Deadpool & Wolverine: A Review (Review #1829)

DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE

I was pretty much appalled by Deadpool, snarky and violent. I was in the minority though, as millions loved it precisely for those qualities. I cannot remember if I saw Deadpool 2, but now we have Deadpool & Wolverine. It is what I figure Deadpool and Marvel Cinematic Universe fans wanted: the blending of the unserious Merc with a Mouth and the uber-serious Logan. If that appeals to you, then I figure Deadpool & Wolverine is right up your street. If you don't, and you don't keep up with every minute detail of the world's longest and most expensive soap opera, then there is nothing in Deadpool & Wolverine to convert you.

Wade Wilson/Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) is searching for Logan/Wolverine, but surprisingly finds him dead. That does not stop him from using Logan's remains to fight off a group of fighters while dancing to N*Sync's Bye Bye Bye. Why does Deadpool need Wolverine? Well, we have to back up a bit.

Deadpool wanted to join the Avengers but was rejected by Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau). Dejected by being rejected, Wade has been miserable working as a used car salesman with his friend Peter (Rob Delaney). His birthday party causes him no joy since his ex-girlfriend Vanessa (Morena Baccarin) is also there. Things pick up a bit when agents of the Time Variance Authority come in to take him to renegade TVA bureaucrat Mr. Paradox (Matthew Macfayden). 

Paradox tells Deadpool that the Sacred Timeline is being affected and that while he can remain, his own timeline has to be obliterated due to the death of Deadpool's anchor being. That anchor being is Logan. Rather than see his loved ones erased, Deadpool will find his anchor being and prevent him from dying.

That's thirty minutes before we go back to where we started and move forward. 

He does eventually find Logan (Hugh Jackman), though his Logan/Wolverine is the worst of all of them. Thrown into the Void, Logan and Wolverine must join forces to fight both Paradox and Cassandra Nova (Emma Corrin), unofficial ruler of the Void and Charles Xavier/Professor X's twin sister. 

As a side note, is baldness both a hereditary trait and requirement in the Xavier family? 

From there, they meet various heroes and villains from past MCU movies, even those not from the official Marvel Cinematic Universe. There's Johnny Storm/Human Torch (Chris Evan), Elektra Natchios (Jennifer Garner), Gambit (Channing Tatum), Laura/X-23 (Dafne Keen) and Blade (Wesley Snipes). There are also villains such as Pyro (Aaron Stanford) working against the Resistance, as well as those in between such as the various Deadpools in other worlds. Nicepool (Reynolds in a dual role) is in the Void as well. Ultimately Deadpool & Wolverine must fight to keep all the timelines intact.

Deadpool & Wolverine has five credited screenwriters including both Reynolds and director Shawn Levy. I always take such a high number of credited screenwriters as a cause for alarm. It smacks of writing by committee; it suggests that there are too many cooks in the kitchen who couldn't form a unified vision. It also tells me that there were probably more hands on the project than people are willing to admit. 

With so many people hacking away at a script, it looks like Deadpool & Wolverine opted for a "more is more" plan. All kinds of fan service were thrown at the viewer (Chris Evans as the Human Torch from earlier Fantastic Four films! The original Blade is back! The Alabaman Channing Tatum as the Cajun Gambit!). Double, triple, quadruple down on all these callbacks and throw in some more. Shoutouts both metaphorical and literal to Furiosa and the demise of Twentieth Century-Fox. 

For me, a reason as to why I thoroughly disliked though not detested Deadpool & Wolverine is what so many people loved about it. The various callbacks, the fourth wall breaking, the "aren't we being clever" bits did not impress me. There were many people laughing at various parts, such as a major fight between Deadpool and Wolverine to Grease's You're the One That I Want. I do not take away from anyone's enjoyment of such things. I just want, for myself, something with a little more substance, even in a comic book film.

Pointing out things like montages or how a particular creature was in a Loki episode cuts no ice with me. In fact, it separates me from any serious stakes. Why Logan in particular is Wade's anchor being is unclear (and I think I'm being generous in using that word). The few times Deadpool & Logan pause to give Jackman a more dramatic moment seems jarringly at odds with all the craziness going on around here. Far be it for Wade/Deadpool to have a serious moment. I think the film tried, but no one would believe it. 

Moreover, since we have all these variants going on in multiple universes, there are no stakes to anything here. 

The various cameos did not impress me. I get that Tatum was always in the running for a separate Gambit film. However, separate from the fact that Taum has no acting skills or any real skills apart from taking his clothes off, the deliberately exaggerated Cajun accent was maddening. Pointing out that he was almost unintelligible is not clever. It only draws more attention to a gag that was not funny to start with. Having Snipes say, "There's only going to be one Blade!" could be mildly amusing. Having Reynolds as Deadpool face the camera to give us a knowing look is not. 

Also, why throw in a Furiosa reference when presumably in any of their worlds the Mad Max franchise would not necessarily exist. 

I don't think there were any performances here. People came, cashed their checks, and moved on. Taking jabs at the presumably high salaries is not impressive or clever. After Evans' Johnny Storm is killed, Reynolds' Deadpool tells Logan "Do you know what he was doing to the budget?". Sure, the audience laughed, but I did not. I did not laugh once at Deadpool & Wolverine, though did find myself nodding in agreement when Logan mocks Deadpool. Wolverine rants that Deadpool can't save the world, he couldn't even save his relationship with a stripper! Yet I digress.

I suppose it's nice for Jackman to show off his incredible physique at age 55, but it would be nice if he actually moved on in his career. The same for 47-year-old Reynolds, who has been doing the same snarky schtick since Two Guys, A Girl and a Pizza Place back in 1998. I liked the show, but how is he still doing a variation of Berg all these decades later. Jackman did best in the few dramatic scenes he was in. His Logan was fine, but I was not overwhelmed. Macfayden could have been fun as Paradox, but I wonder if he even knew what was going on. Tatum did not make clear whether Gambit was the joke or just in on it. Garner looked bored and almost desperate to get out of things. Snipes looked like was having a good time.

Oddly, I did not find Deadpool & Wolverine to be as violent as I thought it would be. Yes, you do get graphic depictions of all sorts of killings. However, I was curiously numb to it all. 

The entire premise of Deadpool & Wolverine (Deadpool doing what he can to save his friends) got a bit lost in the Paul Rudd jokes and shade throwing. I did not know those characters enough to make the stakes feel high. I just did not care for the film on any level. 

