Kevin's Watch

Saw this one yesterday. I walked out with a "meh" attitude about this sequel. It definitely could've used Bryan Singer's touch. There are some HUGE shockers,

Spoiler

particularly Xavier's death.

At this point I'll say the movie was OK, and not as good as the first two.

Hmmm, I thought it was better than the second myself. You are right in saying that Bryan Singer would have added greatly to it, but still I enjoyed it immensely.

My only gripe would be with some of the characterisations. The story was brilliant (or at least a great framework from which to build brilliance), but some of the characters seemed either under-developed (Storm for one, which is disappointing considering Halle Berry demanded and received more airtime for the character) or oddly-developed (Pyro and Rogue just seemed a little strange for some reason). Other characters, like Collossus, seemed to only be there to fill in the gaps left by those such as Nightcrawler who didn't return from the first two movies.

Part of the problem is that film is insufficient in many ways to do the X-Men justice. Two hours just isn't long enough to develop even the ten key mutant characters to the extent required.

There were some good character moments however: pretty much all of Jean Gray's scenes, and most of the interaction between Jean, Xavier and Magneto. I especially liked Xavier and Wolverine's "discussion" in the depths of the mansion - it revealed a side of the professor that very few would ever have seen before.

Other than that, brilliant effects, great battle scenes, very dramatic ending (if you discount the very deus ex machina-esque way in which many of the minor characters were killed off right before the climax), and yes, those shockers scared the hell out of me.

Spoiler

Cyclops' death, Xavier's death, Jean's death, Mystique and Magneto's loss of their powers - it was almost all a little much.

I must say, I was on the edge of my seat.

I also thought it was better than the second.

It was very cheesy at points, though. But they made up for that with some brilliant one liners.

Ah yes, the cheese factor - which culminated in Wolverines horrid little speech about being teh X-Men. *shudder* Still, take away those few moments and the movie was damn good.

Wow! I haven't seen it, but I read you spoilers. Amazing! I'll likely see it next week at work.

You weren't supposed to read the spoilers, Fist!

Why doesn't anybody tell me these things in the first place!!!

dlbpharmd wrote:You weren't supposed to read the spoilers, Fist!

I did, but will most likely not see it!

I'd already read all the spoiler bits in this rather unflattering review.

I'm no good at reviewing things, but I need to add that it's very very important for those of you who are going to see it, that you stay past the credits!!!

Very, very, very important. I don't like spoliers so I'm not gonna say why, but if you really want to know what happened you can PM me or look it up.

Damn, I didn't stay past the credits....

Yeah, I'd give it a B-. Some things were a bit over the top, the direction really being the biggest killer.

Spoiler

The alcatraz and GG Bridge thing, to me, seemed entirely unnecessary (not to mention unbelievable). And I'm definately not opposed to violence and profanity, but it seemed so... forced, as did a lot of plot elements.

And no way is Professor X dead. He's hanging out in the guy in the hospital with no brain activity from his 'hypothetical ethics' lecture.

I think that Brain Singer was deeply missed. His type of directing seemed to concentrate on the characters as much as the action. He built his action around the characters - not the other way round. Despite having so many characters to juggle with; Brain Singer managed to give them good personalities, and some great moments; and the first two films, for me, excelled as a result of that.

However; in this film, the characters where given very little classic moments, nor were some of them believable when compared to the personilities and actions of the first two films. For this reason, the characters seemed really weak.

Also. another problem I have with this film is Magneto's rejection of Mystique. From the first film we know that Magneto must have an extensive knowlegde of human and mutant cells - he did after all create a machine that could produce a radiation field that could turn a human into a mutant -- so why did he do that? Instead he left her.

Also I'd like to comment on Magneto's complete lack of regard for mutants altogether. He really didn't care what happened to those that died or were turned human in this film. Yet in the previous films; he does give regard to Mutant kind. Oh, he willing to make sacrifices, "By any means necessary". But it seemed he let the mutants who gave him his support no more care than he would a human.

Where was Nightclawler? A character I enjoyed in the second film just completely cut out?

Angel... I saw very little to his character. He has featured in the comic a fair amount of times; yet he was given so little in this story. He wasn't given justice, I feel.

And Cyclops was given as much thought as he had been in the previous films. Featuring very little until his death (If he did die, as was said, I think we have to see the body first) he was completely disregarded once again.

Lumbering plot in my opinion. It had it's good moments, definitely. But I think it missed Brain Singer.

Agree.

A friend of mine pointed out to me that Hugh Jackman is probably not the best actor to play Wolverine (although he could not name anyone better.) He says Wolverine is just not as blood thirsty or bad-ass as he is in the comics.

Waddley Hasselhoff wrote:I'm no good at reviewing things, but I need to add that it's very very important for those of you who are going to see it, that you stay past the credits!!!

Very, very, very important. I don't like spoliers so I'm not gonna say why, but if you really want to know what happened you can PM me or look it up.

:::nodding:::

I saw the movie Saturday. All I'll say is the above bears repeating.

Syl wrote:

Spoiler

And no way is Professor X dead. He's hanging out in the guy in the hospital with no brain activity from his 'hypothetical ethics' lecture.

Spoiler

Which you definitely get the jive of after watching the credits.

Aww, was there after credits stuff?

Yup, I missed it too.

My rule of thumb for the last few years has been to stay for the credits if I'm going on the opening weekend, just in case.

I need to start doing that also.

Yeah; the last couple of years have had a lot of films put extra little bits thrown in during credits.