Today in Superhero movies is X-Men 20th Anniversary

[Valentis]

On July 14th 2000, X-Men 1 was released.

The brilliant, unsettling legacy of X-Men, 20 years later

The X-Men movies were always American movies. They attacked national monuments and protested White House supremacy. The best bad guy tried to save JFK, and the best good guy got an A-Bomb dropped on him by Truman.

The first film in the X-Men franchise, released 20 years ago today, relies heavily on immigrant labor. Australian Hugh Jackman plays a Canadian. New Zealander Anna Paquin gradually sheds a Southern accent. Magneto and Professor X are both obviously British, because they are Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart, even if the characters nominally hail from Europe and New York. That's how things work in the melting pot. Everyone has a codename to mark their new life: They have transformed themselves, like the huddled masses of yore, like the Dutch brunette playing an American redhead. So of course the final battlefield is the Statue of Liberty. The mutant superteam saves the world, although Wolverine (Jackman) has to carve his adamantium claws into Lady Liberty's crown. It's a defensive tactic rich with meaning: Save the statue, but leave your mark on it, too.

Magneto is never really a bad guy. He's too charismatic, his actions always sorta justified. The first time we meet him — the beginning of the whole franchise! — he's a little boy getting marched into Auschwitz. So the most loathsome character is Sen. Robert Kelly (Bruce Davison), a contemporary demagogue for genetic purity. Magneto turns him into a mutant. Kelly's powers are disgusting, unusual, not really believable as a special effect but still kind of awesome. The process is unstable. He turns to goo.

Gradual glorious liquefaction: Yes, that was the X-Men franchise, which started on July 14, 2000, and will end whenever Disney dumps The New Mutants into bankrupted multiplexes or streaming oblivion. The stories never lined up, the costumes were ridiculous, the villains were awesome. The whole process was unstable. The series turned to goo, yet it stuck to you.

And the most interesting thing about the franchise is that it's over. Oh, the mutants will return in a few years, dis-amputated into limbs of the Marvel Cinematic Hydra. There will be more jokes, better continuity, less compelling camera angles. Storm will finally have something to do. Jackman will play Wolverine again, you know he will, it will happen like this: A cameo as himself in Deadpool 3, Ryan Reynolds posting an Instagram of Jackman wearing what will be described as "the iconic yellow spandex," a release date for something called Wolverine vs. Deadpool or possibly Wolverine X Deadpool, Jackman explaining at D23 how this new Wolverine is "a different character, a spoof, really."

There's always money in the banana stand. But after New Mutants, there will never really be another X-Men movie as we knew it. The 13 films (perfect number!) were products of 20th Century Fox. They were the studio's great hope for a cinematic universe in the 2010s. Now, on a related note, Fox is kindling for the Disney worldengine. And Disney could never have made a film as stylish as First Class, as vulgar as Deadpool, as stoned as Apocalypse, as serene as The Wolverine, as terrible as X-Men Origins: Wolverine, as accidentally terrifying as Dark Phoenix.

That awful do-over already ended the mainline series last year. It was a financial flop, cruelly irrelevant in a big year for superhero movies. Forget Endgame and Joker and Far From Home. Dark Phoenix grossed less at the domestic box office than freaking Glass.

It's bad, no question, bland enough to make you yearn for the polychromatic mess of Apocalypse. But the final proper X-team movie picks up the saga's unique strand of underground political lore. In the original X-Men trilogy, the U.S. government opposes mutantkind. Whereas, in the first act of Dark Phoenix, the X-Men are national heroes. James McAvoy's Professor X is a magazine coverboy with a direct line to the president. He is, frankly, a sellout — and it's the '90s, so that still matters. This would be ripe material for a radical new X era, one where the old revolutionary heroes become the establishment a new wave rebels against. It's right there in the movie's uncomfortable outline: Professor X, we learn, has been dampening the powers of fellow telepath Jean Grey (Sophie Turner). "I had to make adjustments to her mind when she was young," he explains — gross!

Any #MeToo resonance was probably unintentional (and eerily ironic, given the franchise's past employment of Bryan Singer and Brett Ratner). Yet the X-Men movies are resonant even when they don't mean to be. This comes from the comics, which built up the Civil Rights analogue into a brand identity, but I think you have to credit all the franchise's various collaborators for carrying that mood onto the massive global stage. X2 had that great coming-out sequence, quite potent in a world so primordial that Satan hadn't even invented Prop 8 yet. The First Class films embedded mutancy into pop history, bringing the fight right to Nixon's lawn. The Wolverine trilogy casually Forrest Gump'd Logan into a century of American wartime.