"I don't want to spend my life being an annoying one-trick pony," Wade Wilson tells Happy Hogan early in Deadpool & Wolverine. That's about the only funny thing in Deadpool & Wolverine since that's the only thing Deadpool has ever been. Deadpool & Wolverine sorely test whether it is better than Argylle. Very briefly, it was worse than Argylle. It is teetering on the edge, but Deadpool & Wolverine did not leave me in a state of shaking fury as Argylle did. It left me cold, which may be worse. 

DECISION: F

The New Mutants: A Review (Review #1419)

THE NEW MUTANTS

I don't think I would have imagined that a film that had been held back for three years would be the film to almost essentially reopen cinemas after the COVID-19 pandemic/panic. However, if 2020 has shown us anything, it is that this year things are completely bonkers. The New Mutants is not a good movie, but tales of it being a horror or a disaster are grossly exaggerated. 

After her reservation is wiped out, Native American teen Danielle Moonstar (Blu Hunt) finds herself in a hospital that specializes in mutants, people with specialized physical powers. Under the watchful but benevolent eyes of Dr. Reyes (Alice Braga), Danni slowly starts accepting her situation. There are four other teens in the hospital: an enemy in the Russian Illyana Rasputin (Anya Taylor-Joy) but a friend in Irish Catholic Rahne (Maisie Williams). There's also Kentucky hick Sam (Charlie Heaton) and hot Brazilian Roberto da Costa (Henry Zaga).

As we keep flashing back to their pasts, we find that there is an evil force chasing after each of them. We also see that things may not be what they appear to be, that perhaps these new mutants are not being prepared for a future as X-Men, but instead part of a secret sinister corporation bent on using them for their own nefarious plans. Danielle herself may be unwittingly the source of the danger, putting her in danger herself. The kids now join forces against their enemies to save themselves and find their true purpose.

The New Mutants is almost delightfully misguided because it does not play as a feature film. Instead, it plays like the opening to the planned/hoped-for trilogy the film was meant to create. We get not a real story but introduction to the characters who are thrown into a situation close to a surprisingly short running time.

With perhaps one exception these are not characters but types. Roberto's main characteristic is his hotness (literal and figurative). Sam's main characteristic is his hick accent. Apart from that we kind of forget to give them personalities or anything close to interesting roles.

It may be a positive that The New Mutants sidelines the men to focus slightly more on the women, but even then the actresses are given so little to work with apart from one-note characters (Rahne: guilt-ridden, Illyana: angry, Danielle: frightened, Dr. Reyes: stern) that they become dull. 

A lot of The New Mutants is surprisingly cheap-looking, probably because the film is dominated by grays and the very small cast. The climatic battle is not great but serviceable, nothing exceptional but nothing horrible. I can see the actors really doing their best but sometimes it felt as if they did fend for themselves.

In a lot of ways, The New Mutants felt like The Breakfast Club blended with One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and threw in a superhero veneer on it. There's really little here: a little teen drama, a little superhero world building, hints and bits of things to come that will never come.

Out of the cast Maisie Williams is the best, her conflicted emotions of guilt about her powers colliding with deep Catholic faith a well-acted role. It's curious that while Rahne feels guilty about causing a death, her lesbianism mixing with her Catholicism does not, or at least appears to. The Rahne-Danielle romance seems a trifle tentative but it gives Williams and Blu their best moments.

Apart from that though I think the actors did their best with what they had. The men fared worse: Heaton's Southern accent a bit comical and Zaga all but disappearing for long stretches, with his only real sequence being an obligatory shirtless scene. Braga I think tried to be serious but she all but signals "I'M DANGEROUS!".

I am mercifully too unaware of these characters to offer views on the controversies over Roberto being "whitewashed" (I understand in the comics he's Afro-Brazilian vs the lighter-skin but still Brazilian Zaga), Danielle also being "lighter" in skin tone or the Rahne-Danielle romance not being more prominent. All this I figure would bother those who know the characters, but those of us unaware would not give it any thought.

The New Mutants feels more like a television pilot than a film, let alone the opening of a new franchise. The actors really tried their best but director/co-writer Josh Boone (writing with Knate Lee) did not give them or the audience much to work with. Whether people want to risk going to theaters in-person to see The New Mutants is up to individuals. I took the risk and hope to be with you in two weeks time. 

It's worth a rental if there is nothing else to see, but don't expect much. 

DECISION: C- 

Dark Phoenix: A Review

DARK PHOENIX

Dark Phoenix is akin to an athlete, long past his/her prime, attempting to mount one last hurrah. It evokes more a sense of sympathy and sorrow watching what was once a great franchise descend to such a sorry state. While nowhere near as bad as X-Men: The Last Stand or perhaps Apocalypse, Dark Phoenix is more of a slog than a horror where you can see just about everyone counting down to the end of their contractual obligations.

Jean Grey (Sophie Turner) is forever haunted by how she inadvertently caused the deaths of her parents back in 1975. She has lived at the special school her guardian Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) founded for those once called 'mutants', beings with special powers. Jean, however, has used her powers for good, especially now as she joins a mission in space to rescue stranded astronauts.

Also going up are Raven/Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence), her on/off-again boyfriend Hank McCoy/Beast (Nicholas Hoult), and three younger X-Men: Kurt/Nightcrawler (Kodi Smit-McGee), Peter/Quicksilver (Evan Peters) and Jean's boyfriend Scott/Cyclops (Tye Sheridan). The mission goes well but Jean is caught in what appears as a massive space storm, affecting her powers.

Back on Earth, she finds herself still emotionally and physically tormented, more so when she discovers that her father is still alive and not dead like Charles mind-planted in her that he was. She, now as Phoenix, goes on some kind of rampage, a pawn in the scheme of Vuk (Jessica Chastain), leader of otherworldly beings who will use Jean to take over the world.

Erik/Magneto (Michael Fassbender) is also roped into the proceedings, culminating in an informal battle between Charles and Erik's mutants over Jean, then united to save her from Vuk and her minions.

I don't think I or anyone else can figure out the loopy logic of the X-Men franchise, particularly in terms of character ages. If we went by the films, Magneto would be somewhere in his 60s when the events of Dark Phoenix take place, but he looks pretty much like he did when First Class took place.

I'm not so hung up on details to not understand that Michael Fassbender is not going to massively age in eight years, but at a certain point, again if you follow the series, it does start looking rather implausible to downright ridiculous to see these characters not age even though the films keep moving things about a decade a film. Yet I digress.

