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Post by Deleted on May 11, 2016 14:54:52 GMT -5
The comic culture you lament was lost long before Singer's X-Men ever hit the big screen in 2000. The rise of pop culture super-hero movies did not cause the fall of comics, they did a good job self-destructing long before Disney got in on the act-the bankruptcy of Marvel, which led to the selling of the movie rights to X-Men and Spidey to Fox/Sony to keep the company solvent was a result of that self-destruction of the comic culture you lament, so it was a fait accompli before the superhero movie rose to prominence in mass/pop culture. It's funy though, toip rated TV shows like Adventures of Superman, top rated radio shows like the same pre-TV, money making movie serials in the 40s, the ubiquitous of super-heroes on Saturday morning television all co-existed with the comic culture you loved, but the movie studios doing the exact same thing those things had done suddenly ruined it for everybody? I don't think so. -M I would argue that the dynamic and degree of synchronization between comics and third party media has changed dramatically though, even within the last decade. For instance, even if Jimmy Olsen was brought into the comics from the Superman radio show, Superman was still the same character he was the previous month. The continuity and core elements of the character were still the same. Which Superman-the one who leaped (not flew) and fought gangsters or the one flying in space smashing planets around? Because, yeah those are the same characters... The idea there is one monolithic character story form the Golden Age to the Bronze age broken only in the modern period and that there was a consistency to the characters and their story arc is as mythic and as the characters themselves and patently false. Is all rose-colored tint, not an actual reflection of the way things were. -M |
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Post by Deleted on May 13, 2016 5:08:02 GMT -5
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Post by Warmonger on May 13, 2016 7:30:37 GMT -5
As others have said, I've completely given up on trying to understand the continuity in these movies. |
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Post by Deleted on May 17, 2016 16:52:51 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on May 22, 2016 16:00:03 GMT -5
Now seen it - first impression is that it's really not very good at all - far too much standing and posing, and not at all impressed by most of the new characters, they seem very wooden. The timeline is still/even more FUBAR and there are some major problems with the film. 1. First Class was set in 1962 and this is set in the 80s. The characters who appeared in First Class have not remotely aged by 20 years - so you have Alex Summers (oldest Summers brother in film continuity), who should be around 38-40, but looks mid-20s, with his younger brother, Scott, who is supposed to be somewhere between 15-18, but looks early 20s. Those ages could just about work for the same parents. Xavier, Magneto, Mystique, Beast don't look any older at all.
2. We now have 3 different "Angel" characters in the same continuity - one from First Class, one from this film, and one from later in the original timeline from Last Stand
3. Wolverine turns up in a Weapon X sequence, under control of Stryker, despite the ending of DoFP when "Stryker" was clearly Mystique.
4. Jean Grey is supposely 18-ish in this film, but looks older. That makes her rising 40 in X1.
5. Nightcrawler is here, 17-ish, so he's now active in the 80s, 20 years before his appearance in X2.
6. X3 and the ending of X2 have been written out of the film continuity by the events of DoFP, but X1 and most of X2 were supposedly still in continuity, but there's no way on earth those timelines can be made to align - Xavier & Mystique as shown in X1 are too young for the timeline, and McKellen's Magneto is too old
Plot.
The whole digression to Weapon X is a mess - there's no sensible reason for it in the context of the Apocalypse plot, it just serves to re-introduce Wolverine, though as (3) above comments, this shouldn't be happening anyway.
There's another Quicksilver set-piece which is just another (albeit grander) re-run of the set-piece from DoFP
Characters
New Scott isn't as wooden as old Scott, but is still awful, as is Jean Grey. Emo Nightcrawler is OK. New Storm kind of fits the characters seen in the other X films, but completely jettisons the African goddess part of the comics mythology (probably for the best, TBH - Storm's backstory was always far too convoluted).
Psylocke and Angel are cardboard cut-outs
Apocalypse's power set appears to be "can do anything he feels like", which is a real problem for the film - there's no sense of what the X-Men can sanely do to counteract him, or why he needs his horsemen at all. |
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Post by Gene on May 31, 2016 22:27:14 GMT -5
I liked it well enough. My expectations were pretty low going in, so it was going to be hard to disappoint me. All I really wanted was to see some X-Men fight one of their big bads and I got it. If anything, I think it's time to shake things up behind the camera because it feels like Singer has run out of new things to say about these characters.
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Post by Arthur Gordon Scratch on Jun 8, 2016 8:02:00 GMT -5
I must confess I'm with Gene here. Days of Future Past bore the hell out of me and this didn't. I dont care for continuity : this was just quite entertaining despite problems, most of which was quite stiff narration. I liked that it didn't take itself as seriously as the previous entry but still was pretty rich in drama. This was almost some sort of reboot for sure, but I'm fine with that. Appart from Angel, I mostly enjoyed the new characters, and this easily ranks as my fave singer X-Men film. X-Men 1 and 2 probably had a few better scenes, but as a whole let me down much more than this. And despite ho lame I thought the villain looked in the promo pictures and clips, he worked quite well on screen. It felt a tad like a David Twhoy film, even had some clive barker tones, but why not?
