It is important to remember that we live in a magical age, when sequels aren’t necessarily callous corporate cash-ins and frequently wind up even better than the original movie. Don’t forget that we are very lucky to have films like Captain America: The Winter Soldier, X-Men: Days of Future Past and The Dark Knight, because until relatively recently the best sort of sequel we could hope for was middle-of-the-road junk like X-Men: Apocalypse.
X-Men: Apocalypse isn’t the worst X-Men movie, not even close. Big parts of Bryan Singer’s new sequel are genuinely entertaining. But for the first time in a long time, one of these X-Men films now feels almost entirely perfunctory, like this was a hurdle we simply had to jump over in order to get to a better movie down the road.
X-Men: Apocalypse takes place ten years after X-Men: Days of Future Past, which took place about ten years after X-Men: First Class. Naturally, nobody seems to have aged a day, especially Havok (Lucas Till), who should be in his 40s by now but is instead the 20-something brother of a teenaged Cyclops (Tye Sheridan), who has just discovered his mutant abilities and then gets transferred to Professor Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters.
20th Century Fox
Also: No X-Men For You! | 20th Century Fox Cancels on Comic-Con’s Hall H
There he meets Jean Grey (Sophie Turner) and Nightcrawler (Kodi Smit-McPhee), and while they go off to the shopping mall with Jubilee (Lana Condor) – who shouldn’t have been born yet since she was last depicted as a teenager over 20 years later, but maybe I’m the only one who cares – an ancient evil rises from the sands of Egypt and starts recruiting pissed off mutants like Magneto (Michael Fassbender), Storm (Alexandra Shipp), Psylocke (Olivia Munn) and Angel (Ben Sharpe). Those latter two also shouldn’t be adults yet unless somehow Wolverine going back in time to 1973 also affected how much sex their parents had a decade earlier.
But I digress. The villain, Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac), has a plan to destroy the world and only the X-Men can stop him. That’s it, really, and honestly that really is the problem with this movie: the villain is just a Saturday morning contrivance. X-Men: Apocalypse goes out of its way to justify Apocalypse’s and his followers’ behavior as the acts of an immortal narcissist and his acolytes, who are themselves driven only by naive rage and overpowering depression. But it’s hard to take that seriously when it only boils down to a big dumb fight in which everyone pushes CGI at each other for several minutes at a time, and in which the valuable lesson the bad guys learn would be considered pretty trite for an episode of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.
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Also: ‘X-Men’ Producer is Open to ‘Avengers’ Crossover Film
Again, it’s sometimes entertaining, but X-Men: Apocalypse can’t help but feel like a massive step backwards for this series. It exists to reintroduce the popular characters that this franchise screwed up in the first place, and as grateful as we may finally be to have versions of Cyclops and Jean Grey that hold up to their counterparts in the comics, the fact that it took 16 years and almost ten films to get there is being constantly shoved in our faces with continuity throwbacks and worse, continuity errors. It’s a gourmet dinner from a chef who forced you to eat nothing but hot dogs for eight meals beforehand. It’s okay if you’re not overcome with thankfulness.
There are other little details that sting. Quicksilver’s big moment is just a repeat of his big moment from Days of Future Past, except now it goes on for so long that it actually gets boring. Psylocke barely qualifies as a character. Apocalypse goes out of his way to CGI fabulous Joel Schumacher uniforms for his henchmen for no other reason than I guess he thinks they look neat. The opening action sequence is so ludicrous it plays like an outtake from Gods of Egypt. And so on.
20th Century Fox
But then there are some moments that really work. A sidestep into unexpected territory halfway through the film, setting up a memorable set piece. The revelation of what Magneto has been up to between movies. The way bird wings now suddenly seem like a dangerously badass superpower. An actual explanation for why Cyclops and Jean Grey get together someday. Oscar Isaac giving Apocalypse a gravitas that makes you almost forget how silly most of what he actually does on camera really is.
X-Men: Apocalypse plays more like an overblown episode of the 1990s cartoon series than anything else, and I wouldn’t consider that a compliment. Then again, your mileage might vary. If you always wanted the X-Men movies to be over the top and hard to take seriously, maybe X-Men: Apocalypse is the film you’ve always been waiting for. The rest of us will have to just keep waiting.
William Bibbiani (everyone calls him ‘Bibbs’) is Crave’s film content editor and critic. You can hear him every week on The B-Movies Podcast and Canceled Too Soon, and watch him on the weekly YouTube series Most Craved, Rapid Reviews and What the Flick. Follow his rantings on Twitter at @WilliamBibbiani.