Dark Phoenix flounders because everyone looks and acts rather bored, as if they would rather be anywhere but here and are just going through the motions. Lawrence is the worst offender in this department, clearly showing she thinks that not only is this a waste of her time but far beneath her. Even when spouting off some proto-feminist declarations about how Charles should change the name to "X-Women" given how women keep saving them, there is a rote manner to her delivery.

Few people look as bored as Mystique does when she dies. I think she agreed to be in the film with the understanding Mystique would be killed to ensure she would never have to come back. Fassbender at least has the excuse that Magneto was totally irrelevant to the plot so he could coast through this for the paycheck. Lawrence, however, has no excuse, and her appearance shows off her total contempt for all this.

To be fair however everyone looked just so disinterested in the proceedings. Some, like Sheridan and Smit-McGee, attempted to compensate by either speaking fast or widening their eyes. Others, like Chastain, went the opposite route and decided monotone speaking and blank stares would do.

Turner was pretty much disastrous as our lead. I assume she can act, but Dark Phoenix gives no evidence that she can. Whether it's showing her love for Cyclops, her sense of betrayal by Xavier, her oddball request from Magneto for mentorship, facing off against Vuk or regret at having killed Mystique not once did Turner's voice or expression change.

The fault cannot rest on the actors alone. No matter how talented a cast (and to be fair McAvoy, Fassbender, Hoult and Sheridan are strong actors), the fault lies squarely at writer/director Simon Kinberg. There was not one moment in Dark Phoenix that was exciting or interesting, not one scene that evoked any emotion other than boredom, not one character I cared about.

In short, Dark Phoenix is surprisingly boring. There is no way around it: Dark Phoenix is boring. Everything about it is boring: the story, the performances, the action sequences, the characters.

This is a sorry way to end this version of the X-Men universe. I still hold that X-Men and X2: X-Men United are among the best comic-book based films made. I've also warmed to X-Men: First Class and have positive memories of X-Men: Days of Future Past. Now the X-Men will soon find themselves part of the world's longest and most expensive soap opera, also known as the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

At this point, just like everyone involved with Dark Phoenix, I'm beyond caring.   

DECISION: D-

X-Men: Apocalypse: A Review (Review #860)

X-MEN: APOCALYPSE

Apocalypse Never Again...

During X-Men: Apocalypse, some of our junior mutants are seen leaving a screening of Return of the Jedi.  One of them, Jean Grey, makes the witty comment that 'the third part is usually the worst'.   Accompanying her was a character identified as "Jubilee", though through the course of X-Men: Apocalypse we don't hear that name said or see said character do anything that is relevant to the plot. 

This in short reveals one of Apocalypse's myriads of problems.

Perhaps the makers of X-Men: Apocalypse thought at that "third part is usually the worst" they were being cute, funny, making an in-joke.  Perhaps an homage to X-Men: The Last Stand.

Beware of taunting the audience, for X-Men: Apocalypse more than lives up to one of my Golden Rules of Filmmaking: A "Part III" Will Be Either a Disaster or the Harbinger of a Greater Disaster.  X-Men: Apocalypse goes through the motions, but it is a dead, sad affair, with a story that is boring on its own and worse, makes trying to keep continuity with the original X-Men films (let alone the two in the new franchise) all but impossible. I'll get to some of my questions regarding continuity within the overall X-Men universe later on.

In ancient Egypt, the first and most powerful of mutants, En Sabah Nur, is about to perform another quasi-Satanic rite that will give him another mutant's powers (a bit like Sylar from Heroes).  However, humans manage, at great cost, to stop him and he ends up buried alive.

Fast forward to 1983, a good ten years since the events of Days of Future Past and twenty-one years since those in First Class.  The constant struggle between Professor Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) and Erick Lehnsherr aka Magneto (Michael Fassbender) continues, though for the moment there is détente. Charles is still at this School for the Gifted, working to have humans and mutants coexist (and rocking some era-appropriate Miami Vice-style threads).  Erick is hiding out in his native Poland under an assumed name, with a wife and adorable little girl.

If you've seen movies, you can imagine what will happen to the villain/antihero's wife and adorable child.

Also at work is Raven, better known as Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence), attempting to find mutants and take them to Charles' school, though she wavers between the Xavier and Magneto worldviews.  One of those she rescues is Kurt Wagner, aka Nightcrawler (Kodi Smit-McPhee), a mutant who can teleport.  She gets him from a cage match where Nightcrawler is forced to fight Angel (Ben Hardy), who has large wings.

Thanks, in part, to CIA Agent Moira McTaggart (Rose Byrne), En Sabah Nur has reawaken.  He now goes by Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac) and is going to force all, mutants and non, to submit to his will and turn from the 'false gods'. His first recruit is Ororo Munro (Alexandra Shipp), a mutant who can control the weather.  He also picks up another mutant (to be named later), Angel...and Magneto, affording him a chance to avenge both his wife/adorable child but his parents killed at Auschwitz.

There is also the matter of Scott Summers, soon to be known as Cyclops (Tye Sheridan), who has a literal meltdown when he finds that his eyes can emit fire.  He's the high school-age brother of Alex Summers, better known as Havok (Lucas Till), who worked with Charles Xavier to stop the Cuban Missile Crisis, along with one of the top teachers at Charles' school, Hank McCoy aka Beast (Nicholas Hoult). Scott meets and somewhat bonds with Jean Grey (Sophie Turner), who works to keep all her mutant powers controlled/hidden.

Apocalypse becomes aware of Charles Xavier's great powers and wants them in the ultimate weapon to TAKE OVER THE WORLD and will stop at nothing to get at them.  Those not part of Apocalypse's "four Horsemen" will also stop at nothing to prevent this from happening, even if in the case of Havok, it costs them their lives.  Aiding in all this are not just all the aforementioned figures, but also Peter Maximoff or Quicksilver (Evan Peters), who not only has super-speed but is Magneto's illegitimate child.

Apocalypse has decided that it is his time, and that Charles' powers must be transferred to him in a revived quasi-Satanic rite.  Only with the uniting of all the others, fighting against the forces of darkness will they save all from the massive destruction that Apocalypse and his minions are wreaking.  Magneto, the most moral of the Four Horsemen, turns on his master, and they all manage to destroy Apocalypse.