5,5/10
So far, First Class remains IMHO the only worthy film of the franchise, even if barely.
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Post by MatthewP on Jun 8, 2016 11:20:34 GMT -5
I just saw this last night, and my opinion on it is pretty much in line with Gene and Arthur's above. A reasonably entertaining super-hero smash-up, but nothing exceptional. For all the build up to the world threatening climax, I never felt any great tension, nor did I care too much about the characters. I thought Cap's Civil War did a much better job both with making the characters people to care about and the conflict one of interest. Still, this X-Men movie was decent popcorn entertainment.
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Post by Icctrombone on Jul 9, 2016 5:44:00 GMT -5
As of 7-8-16, this movie has made 154 million domestic. It cost 178 to make. I'm kind of shocked it didn't make it's production value back but I'm not sure if it will be a money maker after all tallies are made( foreign, Dvd sales).
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Post by spoon on Jul 9, 2016 9:01:24 GMT -5
As of 7-8-16, this movie has made 154 million domestic. It cost 178 to make. I'm kind of shocked it didn't make it's production value back but I'm not sure if it will be a money maker after all tallies are made( foreign, Dvd sales). I would think it'll make money. Its foreign gross so far is $373.7 million for a global total of $527.8 million. It don't know how much money will go to the theaters and what the advertising budge is, but it's well clear of the production budget. The foreign portion of action movie profits seems bigger and bigger nowadays. Much of this is the emergence of a large movie-going public in China. Apocalypse made over $100 million in China. Warcraft was a box office bomb in the U.S. But there will probably be a few sequels because it made lots of money in China. |
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Post by rom on Dec 19, 2016 22:41:10 GMT -5
Recently saw X-Men:Apocalypse for the very first time. I was waiting to see this on Blu-ray, and just got a chance to finally watch this. My thoughts - AWESOME! I really enjoyed the film, despite not being a huge fan of all of the previous X-men films (with the exception of X-men 2 (2003) ). This is definitely my favorite X-men film - at this point. I really liked the epic scope of this film; also, the physical appearance of Apocalypse was quite similar to what we've seen in the comic, despite being a lot smaller (except when he was in Xavier's dream/nightmare); I'm a purist when it comes to movies that adapt comics, so this was good to see. Apocalypse was an amazing villain, i.e.very evil, corrupt, and extremely powerful. The scene when he disarmed all of the world's nuclear weapons was amazing; as were the scenes when he destroyed various cities/buildings. I liked the Punk Rock Storm (taken from the '80's Uncanny X-men comic); Psyloke (sp?!), and Angel with the metallic wings. Being an '80's kid, I really liked the setting (1983) and all of the '80's references, including the younger X-men coming out of Return of the Jedi & discussing the film, as well as the very cool scene when Quicksilver (Magneto's son) quickly saves all of the X-men from the disintegrating mansion to the tune of the iconic tune Sweet Dreams (are made of this) by The Eurythmics - very cool! There is a deleted Mall scene online (which I also just saw) & that was excellent; very funny; I remember '80's mall culture very well, i.e. video arcades, big shoe & record stores - all to the tune of another iconic '80's song, "Safety Dance" by Men without Hats. It was also funny how Scott told Jean that she looked like "Boy George" (Culture Club) -  Here's a link: www.traileraddict.com/xmen-apocalypse/deleted-scene-80s-mall Also, I'm not taking into account any of the previous X-men films when watching this one - it's too confusing trying to figure out where this stands in the continuity. So, as far as I'm concerned, this was a stand-alone film (though X-men: Days of Future Past was obviously referenced here). My only complaint (a minor was) is that it would have been cool if we had seen Apocalypse being huge in actuality, as he is in the comic & as he appeared in Xavier's mind when they were fighting. But, it's possible that they only showed him being huge in the dream for stylistic purposes... |
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Post by batlaw on Dec 20, 2016 0:56:54 GMT -5
Finally saw this last night. It was about what I expected, basically mire or less the same as every X movie to date. Neither remarkable nor awful. I thought it was pretty good and wondering what was so bad or so much worse than the previous movies that has everyone hating on it?
I'd put it at the lover end of the lift but I don't see how it's radically worse than any of the others.
IMO this one seemed to try too hard. Tried to be cool. Tried to be intense. Tried to copy what worked before and what parole responded to Last time. Also tried to hard to incorporate previous characters and actors. Mostly before story. But thought they did a good job.
Biggest disappointment was arcanger. A favorite of mine complete wasted here. Same with psylock. Poorly done and unnecessary.
Liked apocalypse ok. He was actually scary in scenes.
Funny, perhaps the worst part was what should've been the best. The wolverine scene just didn't work. It was off and cheesy.
Love the costumes at the end and wished they'd used them instead.
Personally I'm sick of mystique and magneto and the status quo of this universe. More than ready to completely start over. Or keep this continuity but don't be afraid of branching out. Just do a new team or two. Give the other characters a chance.
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Mar 9, 2017 9:36:39 GMT -5
Since the movie finally arrived on Netflix, I got a chance to watch it last weekend.
