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 X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST Rotten Tomatoes Score: 91% (Fresh) Metacritic Score: 74/100 Spoiler-free review: Oh boy, in a couple of days, you Americans are going to have a blast. It's very good. Easily the best superhero film of the year. Maybe better than Winter Soldier. The best X-Men movie yet. One of the best superhero films ever done. If you want a movie with competent political and philosophical subtext, forget the Winter Soldier or the Nolan Bat-films; watch this. If you want great character chemistry, forget The Avengers, watch this. I went in with high expectations and they were all met. The poster for the film (above) prominently features Wolverine, because Jackman is the biggest star. But while Wolverine plays a key role, the heart of film is really the relationship between Charles, Raven (Mystique), and Erik. I don't know why they made Bolivar Trask a midget but Dinklage is great in the role. Trask is really determined to convince everyone that the handful of mutants that pop up in the film presage an apocalypse because he wants everyone to buy his silly robots. His both doomsayer and opportunist. The fight scenes that take place in the future look like they were made for a videogame. The Sentinels look like they wear Crysis nanosuits. Blink's portal effect looks straight out of a videogame. It was fun to see the synergy the X-Men display in combat, like Blink doing combos with Colossus. I'm not satisfied with Beast, who is still too obviously fighting on wires. I'm also disappointed the X-Men in the future scenes still wear drab black costumes. It is consistent with the previous movies, yes, but The Avengers proved that colorful costumes can work, so why not give them a shot? Another criticism of the film is that it might be a little inaccessible to someone who is not a devotee of the X-Men. I think a little more exposition here and there could have brought the rest of the audience up to speed. It's hard for me to relate to this, so I'd like to hear feedback from non-fans. This film is a love letter to the fans, as it should be, but regular people should also be accommodated. The movies are generally very good at this, but this movie is the sixth installment in a long-running series of films. Baron Bifford fucked around with this message at 06:55 on May 24, 2014 |
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May 21, 2014 12:46
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I was lucky enough to see it last night, too, so I'll just re-post what I put in the General Discussion thread. However, I agree with everything you said, Barron Bifford. The political undertones of everything really put it squarely in line with the feel of the old Chris Claremont run of X-Men comics. Although 10 hours later, my mind is still in overdrive thinking of possibilities for the next film. From last night... My faith in the franchise has been completely restored. I've been a fan of X-Men since I was old enough to walk, and I was happy with their interpretation of the Days of Future Past story arc. It's outstanding. I know full well a bunch of people here are going to nit-pick it to death, but if you enjoyed the original X-Men and X2 films, then definitely get out this weekend because this one is better. The film delivered one thing the franchise desperately needed, but I will spoiler this bit... I tried to show restraint to not spoiler specific plot points, but it's a take on this movie's impact on the franchise as a whole.... The timeline is completely reset. X-Men, X2, X3: The Last Stand, X-Men Origins: Wolverine and Wolverine all basically don't count anymore except with respect to the character development of Wolverine (the only living soul that remembers the earlier timeline). Once you see the movie this will make sense. The plotline begun in First Class is what's in effect now. Long story, short: Go see it. It's absolutely excellent.
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May 21, 2014 12:51
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Have a beer at the cheesy butt-shot of naked Hugh Jackman, who is ripped as hell.
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May 21, 2014 13:01
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So is Anna Paquin in this movie or not
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May 21, 2014 13:14
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I was surprised how much I liked it. Like some, I was expecting some kind of a clusterfuck, but it really wasn't. A really entertaining and at times, quite amusing. The Quicksilver dude was actually funny and probably had the best scene in the whole movie. Reminded me a little bit of the Nightcrawler's White House scene in X2. Jackman, McAvoy and Hoult had great chemistry and I could have watched their fraternizing a lot longer. I liked that even though there was a lot at stake in the end, it all came down to the characters' personal decisions and not the same "climactic" hundreds of buildings are exploding, the world is dying and here's a thousand generic bad guys for them to fight. Of course with a cast this big, some of the characters don't get much to do and feel wasted, but the main cast was tight enough. The frame story was a pretty generic countdown to extinction but McKellen and Stewart sold it nicely and somehow I found myself worrying when Wolverine was drowning, that was brutal. Also, can someone tell me what the hell was happening in the post credits scene? I guess the dude was ----Apocalypse----since that's what they are doing next, but still. He built the Pyramids?Okay! I guess that's that! BOAT SHOWBOAT posted:So is Anna Paquin in this movie or not Yes. For about 2,5 seconds Yet, in the credits, she's billed like sixth or something.