X-Men: Apocalypse, is one of if not worst comic book-based films of 2016.  Nowhere near the horror that is X-Men: The Last Stand, Apocalypse suffers from other maladies: being boring, chaotic, and in so many ways indistinguishable from others in the genre.

Whole things that don't make any sense are thrown in just to have characters put in.  First, let's look at Jubilee.  Not once was her name used, or her powers shown, or given anything to do.  In Apocalypse, she had no reason for being there at all.  She served no purpose story-wise, and worse, she wasn't even there for fan-service precisely because she didn't get a name check.

Let's now go over another flat-out bizarre situation: that of the Summers Brothers.  First, a little math. 

Lucas Till (Havok/Alex Summers) is 26 years old (born 1990).  Tye Sheridan (Cyclops/Scott Summers) is a mere 20 years old (born 1996).  Havok was involved in the Cuban Missile Crisis, which was in 1962 and which play a major part in First Class.  IF we put in that Havok was around 21 at the time of First Class (the age Till was when the film was made), that should make him 42 years old in 1983 for Apocalypse (estimating a birth year of 1941). 

Further estimating that Scott was a junior in high school at the time of Apocalypse, with a birth year of 1966 (making Scott 17 years old in 1983), we have a situation where Alex Summers is theoretically old enough to be Scott Summers' father!

I'm not well-versed enough to think about things like age gaps between mutants or whether being a mutant preserves you so well, but this playing fast-and-loose with time and characters just makes things a bit muddled for me.  I do leave it up to other people, more seasoned than I on mutant matters, to try and sort this out for me.  I'm sure I just missed something.

One thing I didn't miss was the lack of performances from most of the cast. Out of all the returning cast, I think Lawrence was the worst.  She had simply awful delivery in almost every scene, looking bored and desperate to get out of this (and desperate to not get into her Mystique paint given that she appeared as Mystique a total of two and a half times versus looking like J-Law almost all the time).  Fassbender at times looked equally bored, which I figure he thought was showing him as 'sad' and 'tragic', but there didn't seem to be much reason for him to join or abandon Apocalypse.

Let me now touch on Psylocke (Olivia Munn).  What was HER reason for joining Apocalypse, or being the last one to remain loyal to him?  Did she have any lines of great importance?  Apart from showing off the latest style in S&M wear, did Psylocke do anything of great importance in the film?

The same for Angel, who did nothing in the film and worse, had a great dramatic moment stolen from him.  Apocalypse gifts him with metallic wings, but what could have been impressive, even thrilling was not thanks to the decision to have such dark cinematography that one almost can't see what is going on.  What could have been a fantastic moment ends up leaving no impression.


The sheer failure of X-Men: Apocalypse is more disheartening given that some of the newer members actually gave good performances.  A particular highlight was Sheridan, showing that he not only can do drama but can handle action pictures on this magnitude.  His Scott Summers was a real figure, one who had anger about what he considered a curse until he saw that it could be a force for good. 

Smit-McPhee did a credible German accent and was more endearing than annoying as the put-upon but still somewhat naïve and innocent Kurt.

Turner's Jean Grey was a conflicted character, and it's credit to her that she made the most of her time.

Sadly, the worst is Isaac as our titular villain.  I don't blame him, but blame writer/director Bryan Singer for not just encasing him in so much makeup you could have had anyone play (or overplay) another boring megalomaniac power-hungry villain, but also for telling him to deliver his lines in such a portentous manner that it comes across as the worst of monologuing.  This super-villain ends up coming across as the title character in the fictional film The Mummy Returns Again.

Actually, a lot of people were directed by Singer to deliver their lines in a heavy-handed manner, so again Isaac isn't at fault for how bad this was.

Too much of Apocalypse is repetitive of both other X-Men films and comic book-based films in general.  Quicksilver's saving of everyone as the school is about to explode is almost beat-for-beat a redo of the same situation in Days of Future Past (substituting Sweet Dreams for Time in a Bottle), but what was once exciting and plot-necessary now here comes across as rote.  It doesn't even look exciting: Peters' face looking laughable as he speeds through the school, saving dogs and goldfish. 

Also, isn't it just so wonderfully coincidental that he just happened to show up at that precise moment?

The climatic battle where the Earth gets literally torn apart is just another entry in this 'let's see which comic book can destroy the world the most' contest.  We've seen in it Man of Steel, in Age of Ultron, in Batman v. Superman, and now here.  Just give it a rest.  The world doesn't have to end EVERY TIME.

What should have ended was a scene where Apocalypse uses sand to behead some thugs.  For a PG-13 film, I thought that moment was rather grotesque and not obscured enough to not push it to an R. 

Suffice it to say X-Men: Apocalypse is just another big, loud, comic book-based films that doesn't expand on what came before or add anything interesting in and of itself.  Apart from the younger set of Sheridan, Turner, and Smit-McPhee (who should have gotten their own movie), X-Men: Apocalypse is the weakest entry in the revived franchise.  The fact that it doesn't rank lower is less about this film and more about the weakness of the others. 

DECISION: D+

X-Men: Days of Future Past. A Review (Review #637)

X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST

Timey-wimey. 

That famous phrase (or infamous, depending on your thinking) came to me as I thought on X-Men: Days of Future Past.  We have a major character going back into the past to alter the future.  Would it all work?  Would it make sense?  I am too honest in saying that how Days of Future Past fits into the previous X-Men movies I cannot answer for certain.  What I can answer is that DOFP holds up well on its own, has some thrilling and well-crafted action pieces, and has incredibly intelligent acting and directing behind it, making this a rare comic-book adaptation that both die-hard fans and those generally unaware of the mythos will enjoy.

It is 2020, and the world is devastated by a war between humans and mutants, with the latter about to be exterminated completely.  Those mutants and their human allies not already captured have been killed by Sentinels, machines that can counteract any mutant power and kill them.  There are a few mutants left to make a last stand.  Among them are Professor X (Patrick Stewart), his erstwhile ally Magneto (Ian McKellen), two instructors from Professor X's school, Storm (Halle Berry) and Wolverine (Hugh Jackman), and a former student, Iceman (Shawn Ashmore).  Along with younger mutants such as Warpath (Booboo Stewart, no relation to Patrick), Bishop (Omar Sy), Blink (Bingbing Fan), and Colossus (Daniel Cudmore), they manage to hole up in China.  It is decided that the best way to end the war is to stop it before it began.

