X-Men: Days of Future Past

By: Robert Murphy

Spoiler alert!

I like many of you were probably very excited for the latest addition to the X-Men franchise with the recent release of X-Men: Days of Future Past. The reason I was so excited for this film was the fact that it is based on my favorite time in the X-Men universe where we enter a not so distant future where the world is in disarray in the wake of the robotic creatures known as the Sentinels. These robotic juggernauts were created by humanity to hunt down and if necessary kill them all because of the threat they posed to the human race. This though proves to be bad for both sides as the Sentinels are really out of control and doing things on their own terms, so to prevent this the last remaining mutants must send one of them back to the past to prevent any of this from ever happening. The only person able to do this though is Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) and he must unite the younger versions of Professor Xavier (James McAvoy) and Magneto (Michael Fassbender) when they couldn’t bare to be around one another, but uniting them regardless to save the future, for everyone. 

Wolverine wakes up in his younger self in 1973 and I say younger but he really just looks the same as always, anyway he has to track down Charles as his younger self but he will quickly find that he is not the man we all have known these many years, he is more of a lost and troubled soul right now. Ever since the events of the last movie, X-Men: The First Class, he has lost everything, mainly his dearest and closest friend Raven who was also known as Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence). Mystique will prove to be the main focus of the story as she is the driving cause behind why all these events unfolded and her passion for her fellow mutants will be let loose. Not only this but she receives many of her incredible martial arts moves and acrobatic feats that we’ve seen her use in earlier movies but weren’t present in The First Class, so no more useless little girl for this character. Also after the events of First Class we see that the only friend to have stayed by The Professors side is the young Hank aka Beast (Nicholas Hoult) whose helping him in his time of need. And finally we have Magneto who is in the midst of another extreme lockdown situation after certain events, let’s just say he managed to curve a very life changing bullet and people were not happy. The whole plot work behind this film is massive and where in most films so many ideas and moving parts wouldn’t work, Days of Future Past managed to find balance and fix many screw ups of the past films that annoyed fans like me.

Each of the core characters get their moments on screen which is to be expected but what is great about it is that it doesn’t feel like a setup, everything is important for the characters at that time and each character has a drive or motive to them in earnest. Charles is having a hard time as I mentioned and it will take wise words from not only himself but from Wolverine as well, I say this shockingly because advice and patients isn’t his strong suit and even he admits that. Wolverine almost becomes a teacher to Charles in his own way during the film and what he does for Wolverine in the future, he must now do for Charles, guide him and help him be the man he’s meant to be. Mystiques role in Days of Future Past was surprising to me, she was always a mystery in the original three movies and while I like her more since The First Class, I was surprised to see how strong of a character she is now. While the events in the future are important, the character don’t get much attention, the Magneto and Charles we know as played by Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart do get their moment but the rest really don’t, I don’t even think I heard Storm (Halle Berry) say more than one line. This was okay for me though, they all still played their roles very well and came up more in the fight scene portions of the film.

Speaking of the action scenes, these were very powerful moments when you see them as they deal crushing blows to our favorite characters a lot of the time. You will have to see some of your favorite characters die in their fights with the Sentinels, who oddly look and behave a lot like the Destroyer weapon from Thor. These robots are merciless and deal horrible blows to some of the cast and it really does hurt to see them fall to their knees, I won’t spoil any names though. Other great scenes come from the present 1973 story telling such as the incredible scene with Magneto lifting a whole baseball stadium around the White House and showing just how powerful a mutant he is. Perhaps the best moment for the whole film (comedy wise anyway) was during the prison break for Magneto and watching the new character Quicksilver (Evan Peters) who completely steals the show for this entire section of the film. And I know right about now you may be asking about good old Trask (Peter Dinklage,) well I don’t know what to say, as a bad guy he isn’t much of one and as a character he doesn’t stand out that much either. I don’t blame his performance or anything like that, I just don’t think he was that important in the film despite being the creator of the Sentinels, he just doesn’t stand out.

In conclusion, I am absolutely blown away by X-Men Days of Future Past, I knew that I would enjoy the film but I didn’t realize what a great addition it would be to the franchise. As I casually mentioned before, I saw many fixes to story errors the other films had made which was just great, it may be petty but the adjustments are probably really appreciated and were definitely noticed by myself. Everything was very ambitious for Days of Future Past as it combined the classic characters and the new additions from The First Class and we all know how bad that can turn out but it comes out the best I’ve seen a film do in a long time and was a stellar movie for the X-Men franchise.

Good:

- So many moving parts for the film that were all juggled very well

- Excellent action

- Both the new comers and old favorites performed amazingly

- New additions like Quicksilver stole the show

Bad:

- Dinklage’s Trask wasn’t a very good villain and was more of a background character it seemed

Scully Rating: 9.0 out of 10 

X-Men Days of Future Past Second Trailer

By: Robert Murphy

Hey everybody, I had the great pleasure to see the second X-Men: Days of Future Past trailer come up on my news feed this morning and I have got to say I'm getting more and more excited for this movie. The movie is delving into a very interesting moment in the X-Men universe and is looking like it will be handled beautifully. Not only are we seeing the new younger faces of Magneto and Charles Xavier but their older selves as well in the future where mutants are on the verge of extinction as they were hunted and killed/captured by humanity and it left the world war torn and destroyed. Everything about the movie looks impressive and I cannot wait for the release, I hope you all enjoy the trailer and I'll see you all for more reviews later in the week. 

