MAN OF SIN
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X-men: Apocalypse is a decent entree in the X-men series, that doesn’t reach the heights of First Class and Days of Future, but surpasses the films of the original trilogy with the exception of X2. But while X2 is clearly superior as a film, Apocalypse is superior as a X-men adaptation that embraces its source material more than any of the previous films. As well as making up for the original trilogy’s shortcomings. But suffers from its female lead’s dull performance and a rushed final act that features inconsistent quality in special effect.
The best way I can describe X-Men: Apocalypse’s plot is that it feels like a hybrid between 2011′s X-Men: First Class and last year’s Avengers: Age of Ultron. Sharing many intentional similarities with the former and unintentional similarities with the latter. Like with Age of Ultron, Apocalypse is about a team of superheroes facing their most powerful foe yet, who threatens to the world(after gaining information on it no less).
Any performance not from Jlaw is good, especially from James Mcavoy, Micheal Fassbender, and Oscar Isaac. The action is overall decent, but nothing amazing except for the opening scene and anything regarding Quicksilver. The special effects are good for the most part, but some of the CGI and green screen in the final act is shoddy. They probably blew the budget on that Quicksilver scene as it took a month to make it.
There is a good amount of levity in this movie, with probably the most humor in any X-men film, with the best bits being Xavier’s lust for Moria Macgtaggert. Its much needed since this is also the most violent X-men movie by far. If you thought the opening scene in Days of Future Past was violent, they topped that here with an opening action scene with people getting reduced to fleshy skeletons, burnt alive, and folded up like pretzel by telekinesis. Later on people get their heads chopped off on-screen. Wolverine slices into people with blood spilling on the walls.
There is also the city wide-spread destruction due to the powers have gotten crazier. Apocalypse actually shakes half of the planet, Magneto can destroy cities around the world, Xavier’s telepathy can now go global without cerebro, and Quicksilver can save over 20 people around the mansion from an explosion with utter ease. Not that I have a problem with this because the powers in the comics are often this crazy, but it was surprising. The X-men are easily the most powerful superhero team on film at the moment.
En Sabah Nur, who like Ultron I came to appreciate more on multiply viewings. Like how Ultron was a foil for Tony Stark, Apocalypse is foil for Charles Xavier, but not in terms of personality like the former. They are both mentors to their respective teams, they reach out to mutants who feel lost, confused and alone, and encourage them to reach their full potential. We also have Apocalypse paralleling Xavier’s actions in First Class, such as going around recruiting mutants and reaching out to Magneto to join his team when he is on a quest of vengeance. As Erik has once again has lost a family, this time in the form of his wife and daughter which he started after going into hiding due to the events of Days of Future Past, and sought vengeance on the people responsible (which is straight out of the source material), killing them with a metal necklace instead of a coin this time. While Xavier had Erik tipped into his serenity and helped made him stronger, Apoc tipped into his rage and he helped made him stronger. And like with Xavier in First Class Erik betrays Apoc, who response with “you betray me?” and Erik’s answer is “No, I betrayed them”, in reference to that fateful moment in First Class. Thus Charles and Erik’s relationship comes in full circle.
Another interesting thing about Apocalypse is that his characterization is that of God(Yahweh) in the old testament of the bible. Apocalypse in the comics has posed as gods but its given much more emphasis here where he inspired aspects of the bible, such as the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. This is where he is implied being the inspiration for God. In the bible the Horsemen were agents of God to pass judgement on the world and Apocalypse tries to do that here. As well as referring to himself as God at one point in the film. With his plan essentially being the same as God’s in the Noah’s Ark story: to destroy the world and rebuild it with the surviving population.
The reason for this plan is that like God, Apocalypse does not like the worship of false gods. His ideology here is an amalgamation of the first commandment “Thou shalt have no other gods before me” and his comic book counterpart’s social darwinsim. Where he views those with the greatest superpowers as gods(he refers to himself and Storm as god/goddess) due to coming from a time where the term mutant didn’t even exist and that they should rule this earth. So he takes offence when he see the “weak” ruling the world and claiming themselves to be “superpowers”, as to him they are claiming to be gods. This is further emphasize with his awesome line “You can fire your arrows from the Tower of Babel. But you can NEVER…STRIKE…GOD!” when launches the world’s nukes into space. The Tower of Babel is from a story in the bible where humanity build a tower to reach Heaven and this of course offended God. Apocalypse is basically saying that they will never have true “superpowers” with their weapons like the true gods.
