{"id":20793,"date":"2016-05-24T20:09:00","date_gmt":"2016-05-25T00:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=20793"},"modified":"2016-05-24T20:09:00","modified_gmt":"2016-05-25T00:09:00","slug":"x-men-apocalypse-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2016\/05\/24\/x-men-apocalypse-2016\/","title":{"rendered":"X-Men: Apocalypse (2016)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"xmenapocalypse\"<\/a>At the end of the day, \u201cX-Men Apocalypse\u201d is a big step up from the films in the series that preceded it, but it\u2019s still just a Bryan Singer \u201cX-Men\u201d movie. Its two and a half hours of surface level action and superficial ideas that still haven\u2019t broken in to the more complex themes of prejudice, racism, hatred, and bigotry that have made the X-Men property so beloved and widely embraced. Six movies later and only now FOX seems to be getting that a big advantage of the \u201cX-Men\u201d movies is that there are so many fascinating heroes and average people turned in to heroes of varied shapes, sizes, and colors. Only now that Marvel has embraced the team movie are Singer and FOX transforming the \u201cX-Men\u201d in to a team franchise.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Director Singer is gradually taking steps in the right direction, placing Cyclops, Jean Grey, and Nightcrawler front and center, while they do battle with someone other than Magneto, for once. This time around we\u2019re met with one of the first mutants En Sabah Nur also known as Apocalypse, who has risen from his tomb and is readying to destroy the world to rebuild it in his image. Or something like that. Packed with a plethora of powers, he also begins recruiting his four horsemen. This includes a loyal adaptation of Storm, finally, a semi-loyal iteration of Archangel and Psylocke, and Magneto. He\u2019s once again injected in to the narrative if only because Michael Fassbender injects more pain and turmoil than Ian McKellen ever did.<\/p>\n

What with Apocalypse assembling his team, Mystique and Professor Xavier begin traveling the world looking for their own recruits. They inevitably meet young Nightcrawler, Scott Summers, and Jean Grey, all of whom are pushed in to the main hero roles. The indication of their importance is painfully overdue, and the trio of Codi Smit McPhee, Sophie Turner and Tye Sheridan do a wonderful job as these potential heavyweights of the X-Men, all of whom are filled with immense power and have to figure out how to manage it as the film progresses. Oscar Isaac also steals the film wholesale with his turn as villainous Apocalypse, delivering every single monologue like his life depends on it, and I was pleasantly surprised. That said, the core problems are still there like most of Singer\u2019s films.<\/p>\n

The movie is much too long and dull for it to suck the audience in and there\u2019s not much of an explanation as to why we\u2019re ten years in to the future and everyone still looks the same age. It\u2019s also still inexplicably centered on the inner turmoil of Professor X (McAvoy proves he\u2019s the superior Professor X) and Magneto, both of whom should be background presences rather than primary protagonists. Mystique is also one of the major X-Men, now, by virtue of the fact that Jennifer Lawrence is a top billing movie star; Lawrence as always looks bored throughout most of \u201cApocalypse\u201d and it\u2019s embarrassing how future films hinge on her reprising this fairly boring iteration of the X-villain. Singer and FOX also still seem so embarrassed by the concept of the X-Men and still insist on downplaying so much of what makes the comics so dynamic and exciting.<\/p>\n

And yet, they\u2019re never above restaging the Quicksilver Slow motion scene from \u201cDays of Future Past\u201d if only because it\u2019s the only thing audiences remember from that bore two years ago. Sadly it\u2019s still painfully stupid the second time around. In either case, based off of what\u2019s been a long running if crummy series of movies, \u201cApocalypse\u201d is the strongest sequel yet, even though Singer is still a terrible director. I won\u2019t revisit \u201cX-Men: Apocalypse\u201d any time soon, but I don\u2019t regret giving it a chance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At the end of the day, \u201cX-Men Apocalypse\u201d is a big step up from the films in the series that preceded it, but it\u2019s still just a Bryan Singer \u201cX-Men\u201d movie. Its two and a half hours of surface level action and superficial ideas that still haven\u2019t broken in to the more complex themes of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20794,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[58,64,71,302,349,633,676,701,906,922,1087,1208,1210],"class_list":["post-20793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-action","tag-adaptation","tag-adventure","tag-drama","tag-fantasy","tag-marvel","tag-monster","tag-mutants","tag-science-fiction","tag-sequel","tag-thriller","tag-x","tag-x-men"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20793"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20793\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20795,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20793\/revisions\/20795"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}