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May 21, 2014 13:19
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I'm ambivalent about the upcoming Apocalypse movie because it is one of those characters where X-Men venture into silliness. Days of Future Past is not a silly movie. It is wonderfully grounded in its roots. Heck, this movie is better than most stuff the comics are putting out. On another note, does Stan Lee make a cameo? I don't recall seeing him. Baron Bifford fucked around with this message at 15:17 on May 21, 2014 |
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May 21, 2014 13:25
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Baron Bifford posted:I'm ambivalent about the upcoming Apocalypse movie because it is one of those characters where X-Men venture into silliness. Days of Future Past is not a silly movie. It is wonderfully grounded in its roots. Heck, this movie is better than most stuff the comics are putting out. Yeah, I'm with you on Apocalypse. They better have one incredible writing team to keep anything to do with that villain not turning into some clusterfuck where they're introducing too many characters with no development (ie: X3). I'm cautiously optimistic though after Days of Future Past. Also, definitely no Stan Lee cameo. He's also not going to appear in Guardians of the Galaxy coming up.
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May 21, 2014 15:24
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He is now. They gave him a cameo.
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May 21, 2014 15:59
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Doronin posted:Yeah, I'm with you on Apocalypse. They better have one incredible writing team to keep anything to do with that villain not turning into some clusterfuck where they're introducing too many characters with no development (ie: X3). I'm cautiously optimistic though after Days of Future Past. I actually just saw him at the Dallas ComicCon panel and he said he would be in it, although he said he has no idea what he was doing.
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May 21, 2014 16:34
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A strange plot point: Why did Trask discuss the Sentinel program with the Vietnamese? I understand he was getting nowhere with Congress, but to turn to the Vietnamese struck me as madness. This plot point was contrived to set up his downfall at the end and clumsily try to tie the film to historical events.
Baron Bifford fucked around with this message at 17:45 on May 21, 2014 |
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May 21, 2014 16:42
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Kush posted:Also, can someone tell me what the hell was happening in the post credits scene? I guess the dude was ----Apocalypse----since that's what they are doing next, but still. He built the Pyramids?Okay! I guess that's that! He is an ancient mutant who would travel around to different civilizations and encourage them to worship him like a god.
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May 21, 2014 16:57
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I cannot express how shocked I am that this is apparently NOT awful. I'm seeing it on Saturday after all.
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May 21, 2014 19:40
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So it was as good as First Class, then? Because I liked that a lot more than the original X-trilogy.
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May 21, 2014 20:16
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Better than First Class.
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May 21, 2014 20:34
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Do I need to See X-Men 4: Woverine 2: First Class before I see this one?
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May 21, 2014 20:44
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I don't think it was as good as Winter Soldier but it was really good. I might have enjoyed Spider-Man 2 more, but Days of Future Past was definitely a lot better movie. Great action scenes and it really can't be stated enough how good McAvoy and Fassbender are. Fassbender in particular has some amazing moments and his facial expressions are just so good at telling his story. I was pleased to see Mystique step up in her role in the movie, I actually don't think Jennifer Lawrence is a great actor but she plays the role a lot better in this one, maybe its her getting better or just having better writing. I seriously can't say enough good things about Fassbender though, he made the first one and he made this one. It's amazing how McKellan/Stewart have this charisma and bond that McAvoy and Fassbender also share. It's uncanny, no pun intended. GigaPeon posted:Do I need to See X-Men 4: Woverine 2: First Class before I see this one? No, Wolverine is in a younger body and the future is set well ahead of where that movie leaves off. The flashbacks used for Wolverine in the movie are all centered around X3, not The Wolverine. PaybackJack fucked around with this message at 21:03 on May 21, 2014 |
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May 21, 2014 20:59
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I suppose this movie invalidates the post-credits scene of The Wolverine.
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May 21, 2014 21:05
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Baron Bifford posted:I suppose this movie invalidates the post-credits scene of The Wolverine. Not really. If you think about that as being the point right before the war started it makes sense. In the original timeline Trask dies so his seeing Mystiques DNA after he's saved and knowing how to use it works out because at that point nobody believed him and while his death might have started some sort of secret funding project, you still had Striker doing his thing that was also sanctioned by the government so you could pretend that it wasn't until after X3 that the project got full backing and the sentinels got pulled out of mothballs.