Now it should be noted that Apocalypse’s ideology is not like Magneto and Shaw’s, he believes in “might makes right”. So he is not for mutants in general, but for those with the strongest power. As shown when he is choking Mystique and labels her as one of the “weaklings”. As well as the other part of his plan being possess Xavier’s advanced telepathy so that he can enter the hearts and minds of everybody on the world, being omnipresent like God in the bible. That pretty much screams he is not for mutants rights. He believes in this ideology so much that he is very accepting of his death at the hands of Jean Grey who is more powerful than him, being in awe of her might.
The main reason why Magneto and the other horsemen are down with such a guy is because they easily fall prey to his persuasion after he powers them up, as hinted in the movie and mentioned in interviews. He even does it to Xavier at one point, where he is in so much awe of the power he is feeling, that Apocalypse convinces him to launch the world’s nukes into space. Storm goes from being this mother figure who is against killing and wanting to be a hero to being down with Apocalypse’s plan after he increases her power and says that she is enslaving herself by following the systems created by the weak. Same thing happens with Psylocke and Angel. Psylocke starts out as a body guard for Caliban, but suddenly abandons him once Apocalypse he tempts her with power and basically gives the same speech he gave Storm. Angel gets new wings after his old ones are damage, similar to the comics. This pays tribute to Apocalypse’s first appearance in the comics where he original offered people something in exchange to becoming his horsemen.
Other than Magneto, the horseman are very much like the henchmen in First Class. They don’t have much development, though have bit more than the Hellfire Club. It was a huge mistake by Fox to push them so hard in the promotional because like the Hellclub they are just antagonist for the X-men to fight in the final act. Storm and Angel’s fight scene are pretty much “meh” with Psylocke’s being okay. The horsemen in the opening scene were far more impressive. They clearly cut down the length of their fights because there are scenes in promotional that didn’t make it in the final product. Angel seems to die in a plane crush, but the character is known to have a healing factor in the comics, so he can easily come back. I also doubt Singer would waste one of the original five like that.
Apocalypse as threat does a lot of the same things Ultron did, but much better. Ultron dismembers the arm of a man, Apocalypse decapitates three men at the same time with dust. Ultron manipulated Scarlet Witch to making the Hulk go on a rampage killing people in a city, Apocalypse manipulated Magneto into destroying cities across the planet. Ironically both Scarlet Witch and Magneto are not punished for these crimes(like father like daughter I guess). And they both would have won if it wasn’t for one character, Vision and Jean.
Now lets talk about the heroes from First Class. The marketing of this movie made it seem like this was going to be about Mystique and many assumed she was going to be the Wolverine of this movie. Thankfully, that’s far from the truth. She has way less screen time here than Days of Future Past, and maybe even First Class, but Mystique is still is the worse aspect of the X-men. She is basically here to finish her arc left over in in the previous film and returning home. All of that is fine but what’s annoying is that they have basically made Mystique into Katniss Everdeen. And what I mean by that is she is now someone everyone looks up to as a hero and she even gets have an inspiration speech in battle. Even the Weapon X flight suits the X-men wear looks like something out of Hunger Games. This would have been tolerable if it wasn’t for the fact that Jenifer Lawrence’s performance range from “okay” at best to down right “dull” at worst. She does not care about this role at all anymore and it shows. When your female lead is phoning it in, there is a big problem.
But not everything about Mystique is all bad, as she is written well within the story. Mystique isn’t blue for much of the film due to Jlaw’s complaints about the make-up making her ill, but writers have manage to turn negative into a positive giving an interesting in-story reason that reflects race relations today. Much like modern day bigotry, anti-mutant sentiments still exists, its just calm down after Mystique saved the president and viewed as a hero. Just like how bigotry still exists in the United Stated even though it has a black president. Mystique doesn’t want to be viewed as a hero because she doesn’t believe she has really changed the world and doing so would be to embracing a lie, so she keeps herself hidden. But she comes out of hiding in the end to set an example to Xavier’s students Scott and Jean, to embrace their mutations that they struggle with like she did when she was around their age.