With that, Wolverine (the only mutant who could possibly survive time travel), goes to 1973 to stop the even which triggered the war, the assassination of Dr. Bolivar Trask (Peter Dinklage) by Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence).  When she murdered Trask as vengeance for his experiments on other mutants, she was captured and her DNA used to create the Sentinels (and Trask's murder the rationale for striking at the mutants).  Kitty Pryde (Ellen Page) is the only mutant who can send him back (though his body remains in the 'present' as well). 

Wolverine lands in 1973 and is surprised by what he finds.  His mentor Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) has become distraught and disillusioned by the Vietnam War and the loss of his friends Erik Lehnsherr (Michael Fassbender) and Mystique (the former imprisoned in the Pentagon for having assassinated President Kennedy).  He can walk thanks to a serum by Hank McCoy (Nicholas Hoult) which controls McCoy's transformation into Beast, but it takes his telepathic powers away.  After some convincing that Wolverine (aka Logan) is telling the truth, Charles agrees to rescue his frenemy from the Pentagon with the help of a cocky young mutant named Peter (Evan Peters), soon to be known as Quicksilver.

After Erik escapes, it is off to the Paris Peace Conference that ends the Vietnam War to stop Mystique's killing of Trask.  However, soon other motivations from others start taking over and the future appears to have not been altered despite their best efforts.  More wild twists and turns take place until we get a wild climax.

Simon Kinberg's script is highly reminiscent of The Terminator (down to when we see Jackman when he arrives in the past for the first time...fully nude from the back and showing he is amazingly fit at 46).  However, despite the similarity DOFP is based on an X-Men graphic novel.  I haven't read it so I can't say how close or far it strays from the film (though I suspect things were altered).   However, credit should be given that the script managed to keep things flowing and balanced between the past and present.

The bulk of DOFP takes place in 1973, which has the effect of giving the original X-Men Trilogy cast not much to do apart from sit and talk while attempting to hold off the Sentinels.  As a result, with the exception of Jackman (who now not only owns the role of Wolverine but has earned his place alongside Christopher Reeve's Superman as an actor who has made his interpretation of a character iconic) it is the First Class cast that handles most of the story.

I have always believed that if you cast actual actors in these roles, you will have excellent performances.  DOFP confirms my belief.  As Xavier, McAvoy's evolution from a man who has given up on hope to one who rises by acknowledging the goodness in humanity and other mutants showcases just how good an actor he is.  He is matched note for note by Fassbender, whose Magneto is not necessarily evil but who himself is motivated by fear and anger towards non-mutants.  The scene aboard Charles' plane when Erik reprimands his friend shows that in his mind, Erik is doing more for mutants by having humanity be dominated by them than Charles' peaceful coexistence worldview.

The other performances are also solid.  Lawrence's Mystique is placed at the center of the cold war between Erik and Charles, and she herself shows a mixture of both: her desire to avenge her fellow mutants mixed with intellectual acknowledgement that escalating a war will lead to more mutant and human deaths.  Hoult's Hank/Beast is in many ways the calm, intelligent creature required to think of solutions, but when unleashed his fury (such as when he goes after Erik) he is fierce and dangerous.

As for Jackman, well, as stated he is now the face we see when we think 'Wolverine' (even though technically he is all wrong, Jackman being much too tall to fit Wolverine's description).  Jackman as Wolverine still has a way with sarcastic quips and dismissive attitude.  However, when calls for emotion are needed (such as when he has a flashback that temporarily jeopardizes the mission), Jackman can deliver those moments too.

Of the newer members, Evans is the standout as the cocky Quicksilver, and his scene in recovering Erik is perhaps the highlight of DOFP. To Jim Croce's Time in a Bottle, we see things from Quicksilver's perspective as he rushes past everyone while fixing the guards.  He does what is needed (divert the bullets) but he also has fun (stealing the guard's caps, taking a quick taste of the soup flying in slow-motion through the air).  Evans' Quicksilver is a kid who loves his powers and has a good time using them, so this chance to stick it to the Pentagon must have been a highlight in his life.  He isn't deferential to his elders (Erik is not amused and a little stunned at having this kid hold him, warning Magneto of whiplash down to repeating the words, "Whip...lash..." as if he were talking to an idiot), and of the newer cast members Evans' brief turn is one of the best.

However, the jury's still out on his costume.

The song fits into the time period, the ironic message of the song to Quicksilver's fast-paced abilities, and even the sadness of the tune lends a touch of pathos to a beautifully shot scene. 

Other cast members like Dinklage does well with making Trask less overt villain and more highly concerned of mutant takeover (though his motives as to why he was so afraid of mutants were a bit vague). 

As stated earlier, because the bulk is in 1973, the past cast didn't play a large role in the film.  However, there is a scene where past and present meet, and it was beautifully acted by all parties.  Bryan Singer brought out not just great performances from his cast, but also kept a solid balance between past and present.  The editing whenever we had to go back to the future was another solid part of DOFP, where it ramped up the tension as to whether either side would live to tell the tale.

The score and musical choices (such as Croce and Roberta Flack's The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face) fit every moment.  John Ottman's music could be tense and exciting to almost New Age (the past and present meeting sounding like something from Music From the Hearts of Space).

If I were to find faults in Days of Future Past, it is in that one has to know greatly the minutiae of X-Men lore to figure out everything going on.  We don't get a real introduction to the newer mutants and if one doesn't remember Ashmore or Page we wouldn't know who they were (I didn't).  Same goes for the post-credit scene, which I had to have explained to me.  While I don't think you have to know all things X-Men to follow the plot, it does help.  The film does a good job establishing characters for those who don't know a Rogue from a Sunspot, but the rush to get things going may leave some people puzzled.

Without being too philosophical, X-Men: Days of Future Past is not just a fun action/comic-book film (thought certainly it is that).  It is also about intelligent themes: the fear of 'the Other' that leads to tragedies on both sides, the struggle between peaceful coexistence among groups or loyalty to 'one's own kind'.  Ideas like these rattling around in an escapist picture?  That is something to contemplate.

X-Men: Days of Future Past may not be the best X-Men movie ever, but it comes pretty close to it.  However, any movie that erases the bad memories of both The Last Stand and Origins: Wolverine (and maybe renders them obsolete in terms of continuity) already has our eternal gratitude.   X-Men: Days of Future Past does much to restore the luster and potential of the franchise, and one hopes that the Apocalypse will be as good as the future and the past. 

