The Marvel Cinematic Universe

Makeshift Python wrote:

Lawrence (and by the by, I would hit that).

Nah, she had this weird baby fat thing going on in her face.

Armond chimes in:

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Inglourious Mutants
Director Matthew Vaughn virtually turns X-Men into Inglourious Basterds
By Armond White

X-Men: First Class

Directed by Matthew Vaughn

Runtime: 132 min.

Not terrible is the best evaluation a sensible person could give to X-Men: First Class—but that isn’t good enough. This back-to-adolescence prequel is meant to revive the franchise after Bryan Singer drove X-Men 3 into uselessness. Seeing how Professor Xavier and Magneto first met, and began their rivalry as leaders of the specially gifted mutant crime fighters, merely rehearses the familiar story with younger faces. James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender aren’t exactly fresh in these roles; the characters and their situations are so utterly familiar they can’t be rethought or refreshed. The entire film is a hackneyed exercise.

Hack director Matthew Vaughn’s specialty is British refurbishments. As in Layer Cake and Kick Ass, Vaughn repeats already established genres with a desperate lack of imagination. The introduction of each mutant feels like déj vu and is humorlessly drawn-out. Even with new actors playing Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence), Darwin (Edi Gathegi), Beast (Nicholas Hoult), Riptide (Alex González), Havok (Lucas Till), Vaughn finds no personality spark. This makes him—shockingly—a lesser director than Bryan Singer. At least X-Men 2 showed Singer energized by the outsider theme as a gay-teen allegory: Hugh Jackman, Rebecca Romijn, Alan Cumming, Halle Berry and James Marsden were all flirt, promising unleashed potency. Singer had anticipated the “It Gets Better” campaign—but then got worse.

Vaughn stays timidly within the X-Men comics’ narrative limits. He’s finally found an exploitable fantasy mode but when he includes obvious James Bond and Dr. Strangelove references, it only reinforces how mundane the material has become. Ironically, that’s exactly why X-Men: First Class serves as a jackpot for Vaughn just as the debutante Star Trek was for J.J. Abrams. These prequels give an illusion of rejuvenation that might be especially appealing to susceptible young viewers but while rebooting the box office these films also constrain viewers’ imaginations.

Take the good vs. evil premise that starts in 1944 with the Nazi invasion of Poland and ends with the Bay of Pigs standoff in 1963. It teaches vengeance not history, practically turning the X-Men into Inglourious Basterds. Travestying history doesn’t give edge or profundity to action comics; it just makes them distasteful and dumb. Young Magneto’s choice between using his powers to manipulate a Nazi coin or save his mother’s life is merely coarse; it gets wrong the ethical choice that was so well played in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom when Indy’s dilemma opposed diamonds and an antidote.

X-Men: First Class trivializes each mutant’s motivation as childish petulance. Vaughn lacks the knack for expressive action, reducing the athletic gallantry Fassbender displayed in Centurion to doing silly things like levitating a submarine. He wastes Fassbender’s beautiful emotional capacity. Magneto and Professor X’s disputes lower personal principles into mumble-jumble (“the point between rage and serenity”). And Vaughn doesn’t dare push the earnest young men’s sympathies (“There’s so much more to you than you know.”) toward romance. Instead, using Jennifer Lawrence, January Jones and Zoe Kravitz as insipid sex objects is a tired alternative.

Sure, this prequel could have been better, but using pre-sold comic book escapades to pacify moviegoers couldn’t be worse. X-Men: First Class tricks audiences into misunderstanding episodic narrative pleasure. They become accustomed to dull, rehashed gimmicks, awaiting the next ticket buy. Vaughn’s shrewd: His ending isn’t a cliffhanger, it’s a carrot.

http://www.nypress.com/article-22503-inglourious-mutants.html

Singer drove X-MEN 3 into uselessness? How so?

His reviews just make me zone out.

Think he just forgot Rattner directed X MEN 3, not Singer.

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Mutant Mischief
With all their formidable powers, X-Men doesn't fly

X-Men 3: The Last Stand

Directed by Brett Ratner

Bryan Singer's sly, foppish hijinks in the previous X-Men movies are now replaced by director Brett Ratner's straight-boy clunkiness. X-Men 3: The Last Stand wears out the Marvel comics' allegory for teenage alienation. Ratner has no style; he merely sets up the predictable f/x. It gets tiresome watching these freakishly-gifted mutants fight government troops who fire back hypodermics filled with normal-making serum. Showing no feeling for what made the mutants empathetic, Ratner fails his cast. Plus, he seems sexually panicked by the new, androgynous mutant, Angel (Ben Foster).

Ratner's cliched exposition (like Ron Howard's) suggests visual slang; doggerel people mistake for expression. That's why they can't grasp the progressive syntax of Chen Kaige's The Promise, where myth and reality blend magnificently. Ratner drops every chance he gets to astonish.

The moment Angel unfurls his wings should be a highlight, like John Philip Law cradling Jane Fonda in Barbarella—at once heroic, erotic and mythic. Photographic realism requires that fantasy films have spiritual imagination or visual wit; X-Men 3 is as humorless as a Star Wars prequel. The paint has peeled off this toy.

