To be able to answer the titular question, let's make a short comparative analysis of Mangold's Wolverine movies.

After the major fail of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, a movie that had sparks of genius, in my opinion, the direction of the Wolverine movies shifted to a more serious approach with James Mangold on the helm, who outright ignored the aforementioned film. Both The Wolverine (2013) and Logan are loosely based on two highly regarded and very popular limited series comic books featuring the character. Logan is inspired by the very popular Old Man Logan series and one other that I won't spoil. Before hiring Mangold, executives at 20th Century Fox were so adamant... about making up for the X-Men Origins disaster that they were in real talks with Darren Aronofsky. That must've inpired James Mangold to reach for high standards and a strong artistic tone.