DECISION: B+

The Wolverine: A Review

THE WOLVERINE

Memoirs of a Mutant...

Save for a cameo in X-Men: First Class (a movie I was slightly disappointed with), the character of Wolverine has not been seen since X-Men Origins: Wolverine, a clear embarrassment to all concerned and a rare misstep for our morose mutant (Hugh Jackman).  Jackman now has earned the distinction of having played the same comic-book character in more films than any other actor (six times in all).  The Wolverine does at least one bad thing: it establishes both X-Men Origins: Wolverine and X-Men 3: The Last Stand as Canon.

Almost everything else, it was hit-and-miss.

Wolverine/Logan is still mourning the death of his love Jean Grey (Famke Janssen).  As a result, he lives in the wilderness, where he's something of an avenging angel to woodland creatures.  He soon is found by Yukio (Rila Fukushima).  She works for Yashida (Haruhiko Yamanouchi), a former guard at the POW camp Logan was in during World War II.  Yashida wants to thank Logan for saving him at the Nagasaki atomic bombing and say goodbye to him before he dies. 

Once in Japan, Logan finds that Yashida has an offer for him: he can give Logan what he wants: an end to his immortality.  Such powers can be transferred, but Logan won't accept such things.  However, this really is all out of his hands, as a powerful toxin slipped to him makes him if not strictly mortal at least suppresses his healing abilities.  He now requires medical attention.  He now bleeds.

At Yashida's funeral his granddaughter Mariko (Tao Okamoto) is abducted by the Yakuza.  Logan now protects her while she has a secret army of ninjas also on her side (so secret she doesn't quite seem aware of it).  With the assistance of Yukio (who has psychic powers), Logan now must rescue Mariko (with whom he has fallen in love with) against her father Shingen (Hiroyuki Sanada), ninja archer/Mariko's former fiancée Harada (Will Yun Lee) and Viper (Svetlana Khodchenkova), a mutant with venomous powers.

I think it bears remembering that I did not read comic books as a child.  In fact, it wasn't until my twenties that I even glanced at a comic book, and it was only because the Blue Beetle series was set in my hometown of El Paso, TX.   Therefore, I come into all comic book-based films unaware of the mythology the films draw on.  I understand The Wolverine's story is based on a graphic novel, which is all well and good.  However, as a non-comic book reader/follower I found much to object in The Wolverine, both story-wise and acting-wise, that push the film down.

On the second part I can find no fault in Jackman.  He OWNS the part of Logan/Wolverine fully and completely.  Despite the fact that technically he is far too tall to play this character, Jackman gets the rage, the hurt, and even the dark humor of the solitary mutant.  His performance is so good that one forgets he really doesn't fit the description of Logan/Wolverine from the comics (in the same way Peter O'Toole is far too tall to play the diminutive T.E. Lawrence...and yes, I just compared Hugh Jackman's Wolverine to Peter O'Toole's Lawrence of Arabia).  It was just about everyone else in The Wolverine that fell flat.

Particularly bad was Okamoto, a former model beginning a screen career.  Due to this being her first role, one should not be too harsh with her, but if one is going to give someone a central part, it should be given to someone who has had some training.  I can think of only two models who have gone on to respectable acting careers (Lauren Bacall and Lauren Hutton, and if one can provide more examples I'd be grateful), and sadly Okamoto's flat performance as the perpetual damsel in distress (down to literally being trapped in a tower) made her role uninteresting.  Even worse, despite Jackman and Okamoto's best efforts, the 'romance' between Logan and Mariko seem to come from almost nowhere and I never believed it.

Fukushima's Yukio was much better to where I wish the story had taken more interest in her than in the dull, almost lifeless Mariko.  I also have read where Khodchenkova has been trashed for her Viper, but I think she did her best as well.  This Viper is a camp-vamp creature, one who struts and poisons men at whim, so I wasn't too bothered with her performance.

Where for me The Wolverine fails is in Frank Bomback and Scott Frank's screenplay.  Poor Logan gets himself caught up in all this interfamily power struggle where he really has no stake in it.  We've got Yakuza fighting a secret ninja army, an archer from Mariko's past (do I detect hints of The Avenger's Hawkeye crossed with elements of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon?) and for a final wild and wrong turn, a giant robot samurai made from adamantium (and throw in a completely laughable and predictable turn, have a 'dead' character inside the Silver Samurai). 

At that point for me The Wolverine turned into a bit of a farce. I actually started laughing at this, not only at what I was watching but at the fact that the movie was taking this all so seriously. 

One thing that I fault The Wolverine for is that it took far too long to get where it wanted to go.  I think the entire ten to fifteen minutes of Wolverine turning into Grizzly Logan: Defender of the Forest could have been dispensed.  Secondly, the constant dream appearances by Jean Gray (a total of five times) was simply idiotic.  One, two, maybe three dream sequences perhaps, but FIVE?  Even worse, the first time she appears it is as part of a dream within a dream.

What is this: Wolverine's Inception?

However, there are some things that are quite good in The Wolverine.  The action scenes, particularly an extended battle starting from Yashida's funeral that after a pause continues on a train is very tense and well-done, exciting and even with some humor.  An attack of ninjas at the Yashida palace is also quite good, filmed quite beautifully (reminiscent, though not as good, as the Shanghai sequence in Skyfall). 

It is unfortunate on the whole that director James Mangold focused (no pun intended) on that rather than on both the story and some of the performances. 

SPOILERS IN NEXT PARAGRAPH.  YOU'VE BEEN WARNED.

The teaser at the end though, with both Ian McKellen's Magneto AND Patrick Stewarts Charles Xavier (aka Professor X) being X-Men United (pun intended) hinting of a major threat to mutants suggests that X-Men: Days of Future Past will be (or attempt to be) a massive epic, bringing in the cast of First Class (the always brilliant Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy as the younger Magneto and Xavier respectively) along with those who have lived through The Last Stand, with Jackman's Wolverine being part of it all.  That to me makes Days of Future Past something to anticipate. 

END OF SPOILER.

The Wolverine is not a terrible film (certainly it's far and above the last two tries where our crabby mutant was a lead) but it took one too many odd turns and had some weak performances that don't put it anywhere near the level of the first two X-Men films (among the greatest comic book adaptations).  It's a case of seeing something that could have been better.  It's enough to make one unleash their claws in mild frustration.