Alan Cumming hasn't returned to resume Nightcrawler (the series' finest characterization). Unfortunately, flamboyant British actors Patrick Stewart, as the balding pedant Xavier, and Ian McKellan, as megalomaniac Magneto, don't help. They're two kinds of ham: chops and hind-quarters. Specializing in histrionic villains, McKellan follows The DaVinci Code by playing X-Men 3's equally mockable bad guy.

Two Ian McKellan films in one year is excessive. What's next for him, Dracula? Bela Lugosi was subtler.

http://www.nypress.com/article-13583-mutant-mischief.html

It's the best I could find. At least it's concise.

Sharky wrote:

Think he just forgot Rattner directed X MEN 3, not Singer.

No, I give him that.

Armond is as entertaining as always. I won't disagree with his review but I also don't care. I don't demand much from these films, and X-Men First Class got the job done. Good popcorn fare. Fassbender would have made a good James Bond but by the time Craig retires, Fassbender will be too old so forget about that.The movie was kinda lame in parts. The young mutants were mostly annoying. I did like McAvoy, Fassbender and Kevin Bacon's strong lead characters, and January Jones delivered as advertised in the lead babe role.The 60's retro look and contrived vibe was a little cornball.Rose Byrne's CIA non-mutant was not hard to look at either. I'd like to see her return. I thought the final battle was a big mess but at least it looked good on screen.I'll give it 3 1/2 stars out of 5.

This is just plain fucking awesome:



I love that Summer 2011 has two blockbusters featuring lead characters kicking Nazi ass.

Wait, what's the other one? And is that an official poster?

The White Tuxedo wrote:

Wait, what's the other one?

The first third of X-MEN: FIRST CLASS shows Erik Lehnsherr/Magneto globetrotting hunting down former Nazis before meeting Xavier.

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And is that an official poster?

Sadly no, just side project for Marvel with only a hundred actual prints made, mostly for cast and crew.

http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fansites/MarvelFreshman/news/?a=39254

Too bad, that could have been 2 for 2 for Joe Jonston superhero period flick posters.

Jennifer Lawrence is pretty hot.

Another plus for FIRST CLASS: Tits.

Nah. Rebecca Romijn-Stamos > Jenifer Lawrence.

X-men First Class flops at Dutch Box Office with les then 700.000 with a theater count of 91. A bit strange the movie is like earlier happend also with another Fox movie Xfiles sequel released by Warner Home Entertainment. This can be good and bad news for the future dvd release in The Netherlands/Belgium (and possible be France). There making a 2 disc SE but the badnews it get a low DD 5.1 track like moost Warner releases (With keeping in mind both X-men releases have a low track too.) it can going to be one of those exeptions like Taken who offical also be Fox movie with a high DD 5.1 and DTS track but only 1 or 2 short extra's. Another option Warner only release it in the cinema, but Fox release the dvd as 1 disc dvd or 2 disc BD/DVD combo (like Ice Age 3, The A-team and Narnia.) or like Wolvarine who in The Netherlands/Belgium and France get only 1 disc dvd. with only 9 minutes of delete scene's and 12 minute making off and trailers from other movies. Another option it be like Fox and Sony with QOS, cinema by Sony and dvd release by Fox with 1 disc dvd with only 1-2 extra's and 2 disc limited who you only can buy at one store or only be avaible to rent..

I only buy Wolverine of First Class if going to be 2 disc SE dvd or 2 dvd/1 disc Bd combopack (Iron Man 2 comes closer, but i like to see it be 2 dvd/1 Bd combopack.) with a lot of bonus material, i also haven't buy Ice Age 3 and QOS for the same reasen. The Bd/DVD combo pack of Ice Age 3 haven't stil enough for me to wait for til i have a BD player.

Who plays the bald wheelchair guy in X-Men?

http://www.superherohype.com/news/articles/167569-captain-american-in-his-uso-costume

'MERICA!!!!!!!!

I love that Captain America poster.

Makeshift Python wrote:

Another plus for FIRST CLASS: Tits.

Yes, tits and legs galore.

Mr. Brown wrote:

Who plays the bald wheelchair guy in X-Men?

James McAvoy.

He totally makes a convincing young Patrick Stewart while at the same time not coming off as an imitator.

Armond must have the hots for Rose Byrne - he didn't include her in the 'insipid sex objects', despite the fact that she's running around in her underwear within minutes of first appearing.

In X-Men First Class, does anyone know the name of the song that's playing in the club when Xavier and Magneto meet Angel? She's the one with the wings.

Howard Stark > Tony Stark

Johannes Stark > Tony Stark


... Well, er, for the most part.

The Avengers is getting pretty good reviews early on. Currently at 96 percent on Rotten Tomatoes with just fewer than two weeks until it opens.

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/marvels_the_avengers/

The rating will probably drop, but that's a nice sign.

Of course, there are one or two movies with scores like that which I hate, so... :)

Well, I'm pretty much new to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I'd seen Thor last year, and I watched Iron Man last night, which I thought was pretty good, but nothing special. However, I really want to watch The Avengers and I'm thinking I should watch them all before watching that. I need to watch:

Iron Man 2
Captain America
Hulk
The Incredible Hulk

Do I need to watch anything else before watching The Avengers?