Here we go again. Another X-Men film is upon us for the 9th time around. Singer in the director’s chair for the 4th time and Kinberg for his 2nd, or 3rd if you count Last Stand. This time, a new set of actors are placed in familiar roles, along with a new villain but still bringing in the cast from the two previous X-Men films. And frankly, I am sick and f**king tired of Singer.
The story has the omega level mutant known as Apocalypse awoken in the 80’s to gather a new set of Horsemen to rein havoc and destruction across the planet for dominance.
This plot is primed to unleash what the X-Men are all about, right? Wrong.
The film follows the recruitment tropes that have become a staple of the franchise. It’s excusable when you spend about maybe thirty minutes of the film on it, but not when it hogs up the first and second act. They even take time to remind us that Magneto can turn evil in a movie where he was not needed.
The actors sadly only fit in two categories in this film; subpar or stand out with most of the new cast belonging to the former. The few that fit the latter are Oscar Isaac, Sophie Turner and Kodi Smit-McPhee. Isaac does his best with his character, using many scenes to ham and chew up dialogue, but in the end, the Apocalypse character was never sold on me.
McPhee came off as having fun with the role of Nightcrawler as he fitted well with the comedic and lovable traits that the character is known for and will be a great add on in the next film. Sophie Turner as Jean Grey was definitely a good choice but she edges too close to her Sansa Stark role from Game of Thrones. The veterans like McAvoy, Fassbender and Lawrence are still using the same shtick that we’ve seen over and over with no growth. I mean seriously, no one wants Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique anymore.
As alluded earlier, Singer needs to go away. He has now become one of those directors that refuse to challenge himself. He has been given an opportunity to run wild with the massive scale that this movie is suppose to be on but just makes it a yawn-fest. The effects would be considered amazing, only by 90’s standard. A lot of it was really out of place or looked cheap and the fight choreography was so bad that I thought I could see some of the wire tugging on the characters.
Anyone who says that they love this film’s Quicksilver Speedster scene needs to have their head checked. It’s the same boring scene in X-Men: Days of Future Past, just a little bit longer and with a different soundtrack.
The Singer era has came – and needs to be gone. He doesn’t add anything new to the franchise and has a serious problem with asking more from his actors. The ending of this film gave me a little hope in the fact that now we finally have our team, outfits that aren’t black or bland and hopefully we can be done with the recruitment arch in this series. But – if Singer does come back again for another installment, I pray Galactus comes to Earth and decides to have the planet for dinner.