I think the best way to sum up The Wolverine is to point out that at the screening I attended, at the end ONE person let out wild applause, but no one else joined his wild cheering. 

Finally, for those female/gay readers of mine, Hugh Jackman appears a total of nine times shirtless.  Yes, he's 44, and every man hates him for it...

DECISION: C-

X-Men: First Class. A Review

X-MEN: FIRST CLASS

Author's Note: This is the original review for X-Men: First Class.  I have revisited my original views on the film.  I've decided to keep this review as I originally wrote it. However, my views have changed since then. Scroll down to the bottom for a link to the updated version.

Let's start at the end: you can leave as soon as the credits start.  X-Men: First Class has no teaser scene at the end of the film, which is an innovation for comic book adaptations.  This sets it apart from the norm, and that would give it a certain quality.  The appearances from some of my newly favorite actors (James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence), should also elevate the project and be a redemption against the bitter memories from both X-Men: The Last Stand and especially X-Men Origins: Wolverine.  Alas, this...reboot...prequel...whatever you want to call it, suffers from the sins of its predecessors: a lot of information that has to be rushed through in order to get to the climatic sequence at the expense of knowing who the characters are (both in terms of personality and even in name).

You couldn't have had two more different upbringings than those of Erik Lehnsherr (Fassbender) and Charles Xavier (McAvoy).  The former is a Jewish boy at a concentration camp in Nazi -occupied Poland, the latter a lonely WASP in upstate New York (a bit like Franklin D. Roosevelt, who was President in 1944 when we start the film).  Erik is terrorized (and it's strongly hinted, tortured) into using his powers to control metal by the Mengele-like Dr. Schmidt (Kevin Bacon).  Charles, meanwhile, has found a friend who, like himself, is different: he can read minds, and Raven can take the form of anyone, while her own features are a shocking blue.  Let's move on eighteen years.

Erik has made it his life's effort to hunt down as kill as many escaped Nazis as he can find (think of a Simon Wiesenthal with supernatural powers).  His Top Target is Dr. Schmidt, but more on him later.  Xavier, finishing his dissertation at Oxford, is too wrapped up in his work and the women he can bang to pay much interest to anything else, except perhaps Raven (Lawrence), who is like a sister to him.  In Las Vegas, CIA agent Moira McTaggert (Rose Byrne) is tracking down some shady business.  She makes a shocking discovery: the American general is meeting with Dr. Sebastian Shaw (Bacon), who can control fire, and more frightening, a woman in white turns into ice and a devil-looking man whisks said general back to the War Room from Dr. Strangelove.  Agent McTaggert knows only one person who can help: a newly-minted professor at Oxford who has written about genetic mutations.   

Soon, Xavier and Raven are recruited to track down Dr. Shaw, who is planning something nefarious with nuclear weapons.  Protecting him is Emma Frost (January Jones), said woman in white, who like Xavier can read and enter the thoughts of others.  Shaw has two other henchmen: the devil-looking one and another who can control wind.  Don't ask me for their names, only the devil-looking one had one that was used: Azalel (Jason Flemyng).  However, Erik has also tracked down Shaw, and in a battle gets in the CIA's way.  Xavier persuades Erik to join forces to capture a common enemy.  They also agree to find more mutants and train them.

The duo soon make fast work of it: finding four to join them, Raven, and even Dr. Hank McCoy (Nicholas Hough), who is 'in the closet' so to speak.  These kids are oblivious to the danger coming: Shaw basically creates the Cuban Missile Crisis in an effort to bring nuclear holocaust, and thus kill all the humans to leave the mutants to conquer the Earth.  Now, even with the defection of winged mutant Angel (Zoe Kravitz), the other youngsters have only a week to train to stop the Soviets from placing those missles in Cuba...and for Erik to avenge his parents.

The disappointment in X-Men: First Class is that at an incredible running time of two hours and twelve minutes, the film is far too long for the story it's NOT telling.  It's not an origins story because, like so many other comic book adaptations, we the non-comic book readers never get a chance to know who these characters are (sometimes literally: I had no idea what the backstory for the characters Banshee or Havoc are, let alone who Riptide is--that, I discovered, is the name of Shaw's wind henchman).  There is no real focus in X-Men: First Class, because director/co-writer Matthew Vaughn appeared too interested in showing off what his camera could do as opposed to how best to serve the story.

The best example I can give of this is at the training montage.  The constant splitting of the screen to create various rectangles and squares where we see the mutants learning to use their powers does lend it the appearance of a graphic novel, but it starts to become distracting (especially when you have two angles of the same event being shown simultaneously).  Another poor choice was to show the meeting room of the generals.  Granted, Erin Boyd and Sonja Klaus' set design is excellent in capturing the look of JFK-era 1960s, but what possessed Vaughn to make a deliberate copy of the War Room from Dr. Strangelove.  It might have gone over the heads of some of the audience, but I was half-expecting Mayor Quimby to send for the Esteemed Representatives of Television. 

I think the flaw that pushes X-Men: First Class down is what I always find brings any film down: too many hands on the script.  The credited writers number four (Vaughn, Jane Goldman, Zach Stentz, and Ashley Miller) and that is not counting the two people credited with the story (Sheldon Turner and Bryan Singer). That comes to six people who brought this story together, and the fact that so many people were working on the film shows in the final product.  We never get a true focus into what motivates the characters apart from Erik.

We're suppose to believe that Raven (aka Mystique) is Xavier's close friend.  However, she appears to have little conflict in leaving him at a critical point in his life to follow Erik (now Magneto).  The closest I can come to a reason is that they had a romance based on their belief that they are if not better than humanity that they shouldn't change who they are to suit non-mutants.  Given that for most of X-Men: First Class we've had a romance between Mystique and Hank (who becomes Beast), it seems even more strange.  We don't know why Emma Frost is so loyal to Shaw or (as stated earlier) why Angel dumped the group even after she saw one of her compatriots killed.  The story is so sprawling that the characters get short-changed, and we have to sacrifice character development for the next action scene.

Too much time is spent in Erik's Avenging Angel mode before we get him and Charles together, which is a disservice.  If we had a greater focus on the conflict between Erik's and Charles' worldview, we could have seen the rise of Magneto and Professor X.  We have a strong story between how these two friends became fierce rivals, but X-Men: First Class doesn't give us one.  What the film ends up with is a series of events tied together by having the same characters there, rather than having one event flow from another.

