X-Men: First Class

The big thing the critics seem to be saying with X-Men: First Class is "the best superhero movie since The Dark Knight". It's this movie's equivalent of "It's The Hangover with women!". Even if that's true, the fact is, there haven't been very many superhero movies since The Dark Knight. What has there been, Watchmen, Iron Man 2, and Thor? I'd say I enjoyed this about as much as the latter two movies, which is to say, it's a lot of fun, but not without it's flaws. Now, I know my Thor review was largely a rave, but it's because I just took it as a goofy fun movie. X-Men is so much more serious, with a philosophical debate at it's center, and the Cuban Missile Crisis as it's backdrop, it's harder for me to just ignore the flaws.

X-Men: First Class is set in 1962 and follows young Magneto on his quest for revenge against the Nazi who tortured and experimented on him in his youth, his friendship with Charles Xavier, the formation of the first mutant superteam, and ultimately, the eventual philosophical rift that grows between Magneto and Xavier. Along the way, we meet a lot of faces familiar to both fans of the comic and the previous movies.

When watching comic adaptations, I try not to nitpick what's different from the source material, so I'll do my best to avoid that (and probably fail a little). First Class is largely good, and absolutely inspired at times. About half the characters are great and fully realized, the other half barely do anything. There are a lot of great sequences in there, many of my favorite ones involving the rising debate of the mutant issue.

Wow, my thoughts are a little jumbled. How about I go through the characters?

Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy are both excellent as Magneto and Xavier. They bring a lot of dimensionality to their characters and both have the magnetism and charisma to make you believe that they are leaders in the truest sense. Xavier is not who you expect just yet. He's a bit of a ladies man. In fact, I felt like they each represented half of the quintessential 60's superspy, James Bond: Magneto the cold blooded killer, and Xavier the sex machine.

Jennifer Lawrence was one of my favorite characters as Mystique, the shapeshifter. She believes she shouldn't have to hide her true, blue, scaly form. Xavier, who grew up with her, wants her to be able to fit in and be accepted, and so encourages her to hide. She represents a flaw in young Xavier's philosophy, and shows his fallibility. I like that Xavier and Magneto's arguments are reflected through her, and through her, we see that neither belief is 100% right or wrong.

Nicholas Hoult as Hank McCoy/Beast is pretty great. I wasn't a fan of the Beast makeup, but he spends much of the movie in his human form. He felt like a kid of his era, raised in the 50's, pressured by his parents to tow the line and fit in at all costs. He acts as a counterbalance to Mystique's more modern views.

Rose Byrne is awesome again for the second time in a few weeks as Moira MacTaggart, a CIA agent who also acts as Xavier's human love interest. This and Bridesmaids makes her one of the summer's big winners, in my book. I didn't even know she was in this. I think I have a crush on her.

January Jones was Emma Frost, the diamond-skinned psychic White Queen, one of my favorite characters from the comic books (second behind only Cyclops). I think she's really great on Mad Men, and when I heard she was in this, I thought that sounded pretty spot on. Unfortunately, she falls flat in the role. I could see she was playing it as cold and icy and glamorous, which is an aspect of her character, but I think she was sorely lacking in her vampy, Ava Gabor-like qualities from the comic. In the books, she has great, droll lines like "I'm made of diamond, darling, by definition, I'm my own best friend." January Jones doesn't get that kind of material, though, and I'm not sure if she would have played it right anyway. Honestly, I think the aforementioned Rose Byrne would have been better in the role.

Kevin Bacon was the villain, Sebastian Shaw, the leader of the Hellfire Club, the orchestrator of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the object of Magneto's wrath. Bacon is always valuable in ensemble casts (as the 6 degrees game attests), and it was very interesting seeing the parallels drawn between him and the path we all know Magneto ultimately takes.

The rest of the cast don't really deserve a paragraph each. My opinion on them varies from "pretty good" to "I didn't notice them", to "kind of sucked." Banshee was the X-Men's American Ron Weasley, and pretty likeable. Darwin showed a lot of potential that was ultimately wasted. My least favorite character was by far Havoc, Cyclops (apparently by decades?) older brother. He didn't show much dimension at all besides being a jerk, and didn't talk in any way that reflected 1962. He actually said "what-ever" and called Beast a "bad-ass" at one point. Drove me a little crazy.

The action sequences are pretty fun, but none of them quite reached the level of Nightcrawler's White House invasion or Wolverine's berserker rage in X-2. Magneto is pretty ruthless, and his fights are tons of fun. There are two montages that I actually liked better than the action. The training montage is an inspired, retro-60's homage to the slick, mod editing of The Thomas Crown Affair.

There's a big logical hole in the finale of the movie. I'm not going to spoil the movie by pointing it out, but it was just sloppy writing and fixing it would have actually served to make the exciting final battle more exciting.

So, check out X-Men: First Class. It's not perfect, but it's got a lot of good movie in it, and is probably the second best installment in the series to date. I'd definitely watch further installments of the 1960's X-Men team, certainly sooner than the modern team, which was damaged pretty much beyond repair in the third movie.