Now Charles Xavier here is written like one of those naive guys who believes there is post-racial america because there is a black president. In contrast to his characterization in Days of Future Past where he gave up on hope, here Charles is way too hopeful because he isn’t getting a message about war in the future. Mystique tells him that he needs to teach his students how to fight in order to defend himself, but he just thanks she sounds like Erik and just wants students instead of soldiers. However, she is just being realistic here and he eventually realize she is right after the events of Apocalypse, deciding to let her train his students in the end to fight. As there are both mutants like Apocalypse that threaten this world and potential non-mutant threats that will be created in response to such mutants.
Hank also agrees with Raven that they need to prepare for the worst and their relationship is given some actual focus here after being cut out in Days of Future Past. Its revealed that Hank choose the color blue for Cerebro in reference to Raven, which is actually cute. Notice again, writers turn a negative into a positive, by having Mystique address how they are both not in their blue forms and thus share something in common.
The two are actually co-leading the X-men, rather than just Mystique. She gives a speech to the younger X-men, which is essentially “mutant and pride” and while Beast is the one to led them in the field. Hank also sets an example by finally embracing his blue form as we see him at the mansion in the end no longer hiding his true self, thus finishing his three movie long arc.
Now lets start talking about the younger characters, starting with Jean Grey. In the previous film Xavier had gotten a look into Wolverine’s mind and saw the future, seeing Logan kill Jean. So Xavier learnt about the events of X-men: The Last Stand. This is reflected here by Charles not placing mental blocks in Jean’s mind and instead having hope in Jean controlling her massive power one day. Right now she can’t control reading other people’s minds, as she says “I know what everyone feels”. Which is a struggle Xavier also had as a child and its even addressed in a touching scene where he tells her that she will control her powers one day and will have nothing to fear. As Jean herself fears this power, thinking that she is going to hurt someone someday and thus holds herself back. This is yet another example of turning a negative into a positive and that negative would be The Last Stand. The events of that film actually adds weight to Jean’s fears because we know that she indeed can hurt someone with her power.
The other mutant students at the school fear Jean’s power too, as she burns things around her when she sleeps and she says this line to Xavier: “you don’t know what it’s like to be afraid to shut your eyes!”. Which is interesting because Scott Summers burns things when he opens his eyes and students fear him as well. Jean is initially pricky to Scott but she lets her guard down once she founds out that they both share a similar struggle and the two develop a kinship. I must say, that is a clever way to plant the seeds for their future relationship. And another seed that is planted is Logan’s love for Jean which is actually a response to one of the fan complaints in the original trilogy. That is, Logan just suddenly fell in love with Jean without much of a reason. Here its Jean who sets Logan free from Weapon X and she is also restores his memories, which is something that Xavier himself couldn’t do and its foreshadowed earlier with Charles saying she has the strongest mind he has ever known.
Another fan complaint that Singer clearly listened to is the shafting of Scott Summers. He has much more presence here than he did in the original trilogy. He actually gets his own origin story, which is based on a deleted scene from X1 where his powers develop in a school bathroom. Scott is also depicted as somewhat pricky and as a “bad boy” that “borrows” Xavier’s car for a ride to the mall. This feels very familiar to Wolverine in the first X-men film and that’s likely intentional.
Now here comes yet another Age of Ultron comparison. Like Wanda, Scott loses his brother, Alex. And just like Age of Ultron, its not handled like it should be. The movie makes no effort to create a strong connection between the two, which is a huge mistake if they want any emotional resonance. Or perhaps it did make an effort but it was left on the cutting room floor, based on what I’ve heard. Its similar to how scenes that developed Quicksilver’s character was cut, which would have helped make you care about the character when dies. Though Jean comforting Scott was heartwarming and the two holding hands and saying that Havok believed that Scott was going to change the world, which alludes to him becoming the leader of the X-Men. I guess point of that is to give him an arc for future films, where he goes from a trouble maker to a boy scout like in the comics.
Speaking of Quicksilver, lets talk about the version here, who now has a prominent role like the Marvel Studio did in Age of Ultron. However, unlike his MCU counterpart Peter has way more lines, has memorable moments, and is just a fun character. Such as the amazing mansion rescue scene which tops his scene in Days of Future and when he takes on Apocalypse.
