X-Men: Apocalypse (2016) - Written Review
X-Men: Apocalypse sets
out to continue the prequel/reboot story established in First Class and Days of
Future Past with the original X-Men team banding together for the first
time ever to take on practically the God of all Mutants in a fight to save the
world. No pressure then.
The new cast equip themselves
admirably. Tye Sheridan and Sophie Turner will now forever be known as Cyclops
and Jean Grey to me, definitely being stronger than their original actors. Part
of this is down to the story focusing a lot more on these characters growing to
become the X-Men, along with Nightcrawler - a fan favourite from X-Men 2 who makes a welcome return,
albeit played by a much younger actor. I also have to give credit to Alexandra
Shipp, given she plays a key X-Men character in Storm, who from her very first
scene is given a much more distinct character than Halle Berry ever portrayed
in four movies. So...yeah, the new cast are great!
Nicolas Hoult and Evan Peters
are still lovable as Beast and Quicksilver; the latter of which being
responsible for the standout moment in the whole movie. Michael Fassbender is
still awesome as Magneto and James McAvoy is pitch-perfect as Xavier. It's just
a shame that Jennifer Lawrence seems a bit bored as Mystique. Honestly, if you
were to put the film on mute you wouldn't have any idea what emotions the
character felt at that moment, or have any idea of her character at all. For
someone who is the biggest star of the movie, you'd think she'd put in more
than 2% effort.
And as much as I liked him in Star Wars, Oscar Isaac seems a bit
wasted in all that make-up, armour and voice modulation as the titular
antagonist. But, if we're on the subject of wasting actors, it might be a bad
idea to mention Olivia Munn and Ben Hardy as Psylocke and Angel. Future
reference X-Men movies: bring back Olivia Munn as Psylocke! She looks great in
her costume and her power-set seems much more interesting then the movie wants
to let on. As for Angel...I can't even remember if he was any good in The Last
Stand, so him being a bit rubbish here doesn't bother me much.
Oh, and Rose Byrne returned as
Moira McTaggert in this movie. Completely forgot about her. It's almost as if
she was completely useless in the overall plot...
Apocalypse
doesn't juggle its characters very well, but the characters it chooses to focus
on it clearly knows what it wants to do with. There's lots of little hints and
teases at Jean Grey's ultimate fate, Cyclops finally gets a proper character
and Nightcrawler is always fun to see. Maybe future sequels can sort out some
of the character problems Apocalypse
suffers from, but for now I'll leave it.
The screenplay is pretty strong
for the most part. I do think that a lot of elements of this movie have been
either cut down or cut out entirely, there's a completely out-of-left-field
side-quest involving Stryker and the Weapon X program, and the end battle seems
to have been dragged out somewhere between the screenplay and the final cut. There's
also a sense that this movie is a prequel, a reboot and a sequel that just
doesn't quite gel. It starts as the follow-up to Days of Future Past and ends setting everything up for the next
movie in a way that also undermines the threat of Apocalypse. On the whole
though, it was pretty good.
Bryan Singer's direction here
however is a bit of a step-back after Days
of Future Past. The final fight lacks a lot of creativity and there is far
too much CGI clogging up the screen at many points in the movie, meaning that
it lacks the tangibility of other action movies like Captain America: Civil War. Clearly Singer isn't the best director
of this franchise - that honour still belongs to Matthew Vaughn - but he does
do a pretty good job with most of the film - particularly a fight sequence in
the Weapon X facility, and the 'Sweet Dreams Are Made Of This' sequence is the
best bit in the entire film.
John Ottman's score is still
excellent as ever, and possibly even his best soundtrack to date. The main
X-Men theme and a re-jig of the title sequence taking the audience on a trip
through time to 1983 was a pretty cool way to open the movie, and I hope that
this editing structure Bryan Singer has used in all of his X-Men movies is continued into the next instalments. There is also some
cool eighties music in the film which helps to set the aesthetic of the film.
Overall, X-Men: Apocalypse is pretty solid popcorn fun. I can't call it a
perfect movie, but I had an awful lot of fun watching the film. Sure, the
effects could have looked better and the screenplay was a bit all over the
place at points, but the actors and
characters were strong, the ending was very good and I thoroughly enjoyed the
experience of watching the film. I'm not sure why it's got so much bashing from
some critics, but I would definitely recommend the film. With an ending that
makes me quite excited to see where the X-Men go next, I give X-Men: Apocalypse an 8/10.
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