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So the long awaited X-Men: Days of Future Past (DOFP) finally hits our screens, bringing one of the best storylines from the comic books/animated show to the big screen ... so does it live to the hype? Let’s dig in.
By X-Men 2, Bryan Singer (director/producer), had cemented himself as a creative genius when it comes to comic book lore.
His ability to blend character, drama, action and deep social themes into X2 has seen it become an iconic comic book movie which Bret Ratner just pissed on with his less than satisfying X Men 3: The Last Stand (check out Screen-Munchers fitting trailer review below, it sums it up nicely).
As if things could not get worse for the X men universe, X3 was followed up by even pathetic Wolverine movie (yes our Gavin Hood butchered that movie) and if that’s not enough, last year we got another very kiddie-friendly The Wolverine, that almost made me fed up of Wolverine. So when I saw the trailer of XMEN DOFP I was like more Wolverine noooo!
Yet it really works out, especially for us who were in their teens in the 90’s and were fortunate enough to watch Mnet Open Time. Thanks to the animated series that played on Mnet ,we are already familiar with the Xmen:Days of Future Past saga.
Whereby Bishop (which was cool to see yet another black Xman character be central to a plot) was sent to the past to stop the manufacturing of the sentinels, which are basically machines that are created to hunt down mutants. Which is slightly different from the comic books ,whereby Kitty Pride was the one sent back in time. In the movie we have a very bulked up Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) going back in time to stop the same menace as Bishop in the animated cartons.
Jackman is not the only one who has bulked up, Fassbender as Magneto has gained some muscle , Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique does some great physical stunts too. Yet it’s nice to see the original cast of X-men all back in this one, including some comic book fans like Blink and Bishop (woop – woop) . Singer brings out some cool visual effects with Iceman, Blink and Sunspot, I believe all of the Xmen fans have been waiting to see Iceman ride a wave of ice and be fully incased in ice like he is in the comics and TV show.
The first class Xmen have been sacrificed for expediency, from the crew we saw in the first movie (Xmen First class) only Havoc ( in more of a cameo role ) and Hank appear in this one. The rest of the characters from First Class act as exposition fodder, which is a pity. The film is basically a three horse race between , the big stars of Hollywood right now; Hugh Jackman, Fassbender and Lawrence .
The story rotates on those three characters, their whims and wills and its not a totally bad thing. It actually has some genuine surprising turns. The only other character who kinda shines outside the above mentioned trinity is , Quicksilver . The super-fast mutant is hilarious and takes a lot of the seriousness out of this film.
For fans of the comic books and the animated show,there are a lot of easter eggs to unpack and side gags that people who clued up with te source material will be able to appreciate. Such as a cameo of Cable ( yep cable ,but as boy in the future), linkages between the four previous movie and jokes around Quicksilver’s father. Yet if you not clued up on all this,the movie is still able to engage you on the story without loosing you.
My one qualm with X-men : DOFP is that ; yes it has the action, the drama and the characters but it lacked a cohesive social message or commentary. X-men 2 had that whole gay subversive-ness of having mutants coming out to parents etc, First class with ‘mutant and proud’ had a very clever commentary on racism . With DOFP, you’d think it would be obvious but it aint. Is the social messaging that man can not help destroying himself using differences as an excuse to achieve that goal whether the difference be based on genetics, race etc? Or was the big social issue about drugs? Mmmmh in that aspect I really found it wanting
Other than that , there’s enough story , action, character to keep one excited and emotionally involved in this one for the entire duration of the movie. If you are truely patient to wait until the end of the credits, there’s a nice little easter egg there that would make the fan boys go nuts.
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