Determined to bounce back from the massive flop that was Jack the Giant Slayer, director Bryan Singer returns to the X-Men franchise that he helped build, determined to steer it back on track with a massive $250 million budget, a highly ambitious storyline and a who’s who cast of all the prior X-Men films. With X-Men: Days of Future Past, Fox’s epic attempt to truly build an X-Men universe and save a franchise that, at least from a story perspective, hasn’t been very stable, succeeds in launching what Marvel has now been doing for ages, creating a universe with vast opportunities for growth.
X-Men: Days of Future Past opens in a post-apocalyptic world with a group of various X-Men battling future sentinels who are attempting to exterminate and imprison all the mutants on earth. In their quest to find a solution to a war they cannot win, Professor X (Patrick Stewart) and Magneto (Ian McKellen), through the use of Kitty Pryde (Ellen Page), send Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) back in time to the early 70’s in a last ditch effort to prevent Trask Industries and the US government from ever finding an opportunity to utilize the powerful sentinels.
That’s the basic plot but there is a lot more going on in this 130 minute adventure. Raven (Jennifer Lawrence), aka Mystique, is the focal point of the story for much of the film as she is the one who attempts to kill Dr. Bolivar Trask (Peter Dinklage-creator of the sentinels), setting off the chain of events that have led to the creation of the future sentinels. In order to get to Raven, Charles (James McAvoy) and Erik (Michael Fassbender) must reunite in order to find and stop her from doing what she believes is the right thing. Wolverine is the glue that holds all of this together, allowing these events to transpire, but his character outside of that isn’t able to provide much else except witty banter.
X-Men: Days of Future Past is the definition of a summer blockbuster, but what sets it apart is that the story seems more complex than your typical summer actioner, this is mostly because of the time travel element which, for me, is what kept me completely engaged. I found myself sitting there thinking of the consequences and the effects of each action in the past and how it might alter the future. I actually seemed to focus on it so much that it took some of the enjoyment out of the film, so I really need to see it again to embrace the rest of the picture. That being said, there are definitely issues when it comes to the so-called “rules” of time travel and how things play out in the feature. Additionally, there are some continuity issues between the actions in this film and what happens in the other three X-Men films, which is bound to happen. Some you can look past, some are cool surprises and other leave you scratching your head.
The big worry going into the film was wondering how the massive cast was going to effect the story or if would be a distraction. The answer: it’s not an issue. Most of the backstories for the leads were already established in past films and anyone that had a significant role in this film was given their share of background info, the rest of the characters are there as pawns to battle the future sentinels. I’d like to mention that despite the uproar regarding Quicksilver’s appearance, he actually ended up being a hilarious character and, once on set, seemed to fit well into the picture, so fear not my geeky friends.
Now, as far as the action goes this is an extremely impressive piece of cinema. There are some incredible action scenes that utilize breathtaking effects, one in particular involves Magneto picking up a stadium (yeah that happens) and another that involves all the future mutants as they attempt to slow down the advances of the future sentinels. Some highlights include Storm, Blink and Bishop going to town on these bad guys in very cool, team oriented way. This teamwork pays off as a visual and exciting feast. Plus, we even get to see Iceman do an ice slide, finally! The only character who really doesn’t have exceptional scenes is Wolverine, since he has the bone claws there isn’t much for him to do except regenerate after getting hurt.
As far as overall enjoyment goes, X-Men: Days of Future Past doesn’t’ reach the epic storytelling level that I expected, it has a few corny bits that are reminiscent of Singers first two X-Men films, but overall this is a highly entertaining film that’ll satisfy most theater-goers. With the return of Singer and the talented mammoth cast, X-Men: Days of Future Past makes a bold statement, stating that after a few stumbles we have listened and we have learned, a new and exciting X-Men franchise is on the way and it’s going to be explosive.
Rating: A worthy follow-up to First Class and a highly enjoyable blockbuster that resets the stage for future X-Men films (6.9/10)
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