Peter is on a search for his father after he resurfaces and what could have been a powerful moment was wasted. For some reason Quicksilver is afraid to tell Erik that he is his son, when Raven mentions that he has more family than he knows. Why he is so nervous to tell him is unclear, but Magneto does seem to suspect something, as Apocalypse breaking Quicksilver’s leg does get his attention. It would be nice to learn in a future film that Magneto figured this out and was the main reason for him breaking free of Apocalypse’s influence.
Last but not least, we have Nightcrawler who makes his long await return. Once again, Singer address fan complaints and showcases the goofy side of Nightcralwer’s personality from the comics, instead of just focusing on the darker aspects of his personality. Kurt here isn’t as strong of character as he was in X2, but he does serve as an effective comic relief. With his best scenes being where he says “I’m blue too” during a conversion between Hank and Raven where they mention how they are not in their blue forms. Acknowledging that there have been many blue people on the team. As well as when he tries to count to three only to realize that he only has two fingers.
The X-men here feel much more like a team in this film than they ever have before, which is something fans asked for. While the older X-men get more focus as characters, the superhero work is mostly done by Scott, Jean, and Kurt. They are the ones that save the older X-men from danger and ultimately save the day. Especially, Nightcrawler who is the least developed of the three and I guess this was a way to compensate. Him and Jean were easily the most valuable players, having the most power showcase. Scott comes off short compared to the two, but like I said earlier his fight with Storm was cut down.
I do love the parallel Mystique makes between the older and younger generation. Such as them flying on a plane to battle and Alex being a handful like Scott. It made me noticed how Scott and Jean’s relationship is very similar to Hank and Raven’s relationship in First Class. As both pairings developed through sharing a struggle with their mutations. The older relationship was due sharing abnormal appearances, while the younger relationship was due to sharing destructive powers that they couldn’t control. The fact that its Scott and Jean that make Raven and finally Hank embrace who they are creates another full circle.
And the final complaint Singer responses to is the lack of colorful costumes. They get them at the end of the film and they are based on the 90s costumes designs. Sam Raimi’s Spider-man proved him wrong about colorful costumes and Singer has been embracing them since Superman Returns. Nice to see him do it with the X-men.
X-men: Apocalypse was full of fan service and I can see why Fox lifted the embargo earlier. They clearly had confidence in this movie and I’m surprised at the critical reception, because are a lot of invalid criticisms. But I’ll save that for another post. Right now, I’m giving X-men:Apocalypse a 7/10.
The best way I can describe X-Men: Apocalypse’s plot is that it feels like a hybrid between 2011′s X-Men: First Class and last year’s Avengers: Age of Ultron. Sharing many intentional similarities with the former and unintentional similarities with the latter. Like with Age of Ultron, Apocalypse is about a team of superheroes facing their most powerful foe yet, who threatens to the world(after gaining information on it no less).
Any performance not from Jlaw is good, especially from James Mcavoy, Micheal Fassbender, and Oscar Isaac. The action is overall decent, but nothing amazing except for the opening scene and anything regarding Quicksilver. The special effects are good for the most part, but some of the CGI and green screen in the final act is shoddy. They probably blew the budget on that Quicksilver scene as it took a month to make it.
There is a good amount of levity in this movie, with probably the most humor in any X-men film, with the best bits being Xavier’s lust for Moria Macgtaggert. Its much needed since this is also the most violent X-men movie by far. If you thought the opening scene in Days of Future Past was violent, they topped that here with an opening action scene with people getting reduced to fleshy skeletons, burnt alive, and folded up like pretzel by telekinesis. Later on people get their heads chopped off on-screen. Wolverine slices into people with blood spilling on the walls.
There is also the city wide-spread destruction due to the powers have gotten crazier. Apocalypse actually shakes half of the planet, Magneto can destroy cities around the world, Xavier’s telepathy can now go global without cerebro, and Quicksilver can save over 20 people around the mansion from an explosion with utter ease. Not that I have a problem with this because the powers in the comics are often this crazy, but it was surprising. The X-men are easily the most powerful superhero team on film at the moment.