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May 21, 2014 21:11
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Just came back from premiere and... I highly recommend this to anybody! Good action, the sentinels were nice really good acting from McAvoy and Fassbender. Quicksilver ruled.. Only thing i didnt like was Apocalypse looked lame, compared to how he looks in comics.. Hopefully this was just young version and next movie has more traditional look
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May 21, 2014 23:14
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TheCool69 posted:Only thing i didnt like was Apocalypse looked lame, compared to how he looks in comics.. Hopefully this was just young version and next movie has more traditional look Didn't the same thing happen in X-Men: Evolution?
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May 22, 2014 00:25
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I guess I am the minority but I didn't like it very much. I enjoyed the Quicksilver scene but thought the future scenes were too dark because of how they died (iceman being decapitated, colossus pulled in half also for x-men movie, there wasn't much in the way of x-men doing stuff together in the main part of the movie, just its bookends
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May 22, 2014 01:43
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Baron Bifford posted:I don't know why they made Bolivar Trask a midget Uh, it's because they cast Peter Dinklage, who is a midget.
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May 22, 2014 07:53
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Is it ever explained how Xavier is alive in the the future (following up the end of X3 where he's seemingly reborn into a coma patient), and how he looks exactly like his old self (which I assume is some sort of visual mental projection)? Or why he's still handicapped?
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May 22, 2014 08:57
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Gonz posted:Is it ever explained how Xavier is alive in the the future (following up the end of X3 where he's seemingly reborn into a coma patient), and how he looks exactly like his old self? Or why he's still handicapped? if there was any explanation about any of that, I completely missed it.
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May 22, 2014 08:58
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Gonz posted:Is it ever explained how Xavier is alive in the the future (following up the end of X3 where he's seemingly reborn into a coma patient), and how he looks exactly like his old self (which I assume is some sort of visual mental projection)? Or why he's still handicapped?
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May 22, 2014 10:03
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Baron Bifford posted:Days of Future Past is not a silly movie. I disagree. It is an incredibly silly movie. A movie that claims JFK was a mutant is already pretty silly, but their Nixon was practically cartoonish. Delightfully silly, but still incredibly silly. Not to mention the abundance of humour and absurdity throughout.
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May 22, 2014 15:09
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setafd posted:I cannot express how shocked I am that this is apparently NOT awful. I'm seeing it on Saturday after all. This is my shock. This is one of my absolute favorite x-men stories but just given the track records of x-men movies I was expecting to be THE ANGRIEST NERD as they totally gently caress up my favorite thing. I kinda don't know what to do now...am I...am I going to have to genuinely enjoy a comic book movie based on a thing I like? I don't think I can handle that.
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May 22, 2014 15:16
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Dan Didio posted:I disagree. It is an incredibly silly movie.
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May 22, 2014 16:17
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Baron Bifford posted:"Silly" is a relative term. It's nowhere near as silly as The Avengers or The Amazing Spider-Man 2. You mean there's no scene where Erik and Charles stumble upon a Led Zeppelin concert as they're playing the 90s X-Men cartoon theme? What a shame. Hey Baron, so they don't touch on the Trask-as-a-midget thing at all? I was hoping for some interesting subtext about how he's driven to destroy mutants as an extension of some (unnecessary) feeling of personal defect... I guess that's too much of a touchy theme for anybody to want to play with in a summer blockbuster.
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May 22, 2014 16:27
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Glad to hear the CD opinion agrees with the 92% on RT. This will be the first theater outing of the year, first showing tonight in RPX, and I'm glad I made it this and not Godzilla.
Josh Lyman fucked around with this message at 17:18 on May 22, 2014 |
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May 22, 2014 17:15
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I haven't seen it yet but I'd like to issue a preemptive "I told you so" to everyone who told me I was crazy for looking forward to this movie.
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May 22, 2014 17:17
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:I haven't seen it yet but I'd like to issue a preemptive "I told you so" to everyone who told me I was crazy for looking forward to this movie. I still think you're crazy!!  Probably going Sunday and its good to hear its actually pretty good. I legit enjoyed the last Wolverine movie (watched it twice) and First Class was great. I still think Quicksilver is one of the worst costumes ever but everything else should surpass this. Josh Lyman posted:Glad to hear the CD opinion agrees with the 92% on RT. This will be the first theater outing of the year, first showing tonight in RPX, and I'm glad I made it this and not Godzilla. Godzilla was great so you're the one who is missing out.
