The superhero genre has been reinvented with X-Men. Previously, Superman and Batman had dominated the genre in the 60s-90s, but both series dried out under never ending sequels that got worse and worse over time. X-Men, based off of the Marvel comic by Stan Lee, brings us back to the genre and opens the door for a string of other superhero movie franchises to be released throughout the decade.
Directed by Brian Singer and featuring an ensemble cast, the real focus is still on Wolverine (Hugh Jackman), a mutant. The world is divided into two kinds of people: regular kinds of people, and mutants, people with special abilities but are discarded by and even pressured on by the public. Wolverine is an outcast, a loner. He has indestructible claws and can heal any wounds that are inflicted upon him. After joining with a teenage girl named Rogue, he learns of a special school for mutants, headed by Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart), who is leading his successful school while confronting his arch rival Magneto (Ian McKellen), who leads the bad guy mutants.
I was overall mostly impressed by the first part of the film which didn’t overdo itself with action and followed along with the characters. The second part of the movie deviates away completely from that and is overflowed with relentless action with the good guys vs. the bad guys, but this second part of the film remains messy and could really have been cleaned up.
X-Men did still prove that audiences wanted superhero movies. And look at it today, the Hulk, Batman, Spider-Man, Fantastic Four and Iron Man franchises have generated billions of dollars, even though not all of them were good or great films.
X-Men remains a shallower, more of a reintroducer of a movie for a genre. It, of course, started a successful franchise that so far has spawned two sequels and a prequel. It was by all means strict, comic book, popcorn fare, but I’ll give it a pass.
***/5
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