The Wolverine

Article by Zach Goodier

Hugh Jackman is back for the highly-anticipated movie The Wolverine.  When it comes to this movie, you can be sure that Jackman knows his character and can deliver a consistently good performance as the immortal mutant, but the weak point of Origins lay with the supporting cast, as well as some weak writing and blundered execution of what should have been a very compelling story.  The Wolverine provides a chance at redemption for this spin-off, but does it succeed where its predecessor failed?  Let's get into the review and discuss exactly that.

Yashida, the man Wolverine saved from the Atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki.

The story is arguably the most compelling of all of the X-men movies: Wolverine is coping with the consequences of what he did at the end of Last Stand, and he is at a crossroads, he has no reason to continue living, but he also has no means of dying.  Logan is plagued by nightmares revolving around Jean and the things that he has done.  This is where an old friend sends one of his agents, Yukio, to bring Logan back to Japan, where he had saved this man, Yashida, from the atomic bombing of Nagasaki.  Logan's reward for his act is the chance at becoming mortal, so that he can live a normal life and die a normal death.  This is where the story is at its strongest: forcing Logan to confront the possibility of finally being free of the immortality that has forced him to endure all his suffering. 

Yukio is not a girl to be taken lightly, it's just too bad her character wasn't developed more in the script.

From there, the story quickly turns into the action flick that we expected, with Yashida dying, and the Yakuza attacking the funeral to kidnap his granddaughter, Mariko.  From there, we see romance, betrayal, and some quality fights that contain some excellent stunt work and martial arts.  However, the story kind of drops to the background for the most part, with Logan only coming back to the question of whether or not he is ready to die when his powers are taken away and all the wounds he used to be able to shrug off are no longer healing like they used to.  It quickly felt like the story took a backseat, and the movies ending just wasn't all that strong like I was hoping it would be.  It wasn't all that bad, but it really didn't feel like it came full-circle like it should have.

The Silver Samurai has adamantium armor and swords.... So yeah, that just doesn't seem right.  Is Oprah just giving the stuff away now? Wolverine had it before it was cool.

Most of the side characters in this movie have the same shortcomings as those in Origins: they are either not written very well, or they just tried to force things a little too much, too fast, and it ends up seeming hollow in some way.  I think the biggest shortcoming of both Origins and The Wolverine is that they tried to put too many characters into a movie that doesn't take the time to allow a lot of character building between big action scenes.  That being said, Mariko is well written, but Yukio never seemed to get the attention she needed to be fully developed.  She does have some back-story, but as a character she is never fully brought to life for me, considering her significant role throughout the film. 

Viper (left) and Mariko (right) are having a little friendly "chat."

One big issue I saw with this film was in how it handled the established lore.  Without spoiling too much, adamantium is no longer the invincible material we thought it was.  While the comics have differing views on adamantium and Wolverine's powers involving it, as well as how other characters have made use of the unbreakable metal.  However, I felt that rather than risk upsetting the fan base, they could have avoided any problems by just letting adamantium clash with adamantium, just like in the 2nd X-men film.  Once it's broken, the magic is somewhat lost.

One thing this film does right is getting Wolverine more in touch with his samurai-inspired roots in the comics.

Overall, this movie was enjoyable, but held back by the lack of character development for some of the most essential supporting characters.  While whether or not some parts of this film violate lore is debatable due to the flexibility of the story based on the different writers and their takes on adamantium and its' limitations, it feels like a move that was unnecessary in the first place.  Not only does it risk the near-invincible status of our favorite X-man, but it also felt like a pointless move on the part of the writers.  Wolverine is a character driven by the sacrifices he has made, and the hell he has been through.  Every "scar" he bears, and every change he has gone through reflects a significant point of his life.  While this movie is by no means a footnote in Wolverine's extremely long and eventful life, it still lacked that feeling of significance to him.  This movie wasn't about a profound change in the same way that Origins was, it was simply a return to normalcy for the most part.  While the alone bears some significance, it just didn't have the same emotional weight behind it that other X-men movies were able to deliver.

Good:

-Hugh Jackman is still THE Wolverine, no doubt about it.

-Wolverine facing the "curse" of immortality provides a great element to the story.

-Great stunts and martial arts work during the action scenes.

-Some exciting new characters from the comics.

Bad:

-Story kind of takes a backseat to the action, which leaves some things up in the air.  Even the big "twist" towards the end was too predictable, I knew it was coming after the first half hour or so into the film.

-Supporting characters kind of feel like they lacked strong writing in the script, or there just wasn't a lot done with them.

-While the lore of Wolverine is rather flexible, there is still the potential for fans to get very upset with how things turn out, especially without any sort of explanation as to how these things are even possible.

Scully Rating: 7.5 out of 10