En Sabah Nur, who like Ultron I came to appreciate more on multiply viewings. Like how Ultron was a foil for Tony Stark, Apocalypse is foil for Charles Xavier, but not in terms of personality like the former. They are both mentors to their respective teams, they reach out to mutants who feel lost, confused and alone, and encourage them to reach their full potential. We also have Apocalypse paralleling Xavier’s actions in First Class, such as going around recruiting mutants and reaching out to Magneto to join his team when he is on a quest of vengeance. As Erik has once again has lost a family, this time in the form of his wife and daughter which he started after going into hiding due to the events of Days of Future Past, and sought vengeance on the people responsible (which is straight out of the source material), killing them with a metal necklace instead of a coin this time. While Xavier had Erik tipped into his serenity and helped made him stronger, Apoc tipped into his rage and he helped made him stronger. And like with Xavier in First Class Erik betrays Apoc, who response with “you betray me?” and Erik’s answer is “No, I betrayed them”, in reference to that fateful moment in First Class. Thus Charles and Erik’s relationship comes in full circle.
Another interesting thing about Apocalypse is that his characterization is that of God(Yahweh) in the old testament of the bible. Apocalypse in the comics has posed as gods but its given much more emphasis here where he inspired aspects of the bible, such as the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. This is where he is implied being the inspiration for God. In the bible the Horsemen were agents of God to pass judgement on the world and Apocalypse tries to do that here. As well as referring to himself as God at one point in the film. With his plan essentially being the same as God’s in the Noah’s Ark story: to destroy the world and rebuild it with the surviving population.
The reason for this plan is that like God, Apocalypse does not like the worship of false gods. His ideology here is an amalgamation of the first commandment “Thou shalt have no other gods before me” and his comic book counterpart’s social darwinsim. Where he views those with the greatest superpowers as gods(he refers to himself and Storm as god/goddess) due to coming from a time where the term mutant didn’t even exist and that they should rule this earth. So he takes offence when he see the “weak” ruling the world and claiming themselves to be “superpowers”, as to him they are claiming to be gods. This is further emphasize with his awesome line “You can fire your arrows from the Tower of Babel. But you can NEVER…STRIKE…GOD!” when launches the world’s nukes into space. The Tower of Babel is from a story in the bible where humanity build a tower to reach Heaven and this of course offended God. Apocalypse is basically saying that they will never have true “superpowers” with their weapons like the true gods.
Now it should be noted that Apocalypse’s ideology is not like Magneto and Shaw’s, he believes in “might makes right”. So he is not for mutants in general, but for those with the strongest power. As shown when he is choking Mystique and labels her as one of the “weaklings”. As well as the other part of his plan being possess Xavier’s advanced telepathy so that he can enter the hearts and minds of everybody on the world, being omnipresent like God in the bible. That pretty much screams he is not for mutants rights. He believes in this ideology so much that he is very accepting of his death at the hands of Jean Grey who is more powerful than him, being in awe of her might.
The main reason why Magneto and the other horsemen are down with such a guy is because they easily fall prey to his persuasion after he powers them up, as hinted in the movie and mentioned in interviews. He even does it to Xavier at one point, where he is in so much awe of the power he is feeling, that Apocalypse convinces him to launch the world’s nukes into space. Storm goes from being this mother figure who is against killing and wanting to be a hero to being down with Apocalypse’s plan after he increases her power and says that she is enslaving herself by following the systems created by the weak. Same thing happens with Psylocke and Angel. Psylocke starts out as a body guard for Caliban, but suddenly abandons him once Apocalypse he tempts her with power and basically gives the same speech he gave Storm. Angel gets new wings after his old ones are damage, similar to the comics. This pays tribute to Apocalypse’s first appearance in the comics where he original offered people something in exchange to becoming his horsemen.
Other than Magneto, the horseman are very much like the henchmen in First Class. They don’t have much development, though have bit more than the Hellfire Club. It was a huge mistake by Fox to push them so hard in the promotional because like the Hellclub they are just antagonist for the X-men to fight in the final act. Storm and Angel’s fight scene are pretty much “meh” with Psylocke’s being okay. The horsemen in the opening scene were far more impressive. They clearly cut down the length of their fights because there are scenes in promotional that didn’t make it in the final product. Angel seems to die in a plane crush, but the character is known to have a healing factor in the comics, so he can easily come back. I also doubt Singer would waste one of the original five like that.