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May 22, 2014 17:28
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Zombie Tsunami posted:You mean there's no scene where Erik and Charles stumble upon a Led Zeppelin concert as they're playing the 90s X-Men cartoon theme? What a shame. Zombie Tsunami posted:Hey Baron, so they don't touch on the Trask-as-a-midget thing at all? I was hoping for some interesting subtext about how he's driven to destroy mutants as an extension of some (unnecessary) feeling of personal defect... I guess that's too much of a touchy theme for anybody to want to play with in a summer blockbuster. What I was curious about is why the filmmakers chose Dinklage, a midget. Dinklage is a fine actor, but there are many fine actors in Hollywood. Trask is not a midget in the comics. Vintersorg posted:I still think Quicksilver is one of the worst costumes ever but everything else should surpass this. Baron Bifford fucked around with this message at 17:35 on May 22, 2014 |
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May 22, 2014 17:28
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Baron Bifford posted:The upcoming Apocalypse movie will probably be sillier, because the Apocalypse stories in the comic books tend to be really silly. As long as he has that big-rear end A belt buckle at some point, I will be happy. Maybe he already does, but I'm trying to avoid reading about the post-credits. And I agree, it is nice in 2014 to have a movie that just presents the Dink as the Dink without comment, but the X-Men are so connected to discrimination that I had figured his casting was a deliberate choice so the filmmakers could reflect on this theme in the movie. But hey, it's Peter Dinklage, I'm stoked.
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May 22, 2014 17:45
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I'm very excited to hear that this is a good film. I'm typically not as picky as most movie goers, I've liked most of the X-Men movies to some extent but I can't say I've really loved any of them. That combined with the fact that Days of Future Past was one of the stories I remember from the 90's cartoon and liked enough to search out the comics with the same story, and I am really stoked. Sounds like the X-Men movie I've been wanting since I was 7.
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May 22, 2014 18:18
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If they're going Apoc they better go all in and borrow heavily from the 90s cartoon version. I AM THE ROCK OF THE ETERNAL SHORE. CAST AGAINST ME, AND BE BROKEN.
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May 22, 2014 18:51
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Baron Bifford posted:"Silly" is a relative term. It's nowhere near as silly as The Avengers or The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Okay?
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May 22, 2014 19:15
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One thing that bothered me: "Hey, let's bring back the black guy who's functionally immortal through adaptive evolutiOOPS, he's dead." That felt a few steps shy of the 'Girlfriend in the Fridge' play for blatantly forced dramatic tension.
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May 22, 2014 19:25
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I think the high rating on RT is in part because people are just shocked at how much it didn't suck. It may not blow you away unless you are really invested in the franchise, but I thought it was the best X-Men movie. The pacing is tight with no unnecessary lulls, there are good character moments and humor, and nobody's taking up useless space. We all kinda saw the climactic cross-cuts between timelines coming at the end, but I thought it worked well regardless and was genuinely worried a few times. It is an ugly film, I have to say. The future/present scenes could be set in a generic video game, and a lot of character/costume designs are hokey as can be. The 70s timeline looks much better, though, and while Quicksilver still looks dumb, he's entertaining for the few scenes he's in. That's the whole film in a nutshell, really: looks dumb but isn't. The best thing you can do is go in maintaining low expectations and come away pleasantly surprised.
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May 22, 2014 19:28
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Baron Bifford posted:In a way it's kind of nice to see a movie just cast a midget in a role and have everyone just ignore that he's a midget (though I don't think people were that kind in the 70s). I think I read an interview where Dinklage said that his character was highly driven to earn respect and attention, but nothing like that is in the film. I like this too. People can be dwarfs in real life, so why shouldn't they also appear in films or television without requiring explanation? Despite what Hollywood would have us believe, there's no such thing as a default human, but casting has gotten us into the habit of thinking different types of people need to justify their existence before appearing in media. Let's have different types of people show up more often, not to meet a quota or because diversity integral to the plot, but because that's a more accurate reflection of reality.
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May 22, 2014 19:39
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