The performances were much better than the film deserved.  Fassbender showed the moments of humanity in Erik, and McAvoy makes his Charles a somewhat swaggering figure.  Lawrence did the best job as the conflicted Mystique, who cares for Charles but who has a worldview closer to Magneto than the Professor.  It's hard to judge the other performers since we never get a clear idea who they are as individuals (so much time wasted, yet so little shown in regards to their training).  I question how Bacon could go from German to American English without a trace of an accent (maybe nuclear energy affects the voice?).

There are also other things that made me dislike X-Men: First Class.  Henry Jackson's score had a terrible habit of announcing its presence, especially in the climatic sequence when Magneto raises the submarine and the ensuing battle.  It would be nice to have music that serves the story as opposed to being big and self-important.  I wasn't too thrilled with one of Dr. Shaw's lines when he raids the secret compound where our young mutants are.  "If you are not with us you are technically against us."  From what I know, George W. Bush is no longer President--you can stop using his line as code for "this guy's evil".

I also may be a bit nitpicky here, but when we see a map of the Cold War combatants we see U.S.A. in blue and Russia in red.  If it's the 1960s, shouldn't the map technically have read "U.S.S.R." or "Soviet Union"?  I suppose because the majority of the target audience did not live during its existence and remember the U.S.S.R. as something from ancient history, they wouldn't have particularly noticed or cared.  Yet, I digress.

Finally, there are two cameos from previous X-Men stars: one in the mutant recruiting montage and one after, the first delighted audiences (I wasn't particularly thrilled) and the second went by so fast most didn't even notice it.

In short, X-Men: First Class had a lot of potential to do what good science-fiction/fantasy can do: address real-life issues by placing them in another context.  Sadly, more interest was spent on raising a submarine than in giving the audience true motivation for the character's motives (or even to give them names).  There has to be something wrong with a film where one is more interested in the fact that Brendan Fehr is in the movie than in the movie itself.  Fehr is a good actor (here, playing the Communications Officer), but my mind went to how much I enjoyed his work in the too-short and quickly cancelled Roswell than in what is suppose to be a major battle between the Soviets and Americans, and later between the humans and the mutants.  In the final analysis, First Class needs a refresher course.

ORIGINAL DECISION: C-
REVISITED DECISION: B-

Update: Since the writing of this review, X-Men: First Class was revisited as part of the Fifth Anniversary "Second Look" Series.  The grade has been changed from C- to B-. 

X-Men Origins: Wolverine. A Review

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE

Origins Sin...

X-Mens Origins: Wolverine purports to tell how our angry mutant came to be. How it all ties with the X-Men trilogy films is a little beyond me, and moreover, which watching it, I could only think one thing: I was unaware that Wolverine is older than Magneto. It may be accurate in terms of what the comics say. However, it just didn't make sense to me, and that is just one of the problems the film couldn't overcome.

We start in 1840's Canada, where our hero Wolverine aka Logan (Hugh Jackman) discovers his mutation in a moment of fury. Joined by his brother, fellow mutant Victor Creed/Sabertooth (Liev Schreiber), they run away, constantly fighting in American wars from the Civil War to Vietnam (the Korean War curiously left off). Eventually they are recruited by General Stryker (Danny Huston) to join an elite team, but after a massacre of innocent villagers Logan (sometimes known as James) walks away from them and heads back to Canada. He finds a beautiful woman to love, but then someone starts killing members of his former team, and after his beloved is killed he vows revenge. As part of his revenge, his metal claws are bestowed upon him. From there, he goes after his man.

The main problem with X-Men Origins: Wolverine is that this isn't an origin story in the same way Batman Begins or Iron Man are. It's just a routine action film, right down to the cliches.

When the elite team is heading up in an elevator to assassinate someone while listening to Muzak: cliche.
When Logan finds his girlfriend's body and he screams out while the camera pans up and away: cliche.
When he walks away slowly from an exploding helicopter: you guessed it: cliche.

I kept saying, "cliche, cliche, cliche" while watching the film.

If anything, Wolverine is following in the sorry steps of X-Men: The Last Stand. You have characters introduced and then killed with no real reason. I figure that with this film, The Lord of the Rings, and Lost, Dominic Monaghan is assuring his career at Comic-Con-style conventions. He reminded me of James Marsden's Cyclops in X3: he's killed off before being allowed to do anything.

Taylor Kitsch's Gambit  is on screen for approximately eight to ten minutes and added nothing to the plot except name recognition.

Liev Schreiber obviously had fun playing Sabertooth whom I was unaware was Wolverine's brother (though I'm still confused if they're full or half). My friend Fidel Gomez & I disagree about him: I think he's a competent actor while he insists he's wooden in every performance he's given. In fact, he was not looking forward to Wolverine precisely because of him. However, his performance showed he was in on the joke, not bringing anything to his role of Sabertooth except the cliched villain.

Hugh Jackman looks great but his physical transformation is the only quality he brings to Wolverine; he didn't have that fury mixed with sorrow that he had in the previous X-Men films. This is his worst performance as this character.

Only Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool brought any sense of fun and action to the film, though I question whether being a master swordsman is a true mutation.  However, the decision to silence a character best known for his acerbic wit is yet another bad, bad decision.

There are plenty of fight scenes in the film: three between Sabertooth and Wolverine alone.

Wolverine fights Stryker.
Wolverine fights Deadpool.
Wolverine fights (fill in the blank).

When he does fight, it looks fake. In fact, everything looks fake. The effects looked cheap and unconvincing.

For example, when he first examines his new claws, they looked animated onto the screen. When he walks away from the exploding helicopter, it looks like his body is superimposed on the screen. Even Patrick Stewart's cameo looked odd.

Ultimately, this movie failed to tell an interesting backstory to one of the most memorable characters from the X-Men comic book series. Instead, it was mindless action. You just think how much better it would have been if instead of putting so much emphasis on the explosions or Jackman's physique, they would have focused on the story. Despite it being Wolverine's origin story, it would have been nice if the other mutants actually had something to do with the story.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine suggests that there will be more Origins films. After this one, I think that idea is most sincerely dead. Now that I think of it, Deadpool reminds me of Darth Maul: the best character in the film killed off by the end when a movie about HIM would have been better/more interesting.

I conclude with this thought. In X-Men, they told Magneto's backstory in less than five minutes. In X-Men Origins: Wolverine, they couldn't tell his in close to two hours.

DECISION: F