It wasn't as bad as I feared, honestly. Apocalypse, a character I really dislike, was actually impressive; his calm demeanour, his resolve, were qualities I enjoy in a movie villain. His quasi religious moment of clarity at the end was a very nice touch. And Beethoven's seventh as an end-of-the-world theme? It works really well!
Where the movie didn't work so well for me was in the emotional connection to the characters. We sort of alluded to what made this one or that one click, but immediately jumped to someone else with very little development and usually rather abrupt conclusions.
The movie also suffered from reboot fatigue, I think... we've seen these guys die and be resurrected, so why should we care if they live or die this time around?
Jean letting the Phoenix out was an awesome moment for any X-Men fan... but the film, considering that its audience is the general public and not only X-readers, hadn't sufficiently prepared the scene. Okay, so Jean's a more powerful telepath than we knew and she glows brightly when she lets her control slip. It looks nice, but that scene should have conveyed a sense of awe and horror that only those who knew about the Phoenix beforehand could feel. I mean, I was moved, but only because I knew what was going on; Joe Schmoe might have thought "why didn't she just do this before"?
Ororo having an African accent was great; I really liked this interpretation. And as in the previous movie, the Quicksilver scene stole the show. Mystique having grown into a mutant icon was also a great touch.
The most relatable characters in this trilogy are naturally Xavier and Magneto, but I felt that too little was done with them... the tragedy endured by Magneto was well executed, but not a whole lot was done with it after it was used to justify making him a villain again.
I keep saying "not a lot was done with..." and it is, generally speaking, the film's main problem: we have a lot of little pieces that work well together, but that fail to build up to one big satisfying moment. There's no main character, no central emotional focus, and so the film is a little disparate. (And why was the Wolverine cameo in there at all? Just so viewers would know that in this alternate timeline, Logan was captured by Stryker and turned into Wolverine again? That didn't need to be explained... I still don't understand how Xavier could have been alive and in his own body at the start of Days of future past, so continuity is clearly a little loose in these movies).
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Post by spoon on Mar 9, 2017 22:44:15 GMT -5
Since the movie finally arrived on Netflix, I got a chance to watch it last weekend. It wasn't as bad as I feared, honestly. Apocalypse, a character I really dislike, was actually impressive; his calm demeanour, his resolve, were qualities I enjoy in a movie villain. His quasi religious moment of clarity at the end was a very nice touch. And Beethoven's seventh as an end-of-the-world theme? It works really well! Where the movie didn't work so well for me was in the emotional connection to the characters. We sort of alluded to what made this one or that one click, but immediately jumped to someone else with very little development and usually rather abrupt conclusions. The movie also suffered from reboot fatigue, I think... we've seen these guys die and be resurrected, so why should we care if they live or die this time around? Jean letting the Phoenix out was an awesome moment for any X-Men fan... but the film, considering that its audience is the general public and not only X-readers, hadn't sufficiently prepared the scene. Okay, so Jean's a more powerful telepath than we knew and she glows brightly when she lets her control slip. It looks nice, but that scene should have conveyed a sense of awe and horror that only those who knew about the Phoenix beforehand could feel. I mean, I was moved, but only because I knew what was going on; Joe Schmoe might have thought "why didn't she just do this before"? Ororo having an African accent was great; I really liked this interpretation. And as in the previous movie, the Quicksilver scene stole the show. Mystique having grown into a mutant icon was also a great touch. The most relatable characters in this trilogy are naturally Xavier and Magneto, but I felt that too little was done with them... the tragedy endured by Magneto was well executed, but not a whole lot was done with it after it was used to justify making him a villain again. I keep saying "not a lot was done with..." and it is, generally speaking, the film's main problem: we have a lot of little pieces that work well together, but that fail to build up to one big satisfying moment. There's no main character, no central emotional focus, and so the film is a little disparate. (And why was the Wolverine cameo in there at all? Just so viewers would know that in this alternate timeline, Logan was captured by Stryker and turned into Wolverine again? That didn't need to be explained... I still don't understand how Xavier could have been alive and in his own body at the start of Days of future past, so continuity is clearly a little loose in these movies). I thought X-Men: Apocalypse was better than the domestic box office or critics credited it for. I think it suffered in comparisons because it followed what may have been the best X-Men movie, Days of Future Past. Also, some fans are less interested if there's less Wolverine. I think the lack of emotional connection could have cured by having less action and more quiet character moments. I bought the Blu-ray, and the deleted scenes were largely character moments at the mansion or at the mall. I would've kept those in and shortened some action sequences instead. Jubilee's screen time would've grown a lot. As is, her limited role was puzzling. I don't have reboot fatigue. I prefer the reboot versions of most characters to their original trilogy versions. I agree that there were a lot of characters to try to give everyone attention. I think the Wolverine cameo is just because there is a wide swath of fandom who are Wolverine fans first and X-Men fans second. A Wolverine appearance could be the key factor in getting some people to buy tickets. |
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Post by badwolf on Mar 26, 2017 14:04:20 GMT -5
I thought the film was very good, which considering I care nothing for Apocalypse and his horsemen in the comics (to me that era is where Marvel's decline began) is saying a lot. And hey, finally a decent actress for Storm!
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