Apocalypse as threat does a lot of the same things Ultron did, but much better. Ultron dismembers the arm of a man, Apocalypse decapitates three men at the same time with dust. Ultron manipulated Scarlet Witch to making the Hulk go on a rampage killing people in a city, Apocalypse manipulated Magneto into destroying cities across the planet. Ironically both Scarlet Witch and Magneto are not punished for these crimes(like father like daughter I guess). And they both would have won if it wasn’t for one character, Vision and Jean.
Now lets talk about the heroes from First Class. The marketing of this movie made it seem like this was going to be about Mystique and many assumed she was going to be the Wolverine of this movie. Thankfully, that’s far from the truth. She has way less screen time here than Days of Future Past, and maybe even First Class, but Mystique is still is the worse aspect of the X-men. She is basically here to finish her arc left over in in the previous film and returning home. All of that is fine but what’s annoying is that they have basically made Mystique into Katniss Everdeen. And what I mean by that is she is now someone everyone looks up to as a hero and she even gets have an inspiration speech in battle. Even the Weapon X flight suits the X-men wear looks like something out of Hunger Games. This would have been tolerable if it wasn’t for the fact that Jenifer Lawrence’s performance range from “okay” at best to down right “dull” at worst. She does not care about this role at all anymore and it shows. When your female lead is phoning it in, there is a big problem.
But not everything about Mystique is all bad, as she is written well within the story. Mystique isn’t blue for much of the film due to Jlaw’s complaints about the make-up making her ill, but writers have manage to turn negative into a positive giving an interesting in-story reason that reflects race relations today. Much like modern day bigotry, anti-mutant sentiments still exists, its just calm down after Mystique saved the president and viewed as a hero. Just like how bigotry still exists in the United Stated even though it has a black president. Mystique doesn’t want to be viewed as a hero because she doesn’t believe she has really changed the world and doing so would be to embracing a lie, so she keeps herself hidden. But she comes out of hiding in the end to set an example to Xavier’s students Scott and Jean, to embrace their mutations that they struggle with like she did when she was around their age.
Now Charles Xavier here is written like one of those naive guys who believes there is post-racial america because there is a black president. In contrast to his characterization in Days of Future Past where he gave up on hope, here Charles is way too hopeful because he isn’t getting a message about war in the future. Mystique tells him that he needs to teach his students how to fight in order to defend himself, but he just thanks she sounds like Erik and just wants students instead of soldiers. However, she is just being realistic here and he eventually realize she is right after the events of Apocalypse, deciding to let her train his students in the end to fight. As there are both mutants like Apocalypse that threaten this world and potential non-mutant threats that will be created in response to such mutants.
Hank also agrees with Raven that they need to prepare for the worst and their relationship is given some actual focus here after being cut out in Days of Future Past. Its revealed that Hank choose the color blue for Cerebro in reference to Raven, which is actually cute. Notice again, writers turn a negative into a positive, by having Mystique address how they are both not in their blue forms and thus share something in common.
The two are actually co-leading the X-men, rather than just Mystique. She gives a speech to the younger X-men, which is essentially “mutant and pride” and while Beast is the one to led them in the field. Hank also sets an example by finally embracing his blue form as we see him at the mansion in the end no longer hiding his true self, thus finishing his three movie long arc.
Now lets start talking about the younger characters, starting with Jean Grey. In the previous film Xavier had gotten a look into Wolverine’s mind and saw the future, seeing Logan kill Jean. So Xavier learnt about the events of X-men: The Last Stand. This is reflected here by Charles not placing mental blocks in Jean’s mind and instead having hope in Jean controlling her massive power one day. Right now she can’t control reading other people’s minds, as she says “I know what everyone feels”. Which is a struggle Xavier also had as a child and its even addressed in a touching scene where he tells her that she will control her powers one day and will have nothing to fear. As Jean herself fears this power, thinking that she is going to hurt someone someday and thus holds herself back. This is yet another example of turning a negative into a positive and that negative would be The Last Stand. The events of that film actually adds weight to Jean’s fears because we know that she indeed can hurt someone with her power.
The other mutant students at the school fear Jean’s power too, as she burns things around her when she sleeps and she says this line to Xavier: “you don’t know what it’s like to be afraid to shut your eyes!”. Which is interesting because Scott Summers burns things when he opens his eyes and students fear him as well. Jean is initially pricky to Scott but she lets her guard down once she founds out that they both share a similar struggle and the two develop a kinship. I must say, that is a clever way to plant the seeds for their future relationship. And another seed that is planted is Logan’s love for Jean which is actually a response to one of the fan complaints in the original trilogy. That is, Logan just suddenly fell in love with Jean without much of a reason. Here its Jean who sets Logan free from Weapon X and she is also restores his memories, which is something that Xavier himself couldn’t do and its foreshadowed earlier with Charles saying she has the strongest mind he has ever known.
