X-Men: The Last Stand (2006)



Directed by Brett Ratner
Produced by Lauren Shuler Donner, Ralph Winter, and Avi Arad
Written by Simon Kinberg and Zak Penn
Box office $459.4 million

In 2006, Lehman Brothers wasn't the only thing considered too big to fail. A tremendous demand for comic book films had overtaken the mainstream, and while films such as Daredevil, The Punisher, Catwoman, Fantastic Four, and Elektra (all produced after X2) yielded less than impressive returns, the assumption was that, as the X-Men films had been financial windfalls up to this point, the success of a third film was a sure thing, even to the point where Last Stand leaves plenty of teasers for a fourth installment that never ends up coming. Heck, Fox even felt they could pull off the film without Bryan Singer, who was working on Superman Returns at the time (which was its own particular brand of failure).

The thing is, Fox was right about all of this. While not as profitable as its immediate predecessor, Last Stand earned Fox a 200% return on its box office investment, outperforming even X2 (note: the budget for Last Stand was twice as large; thus the higher box office but lower profit). Still, this installment became the laughing stock of comic book films and brought a quick end to the initial X-Men franchise.

The part that astounds me the most is not how utterly lazy this film is (truly, I could Mystery Science Theater 3000 this thing); it's how sound the whole thing was when it got handed over to Brett Ratner. A film about the ethics of "curing" those who are different (with the potential for overt ties to homosexuality in the real world), including the Dark Phoenix Saga, Hank McCoy as government liason, Bolivar Trask and a teased Sentinel, the flippin' Danger Room, killing off James Marsden, Storm as head of the school -- there was so much potential in this script. And those first two scenes, I wonder if Ratner even filmed those; they're AMAZING. But the rest is such a f**king mess that I don't even know where to begin, so I'll just hit on a few that bothered me the most and let you guys reply out with the rest; I know you want to

- Cyclops dies, no one notices for a half hour of film time, and (after that) not a single person grieves

- Wait. Is Professor X supposed to be an ass in this film or a martyr? You can't play it both ways and then not call attention to that.

- Why couldn't they just tell Leech to run over and hug Phoenix?

- Last film, they forgot to develop the female characters. This film, they forgot to develop ALL of the characters

- THOSE are the mutants we're going to dredge up to be the Brotherhood?

- "I'm the Juggernaut, Bitch"

- What the hell is wrong with Storm's accent?

- When did it become night time?

- All the cars magneto blasted to the sides during the day are now in perfect lines with their headlights on at the end of the film

- You know the same asshole producer who insisted that the climax of the first film be fought on the Statue of Liberty was like "I wanna see The Golden Gate Bridge this time around".

- Why are Wolverine's claws more likely to kill Jean for good than a tidal wave?

- Phoenix is a repressed personality?

- And that repressed personality, which is pleasure and anger incarnate, just stands around doing nothing for most of the film?

- The Master of Magnetism's secret hideout is a campsite in a forest?

- Wolverine goes from the substitute teacher who didn't care about anything to the guy giving inspiring speeches about carrying on Xavier's legacy without the film ever showing any kind of change in him whatsoever.

- Ethics of a cure! This film is supposed to be about discussing the ethics of a cure! Is no one going to discuss or debate the ethics of finding a cure?

- "cure guns?" Go sit in a corner. You're in a time out.



And those are just the ones that bothered me most.



Continuity issues:

- I'm okay with Xavier and Magneto looking a thousand years old twenty years in the past, as that scene feels somewhat dream-like, especially with the lighting. Feels like how Xavier would replay the moment in his own mind's eye, seeing himself and Magneto looking more like they do today.

- Jean's being around 12 in 1986 only makes sense if X-Men (2000) takes place in present day and not the near future. X-Men Apocalypse has her at around 16 years of age during the same time period.

- Kitty Pryde and Hank McCoy are played by different actors than in previous films

- Jean's hair apparently grew while at the bottom of Alkali Lake

- The psychic barriers and repressed personality nonsense does not exist in the revised X-men timeline as is clearly evident in Jean's development in X-Men: Apocalypse. That plus Angel's depiction in that film (though how do you explain his being born 20 years early in the new timeline?) make it clear that X-Men: Apocalypse knocked this godawful film out of continuity. It won't come to pass in the new timeline.

- Moira MacTaggert is significantly younger than she will be in the revised continuity and is a scientist instead of a covert government operative. Clearly, the writers of First Class were ignoring this film even before Days of Future Past knocked it out of continuity. I think it's safe to say that this film semi-officially does not exist in X-Men film franchise continuity.


Adaptation issues:

- This film borrowed more from the original X-Factor than it did from X-Men (the Worthington Corp, Leech, Beast wanting to lose his fur)

- One of the few cool moments in the film: The fastball special!



I won't even try to list all the cameos in this film. Those mutant on mutant scenes were dense with characters. I do have to ask though -- was that Arm-Fall-Off-Boy fighting Wolverine???




All in all, a script with serious potential, an AMAZING first two scenes, and an utter embarrassment of a film that followed.

Grade: D+







That's all for this week. Next up: X-Men Origins Wolverine (which I have never seen before)...

Wolverine gets more screen time than the rest (which was the case in all three of the original films), but they don't do any more with his character than they do with anyone else's.

Granted. I gave this film a D+. I wouldn't score those other films you mentioned anywhere near as high. But both the Superman and Batman franchises had already been skidding downhill when those films were made. Last Stand squandered and ended a series with tremendous potential. Thus the difference, in my opinion.



Sometimes I worry about you.

X2 was a decent film, but there's several things that pull it down, notably the abysmal "acting" from Cyclops and Storm and the awesomely stupid climax - if Jean can hold back the water and lift the plane and jiggle the switches and make the engines run, why can't she do that from inside the plane, where she doesn't have to hold the water back?

Considering that you didn't like the original Mad Max movie, the feeling's mutual.

That film film made my 12 top movies in last years CCC. I really liked that movie.

No, but she was experiencing overwhelming sensations and a foreboding sense of death and doom to the point that she was overtly trying not to use her powers. The film made that much clear.