Frat Boy At the Movies: X-men: Apocalypse
on June 12, 2016 at 3:45 am
Sorry for the late post. Just got back from the movies. Look for Your Fratoscope on Monday.
So, X-Men: Apocalypse? The verdict, it’s good, if you’re up on your X-men lore. Those who don’t know why Olivia Munn is wearing so much purple or why Storm has a Mohawk might be confused. Bryan Singer does a good job of integrating a lot of story. Included in this movie is Stryker (which means you-know-who, makes a cameo as Weapon X). The origins of Cyclops and a reboot of Jean Grey with Sansa Stark in the role (Sophie Turner).
However, so many characters pop up here including Quicksilver, Nightcrawler and Jubilee, that some of them don’t even use their powers. The Apocalypse villain is so marginalized, it simultaneously makes his evil plan quick, his powers insane, but the response equally insane. It makes the ending a bit, well, simple. One plus, however, is that Olivia Munn is pretty badass and not annoying.
Magneto gets the majority of the character development, along with Mystique. But that’s mostly because the two big actors (Michael Fassbender and Jennifer Lawrence) are in those roles. Singer does his best with a comic book crossover that was convoluted to begin with. Unfortunately, by the time you do the wind up, reintroduce the big movie characters, cram in the big comic book characters— Well, let’s just say it’s a good think there’s a lot of teleporting and Quicksilver to move things along.
The Missus was lost through much of the movie, probably because she could only draw from the last X-men movie and what she vague remembers from the first two from years ago. It’s a lot to process and it means a lot of character development gets dropped for exposition and plot. Although the movie is fun and exciting for comic nerds, there’s a lot of retreaded ground here. (Unlike, say, Civil War, which had a huge reveal at a key moment.)
The movie does set up a new X-men team which (since the old X-men movies have be rewritten due to the time travel in Days of Future Past) means that Singer might actually get to keep doing these.
I give X-men: Apocalypse a 7.5 out of 10 keggers. Not as bad as some critics say, but it’s definitely for those of us who read the comics.