Another fan complaint that Singer clearly listened to is the shafting of Scott Summers. He has much more presence here than he did in the original trilogy. He actually gets his own origin story, which is based on a deleted scene from X1 where his powers develop in a school bathroom. Scott is also depicted as somewhat pricky and as a “bad boy” that “borrows” Xavier’s car for a ride to the mall. This feels very familiar to Wolverine in the first X-men film and that’s likely intentional.
Now here comes yet another Age of Ultron comparison. Like Wanda, Scott loses his brother, Alex. And just like Age of Ultron, its not handled like it should be. The movie makes no effort to create a strong connection between the two, which is a huge mistake if they want any emotional resonance. Or perhaps it did make an effort but it was left on the cutting room floor, based on what I’ve heard. Its similar to how scenes that developed Quicksilver’s character was cut, which would have helped make you care about the character when dies. Though Jean comforting Scott was heartwarming and the two holding hands and saying that Havok believed that Scott was going to change the world, which alludes to him becoming the leader of the X-Men. I guess point of that is to give him an arc for future films, where he goes from a trouble maker to a boy scout like in the comics.
Speaking of Quicksilver, lets talk about the version here, who now has a prominent role like the Marvel Studio did in Age of Ultron. However, unlike his MCU counterpart Peter has way more lines, has memorable moments, and is just a fun character. Such as the amazing mansion rescue scene which tops his scene in Days of Future and when he takes on Apocalypse.
Peter is on a search for his father after he resurfaces and what could have been a powerful moment was wasted. For some reason Quicksilver is afraid to tell Erik that he is his son, when Raven mentions that he has more family than he knows. Why he is so nervous to tell him is unclear, but Magneto does seem to suspect something, as Apocalypse breaking Quicksilver’s leg does get his attention. It would be nice to learn in a future film that Magneto figured this out and was the main reason for him breaking free of Apocalypse’s influence.
Last but not least, we have Nightcrawler who makes his long await return. Once again, Singer address fan complaints and showcases the goofy side of Nightcralwer’s personality from the comics, instead of just focusing on the darker aspects of his personality. Kurt here isn’t as strong of character as he was in X2, but he does serve as an effective comic relief. With his best scenes being where he says “I’m blue too” during a conversion between Hank and Raven where they mention how they are not in their blue forms. Acknowledging that there have been many blue people on the team. As well as when he tries to count to three only to realize that he only has two fingers.
The X-men here feel much more like a team in this film than they ever have before, which is something fans asked for. While the older X-men get more focus as characters, the superhero work is mostly done by Scott, Jean, and Kurt. They are the ones that save the older X-men from danger and ultimately save the day. Especially, Nightcrawler who is the least developed of the three and I guess this was a way to compensate. Him and Jean were easily the most valuable players, having the most power showcase. Scott comes off short compared to the two, but like I said earlier his fight with Storm was cut down.
I do love the parallel Mystique makes between the older and younger generation. Such as them flying on a plane to battle and Alex being a handful like Scott. It made me noticed how Scott and Jean’s relationship is very similar to Hank and Raven’s relationship in First Class. As both pairings developed through sharing a struggle with their mutations. The older relationship was due sharing abnormal appearances, while the younger relationship was due to sharing destructive powers that they couldn’t control. The fact that its Scott and Jean that make Raven and finally Hank embrace who they are creates another full circle.
And the final complaint Singer responses to is the lack of colorful costumes. They get them at the end of the film and they are based on the 90s costumes designs. Sam Raimi’s Spider-man proved him wrong about colorful costumes and Singer has been embracing them since Superman Returns. Nice to see him do it with the X-men.
X-men: Apocalypse was full of fan service and I can see why Fox lifted the embargo earlier. They clearly had confidence in this movie and I’m surprised at the critical reception, because are a lot of invalid criticisms. But I’ll save that for another post. Right now, I’m giving X-men:Apocalypse a 7/10.
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