The truth behind the most anticipated mutant melodrama of the summer.

May 24, 2006 - X-Men: The Last Stand hits theatres this Friday and expectations are growing for the third film in the X-franchise. What once looked like a disaster in the making following director Bryan Singer’s departure, now appears like a promising edition to the X-Men legacy. Did Brett Ratner do one better than Bryan Singer? Does the Phoenix finally show up and kick some ass? Is there such a thing as too many mutants? Revealing as few spoilers as possible, we answer these and other questions from a comic fans perspective. If you want the full review (score and all), head on over to IGN FilmForce.

From the Ashes

Brett Ratner has taken an immense amount of heat since the day he signed on to helm the third X-Men film. Fans were eager to see what Singer had planned for a grand retelling of the Dark Phoenix Saga, the most revered X-Men story of all time. But with Singer doing Superman Returns and Fox unwilling to delay X-Men a year, in came Ratner with a hundred thousand boos at his backside. Sorry to disappoint the naysayers, but Ratner didn’t screw the pooch. He didn’t reinvent the wheel either, but this is an X-film that will help continue the franchise, even if it won’t be remembered as its best offering.

If you go into X-Men: The Last Stand having avoided the many script spoilers that have floated around the ’net for the past year, you’re in for some shockers. If you think you know who lives and who dies, you don’t know s---. Though the experience lasts just over an hour and a half, X3 is filled with surprising moments. Some will anger you, but it’s unlikely you will see all of them coming.

Death Becomes Her

From the trailer, you should already know Jean Grey is back. The explanation for her survival should sound awfully familiar to long-time X-Men readers as will little touches that explain why she would side with Magneto. The history from the comics may have been altered, but there’s enough truth to the events to put a smile on every doubting face.

The X-Men is an Earthbound franchise, which means the original tale of the Phoenix is not one that can be told in the movies. Apparently audiences can be expected to believe a man can move mountains with his mind, but the thought of traveling into space would break the "reality" of the series. That limitation forces some alterations to Jean Grey and to the impact she has on the story.

Though Jean is a major player in the melodrama, she’s just along for the ride. The main plot, somewhat inspired by Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men, reveals that a mutant cure has been discovered. Unlike the comics, this cure comes straight from the blood of the mutant Leech. The humans, frightened of a world slipping from their control, want to use the cure as a weapon. Magneto and the Brotherhood want to crush their facility on Alcatraz Island and teach those damned dirty Homo Sapiens a lesson. The X-Men, well, who can figure out what they hell they want. There’s an obvious and immediate opposition to anything Magneto does, but the X-Men take an ambivalent stance on The Cure. They don’t want it used as a military weapon, but that doesn’t mean they can’t see some value in its existence.

So Many Mutants, So Little Time

X-Men: The Last Stand has a simple plot and runs headlong towards it from the moment the X-Men step out of the Danger Room. Ratner has tossed a few dozen mutants on the screen as if to convince us the world is now a densely-populated mutant haven. For the first two films, people got geeked over brief cameos by favorites such as Colossus and Jubilee (okay, maybe not Jubilee). There’s much more of that here, but that also leads to some frustration.

Psylocke, a character the majority of fans have been clamoring for, is in the film. She’s Asian, has the purple hair and little else to do with the movie. You want a psi-blade? Go read a comic-book. Psylocke’s in the film, but to no significant end. The same can be said for Madrox, who is there simply to show that CG technology allows you to have dozens of the same person on screen at once. He has a couple of lines and no personality. Stacy X, a mutant whore whom fans derided, is essentially a no-show in the film. Even the much ballyhooed Shohreh Aghdashloo as Dr. Kavita Rao is little more than a means to deliver a few lines of exposition. Cool mutants are wasted as is some good talent.

The one surprise is Vinnie Jones as the Juggernaut. Who knew the former footballer could pull off Cain Marko? Though he is little more than a thug for Magneto with no acknowledged affiliation to Charles "Half-Brother" Xavier, he certainly looks imposing on the big screen. And yes, when Kitty Pryde dares to face him, Marko says, "Don’t you know who I am? I’m the Juggernaut, bitch!" Congrats to the kids who made the saying famous with an Internet re-dubbing of the X-Men cartoon show. You are immortalized on the silver screen.

With the exception of the main players from the last film, the rest of the mutants are one-note acts with no substance. They are there for their powers and, more or less, to be cannon-fodder in this new war. A war, we should mention, that is really just one big fight on an island and hardly as grand as the trailers would make it seem.

X Marks the Tragedy

If nothing else, The Last Stand captures one element of X-Men lore that has long been a standard: Tragedy. You’ll have to see the movie to see who dies, but there is some classic Marvel melodrama in store for all who attend. Granted, the details are different than in the comics, but the final act essentially merges elements from two classic X-Men tales. To tell you those would be to spoil the ending, but any fan of the X-Men (or reader of IGN Comics’ 25 Greatest X-Men Moments will recognize them after seeing the film.

Potential

While these dark moments fit the X-Men’s history, the film avoids transcending to greatness by withholding development of some of the more interesting conflicts. Beast works in the White House and, upon learning of The Cure, is conflicted. He has a duty to the government, but allegiances to the X-Men. But that tug on his consciousness lasts for just a moment and is never fully explored. The same can be said of the shallow love triangle between Iceman, Rogue and Kitty Pryde. Questions are raised about Xavier’s methods. Is he immoral? Jean goes so far as to suggest to Wolverine that the Professor has "tamed" him. But there’s no time for Wolverine to digest this or to confront the Professor. Everything moves too quickly and these and many other internal dramas are glossed over for the sake of some very slick special effects.

In this way, The Last Stand is reminiscent of the first X-Men film. It’s much more concerned with showing that these characters can exist on screen than it is about actually exploring the emotional depths of those characters. Hugh Jackman is still perfect as Wolverine and seems to single-handedly add an incredible pathos to every scene he’s in. The rest are merely playing their roles.

It should be noted that Halle Berry does a fine job as Storm. Her new wig is a great improvement and her lines are more believable. The character, however, is still not Storm from the comics. Ororo is a Goddess. In the film she is written merely as a strong-headed leader. The powers don’t make the character. So while Storm is more tolerable in this movie, it’s still not the true comic-book incarnation.

Pick A Side

Oddly enough, the most difficult thing to accept in X-Men: The Last Stand is that so many would fall in line with Magneto and no one would think to side with the X-Men. Xavier’s crew lives in a mansion in upstate New York. They have nice clothes, free room and board and enjoy a spacious estate where no one judges them for their mutation. The Brotherhood look like bums dragged off the street. They live in tents in the forest and every one of their neighbors seems like a total prick. You have and want to use your incredible powers — why would you choose to live in squalor?

Neither Magneto nor the X-Men want to see the military using The Cure as a forced method of controlling the mutant population. It’s not a choice of morality. Sorry Mags, but if we lived in your movie universe, we’d be with the X-Men in a heartbeat.

So, It Doesn’t Suck?

X-Men: The Last Stand does not suck. It won’t be revered like Batman Begins or X2, but it’s got plenty of action to satisfy fans. It’s impossible to deny that this film, with either a better script or a different director, could have had a much greater depth. It needed an extra 20 minutes of story, but what is here is entertaining. Go see the film, then look for Bryan Singer’s take on what he would have done with X3 when he pens Ultimate X-Men either later this year or early 2007.