11 Action Movie Sequels That Overshadowed The Original:
Top Photo: 20th Century Fox
Action Movie Sequels That Overshadowed The Original
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Captain America: The Winter Soldier
The first Captain America was took place entirely in World War II and evoked a classic adventure serial feel. The follow-up dropped Cap into the present day and upped all the stakes, as a sinister conspiracy damn near destroys America and our hero's best friend returns to kill him. Ambitious, action-packed, and game-changing for the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Photo: Marvel Studios
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The Dark Knight
Batman got his dignity back in Batman Begins, but with the origin story out of the way, Christopher Nolan was able to direct an intense follow-up that challenged our hero's ideals and gave him the scariest version of The Joker ever, played by the late, great, Oscar-winning Heath Ledger.
Photo: Warner Bros.
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Fast Five
It took five films for the Fast and Furious movies to finally get the mix right, ditching the street racing drama for an ensemble heist flick packed with crazy stunts and family values. Future films in this series may have made more money, but they all followed the template that Fast Five set for the series.
Photo: Universal Pictures
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G.I. Joe: Retaliation
The first live-action G.I. Joe movie made money but pissed fans off with its jokey tone and changes to the storyline. Jon M. Chu's follow-up still had problems, but it righted a lot of wrongs by killing off extraneous characters, fixing Cobra Commander and recreating a classic mountaintop ninja fight from the comics.
Photo: Paramount Pictures
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Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol
Every Mission: Impossible movie so far has had a different filmmaker, so it makes sense that none of these movies felt like they were of a piece. But Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol seemed to unlock the right formula, and the superior fifth film Rogue Nation followed suit. Brad Bird's entry emphasized a whole team of bickering agents, increasingly impossible situations and fantastic, gorgeously photographed stunts.
Photo: Paramount
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The Road Warrior
The first Mad Max introduced us to a cop trying to stave off apocalyptic anarchy. In The Road Warrior the world has finally, officially ended and violent punks are fighting for the last of the gasoline, and our hero has abandoned his soul for pragmatism. Groundbreaking action scenes and a distinctive vision of the future codified the post-apocalyptic genre for decades to come. (And yes, Mad Max: Fury Road is even better, but time will tell how influential it is.)
Photo: Warner Bros.
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Spider-Man 2
Sam Raimi's original Spider-Man was the blockbuster superhero movie that defined the whole genre, but the second film upped the ante with a villain who actually looked cool (heck, Doctor Octopus looks fantastic), a more thoughtful storyline about the price of responsibility and a wicked sense of humor that treats our hero as a punching bag. Practically everyone still agrees that Spider-Man 2 is the best Spidey film yet.
Photo: Columbia Pictures
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Superman II
The first Superman made audiences believe that a man can fly, but it failed to take advantage of the action-packed possibilities. Superman II introduced a whole team of Kryptonian villains, led by Terence Stamp as the deliciously egomaniacal General Zod. Sure, Superman only fights them at the end (and he murders them all in cold blood as soon as they're powerless), but it's still the movie that everyone points to as the Superman flick that came closest to capturing the feel of the comics.
Photo: Warner Bros.
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Terminator 2: Judgment Day
James Cameron's original The Terminator was more of a sci-fi/horror movie than a proper action film, but in the sequel he turned it all around, empowering the heroes and teaming them up with Arnold Schwarzenegger's flesh-covered robot to fight an unstoppable liquid metal badass. Innovative visual effects, exceptional characters and some of the coolest action sequences ever filmed.
Photo: TriStar Pictures
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The Wolverine
X-Men Origins: Wolverine was such a colossal misfire that the marketing for Deadpool had to actually apologize for it. But even before that, The Wolverine was eager to get the character back on track with a film that removed his invulnerability (for a while anyway), and evoked the classic samurai stories from the comics. The Wolverine is the closest we've ever seen to an accurate depiction of the beloved comic book character.
Photo: 20th Century Fox
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X-Men: Days of Future Past
The X-Men movies helped make superhero films a popular genre, but the formula hadn't been figured out yet and most of the sequels floundered in confusing mythology and missed opportunities. Days of Future Past finally told one of the best stories from the comics, got it kinda right, and reset the whole continuity to set the stage for better sequels to come. Unforgettable action and clever reworkings of history made this even more popular than First Class, which was the first step in the right direction for this series since X2.
Photo: 20th Century Fox
