I once begged for the X-Men franchise to stop, slink off and die somewhere in a five-and-dime DVD bin. Now, not so sure.

Rebooting for the win

Nowhere near as good as the Star Trek revamp, the latest X-Men isn’t a second class movie. This one’s watchable.

First, they went prequel on us and maybe truer to the canon and comics? Don’t know or care about mythos.

Second, think they put a little more thought into the people this time, not just the powers. What makes these characters tick, like or hate-worthy.

Cast of Mutants

• James McAvoy, good but no Captain Jean-Luc Picard, takes over as Professor X. He gives good telepathy, and interesting to see his scientific background develop as well as personal bias towards mutations, and mutant-human relations.
• Some blond girl is Raven aka Mystique, who’s his adoptive sister. (Cameo alert). She’s struggling with her appearance as young women do, a big part of what drives her.. as is the influence and nookie she seeks from others.
• January Jones is an older blonde in a push-up bra, aka that Emma chick with the diamonds.
• Michael Fassbender is cool as Erik aka Magneto. But then, how to be uncool with a name like Magneto or Fassbender, anyone’s guess. Most developed character to be sure with a lot of attention on what turns him to an anti-hero and would-be villain.
• Kevin Bacon (pick a movie, any degree of movie) as true villain Dr. Adolf von Hessschmel or whatever, he’s got less motivations. Just seems to enjoy being an asshole.
• There’s a young Beast, some other folks with random powers on TeamGood and TeamBad.
• Rose Byrne (Bridesmaids) and Oliver Platt run around as human CIA-types.

Blasts from the Past

Being a prequel as it were, this starts in the 40s as it introduces us to the various characters. It advances to the 60s, so our players can meet. Good meets good, bad Bacon rounds up some minions, blah blah.

There are semi-flirtatious things going on here and there, but the best love story of the movie: the Charles and Erik bromance. Holy hoyay Batman! (Nope, that’s DC. It’s Marvel so make it Spiderman?)

Anyway… apparently movies like 13 Days got it all wrong. The Cuban Missile crisis wasn’t about guys banging their shoes on the tables at the U.N. while Kevin Costner saved the day, but Hollywood-attractive mutants getting their freaky heroes on. Suck on it Kennedys!

Final Snark: Not sure I’d call it a sweeping success but it’s a vast improvement.

Some reviews I have not read.

• Movie Review | X-Men: First Class – A Class above the Rest (popspoken.wordpress.com)
• Michael Fassbender: The X-Men Star Taking Hollywood (thedailybeast.com)