X-MEN, I forgot how damn good this movie was. It is a near perfect adaptation of the comic. Sure it doesn't have the costumes but everything else is there, the serious and realistic tone, using mutants to tell a story about societies prejudice and treatment of out-groups.
The friendship/rivalry between Charles and Magneto, Hugh Jackman is the perfect wolverine, everything about this movie works.
Watching it made me remember how good superhero films can be, now that we're stuck with the MCU dominating cinema with its Mcdonalds, kid friendly approach, we rarely get a film with serious themes.
The X-MEN actually tries to be a movie for adults, sure all the superhero good vs evil comic book stuff is there but there is also a lot of substance to it. Its a great movie.
XMEN 2 is a great follow up to the original movie and has one of the best opening sequences in a superhero film. It does everything a sequel needs to do, it expands on the themes set up in the original film while staying true to what made the original movie work and it tells a bigger story without the narrative being all of the place.
Wolverine was always my favorite character in the franchise, and the Weapon X plot-line is done justice here, I also enjoyed the uneasy alliance between the brotherhood and the X-men, as they team up to face a common enemy. There's nothing to fault about the movie at all, the only thing i will say that is mildly controversial is that i prefer the original film. Its hard to discern which I prefer the original or this film, both have iconic moments and are great comic book movies.
X3, the one everyone seems to hate for some reason. Its really not that bad, in fact its quite good but it has a few issues, mainly the script isn't as tight as the first two movies.
Lets start with the good, I think the film had the balls to make some shocking choices that the writers must have known would upset fans, I love Kelsey Grammer as Beast, I think the film is well acted, for the most part (bar Hallie Berry but she's frankly awful in everything), I love the idea of the film centering around the dark phoenix saga and I love the idea of there being a cure for mutations and the implications this would have on the world of the X-Men but here's where the negatives begin to show up, neither idea is fully explored to its full potential.
The dark phoenix stuff isn't bad, I didn't mind that Jean kills cyclops (who literally was killed because the writers had no idea what to do with him for the whole trilogy) and I didn't mind that Jean kills Professor X. What I did mind is how these deaths are brushed over, Magneto barely reacts to his best friend dying, sure he mentions in passing how Xavier did more for mutants than anyone else, but this was his lifelong friend, he should be destroyed by his death. There was an opportunity to see Magneto realize how corrupted he is, if only for a moment, that would have been a great scene, anyway it is what it is. Also Famke Janssen isn't convincing enough when she becomes the phoenix, but a lot of that is to do with the writing.
There also feels like more drama could have been drawn out of the cure scenario. But the biggest negative found it strange that Rogue was missing for literally the biggest moment in the film and her disappearance from the script is never explained, its like the writers forgot about her until the end. Really unusual.
Its strange because I also enjoyed this movie but it is definitely flawed, albeit put together well enough that its entertaining and nothing is offensively bad as some people would have you believe.
It just doesn't stand up to the first two films and considering its the last film in this particular continuity i can see why that would be a problem for some people. That said, its still a good time.
X-Men first class is a soft reboot/prequel that takes the X-men franchise and adds an espionage spin to it and I think it works quite well. James Macavoy and Michael Fassbender are good replacements for Stewart and Mcckellen, they're not as good mind, but they're solid stand in's for sure. I like that the opening of the film focuses on Magneto and Xavier's respective childhood's and explains the men they would later become. I think they were going for a more comic book tone this time around and while i don't think the film has the same level of dramatic impact as the first or second or even third entries of the original series, its a lot of fun and a good start to a new chapter in the franchise.
X-Men: Days of Future Past is essentially a reverse terminator movie, Logan is sent back in time by Professor X and Magneto to stop Mystique committing a murder which will eventually lead to the apocalypse, when i say this movie is effectively a terminator film, it really is, right down to the aesthetic of the future war.
There's a lot i like about this film, I think the emotional moments land, particularly in the case of Wolverine and Xavier. I like the fact that it brought both the cast from the original trilogy and the new cast together in the same film, I love quick silver (who Ezra Miller desperately tried to behave like in the flash, albeit with none of Evan Peters charm or charisma). I think its a well put together movie, even if the story is somewhat derivative.
But i also think it has flaws, the biggest flaw in the film is that it doesn't make sense. Charles Xavier was literally blown into pieces in X3, I understand the filmmakers must have realized that they had made a mistake in killing him off but you have to explain why the events of X3 are still cannon with him surviving in this film. Its a plot hole that honestly kept bugging me throughout the whole movie, and the film doesn't even try to explain it. At first i thought it was choosing to ignore X3 completely and was a direct sequel to X2, but then it clearly referenced events in the third film.
Make it make sense!
That said, the film is very enjoyable and the performances are solid.
X-Men Apocalypse, this most annoying thing about this film is the promise it had, there are a few great moments but they're undercut by the presence, or lack thereof of the most boring villain in history.
Don't get me wrong, i think this film deserves way more credit than it receives, it is universally hated by X-men fans and it isn't that bad, in fact , it has or rather, it could have had, some of the best moments in the rebooted franchise, all they had to do was make Magneto the sole villain. All the film had to do was be about Magneto turning fully to the dark side after the death of his family, that would have been a fantastic end to the trilogy and the scenes where we get glimpses at what that film could have looked like are great, Michael Fassbender is a brilliant lead villain, you don't need another one.
There's more I enjoyed about this film than didn't, at the end of the day its still an enjoyable film but every time Apocalypse is on screen i was thinking, really, Oscar Isaac, this is the best you can do, I don't believe you.
Anyway with that out of the way, onto the good,
Magneto's story has hints of brilliance and is well acted, I enjoyed the ensemble cast of teenage mutants, I enjoyed Macavoy as professor X, Evan Peters is still great as Quicksilver, the film is still fun, I think that's something that isn't mentioned enough, even a mediocre X-men movie is an entertaining movie and there's something to be said for that. It just could have been a lot better if Apocalypse wasn't in it.
Dark Phoenix , the first half hour was surprisingly good and i was completely convinced everyone was wrong about this film.. and then it became so unbelievably boring that I had to turn it off, It was that bad. All i can say is that its exactly the plot from X-men the last stand, except more shit. The reason this doesn't get a pass at all is because it takes everything I enjoyed about the first two entries of the reboot series and takes a huge shit on them, it had everything set up for it to succeed and it chose not to.
The acting ranges from mediocre to downright terrible from all involved and none of the actors seem like they want to be there,
how can a film have so many great actors in it and have all of their performances feel wooden and uninspired?, its unusual quite how bad every single actor is in this film. It is a dreadful film. I am actually angry at how much of a waste of time this film is, past the hour mark it doesn't even try to keep your interest, fuck this movie.
Logan, its a fantastic adaptation of the comic book Old Man Logan, although the story is less over the top and more grounded than the source material, it retains a lot of the same tone and feel of the original graphic novel.
Its a very emotional film and its by far Hugh Jackman's best performance as Wolverine. The core of the film and why it works so well is that its an extremely personal film about an old man looking back on his life with regret, in a world that has moved on without him and but it is also about facing your lot in life and accepting the fact that its never too late to change and to be better. Its a dark, gritty look at the life of an aged Wolverine, who has all but given up.
The violence in the film is the best we've seen from an X-Men movie, it is brutal and quite gory in places. The cast around Logan is also very strong, the only drawbacks are very minor ones, while there are three villains in the film, none of them stand out. Its not a huge deal because the film isn't about them but It could have done with a stronger villain, outside of that, its a great film and a perfect send off to a beloved character.....until he returns in Deadpool Vs Wolverine.
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