Worth attaching some suspicion to the saga's victim complex, considering the leads are mainly white dudes. Still, a potent metaphor is a potent metaphor. "You may start off with Professor X," Killer Mike said in his recent GQ profile, "But Magneto got a f---ing point." Here's a smart man talking about race in America today, using a comparison he knows the whole world can understand.

Leave it to Disney to figure out how to incorporate 2020 into whatever the X-Men will look like next. Appreciate, one more time, just how weird the first X-Men movie really is. A runaway teenager who sucks out life through her kisses meets a metal-skulled barfighter with memory problems and mutton chops. Meanwhile, a superpowered concentration camp survivor plans to liquefy the United Nations. The only person who can stop him is his loaded best friend, who owns a mansion school for attractive emo kids with a secret parking space for the private jet. Every superhero after Batmen Begins duded themselves up in body armor, until the MCU made the multiverse safe for fight-scene athleisure. In X-Men 1, Professor X dresses his crew up in uniform tight black leather: Club-ready, or maybe everyone is supposed to look like Catwoman.

All the movies that followed are worth watching — even The Last Stand and X-Men Origins: Wolverine are bad in an impressive way — but one fruitful approach would be to skip right to 2017's Logan. It's set in a now-ish future where all the famous heroes are gone, and a dark powerful cabal has prevented any new mutants from being born. Wolverine and Professor X are walking ruins, left behind by the world, like a franchise that simply wasn't powerful enough to adapt. The script by Scott Frank, director James Mangold, and writer Michael Green earned an Oscar nomination for its rueful power. The Disney buyout inadvertently excavated another layer of meta-commentary. In this dark future, the only new mutations are imitations, brought to life by residual DNA: Reboots, and you wonder if that's all we have left in this genre now. In Logan, the old heroes die, and you can only grow new freaks in a laboratory. The kids are all right, but there's nothing left for them. They go to Canada.

Logan is the flick I enjoyed the most. X-Men 2 is the best film, nonetheless the first movie is one of the most important superhero flicks that deserves to be reminisced.

[DrNewGod]

What an interesting thread, Valentis! Well done.

Superhero movies are now so tightly ingrained in the public consciousness, it's easy to forget that we are one college students lifetime way from there being pretty much none. Sure, there were Superman and Batman movies, but it was rare.

Love the X-Men (and I do), or hate them, the X-films widened the hole in studio resistance carved by Donner, Burton, and Norrington/Goyer through which Feige, et. al drove the MCU.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Don't think X-Men 1 has aged very well. Having said that there's stuff to take note of in the movie.

Pros:
-- Visually, its biggest contribution is the Room-Sized Cerebro which was imported into the comics, and that's still grand and interesting.
-- Rebecca Romijn's Mystique with her full body blue suit is an arresting visual look and a big factor for her to become such a major character in X-lore.
-- Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart are perfectly cast even if they aren't exactly 1:1 the character from the comics.
-- The movie explains the complicated the X-Mythos, without doing origin stories or explaining things too much.
-- Anna Paquin's Rogue is great.

Cons:
-- Visual style and aesthetic with some exceptions is quite drab and dull. Most scenes are staged at night.
-- Halle Berry's Storm did not get to do enough.
-- Scott and Jean are too old looking. Though I do like Famke Jansen otherwise.
-- Structure is weak. Magneto's Auschwitz prologue doesn't really add much or have anything to do with the rest of the movie (as opposed to First Class which is his origin story). Some bits of dialogue allude to subplots that seem to be left off (i.e. Senator Kelly's death with Magneto muttering vaguel, "Are you sure that's what you saw?").
-- Action scenes haven't aged well.
-- Scott Summers got shafted at Logan's expense.

[DrNewGod]

Don't think X-Men 1 has aged very well. Having said that there's stuff to take note of in the movie.

Pros:
-- Visually, its biggest contribution is the Room-Sized Cerebro which was imported into the comics, and that's still grand and interesting.
-- Rebecca Romijn's Mystique with her full body blue suit is an arresting visual look and a big factor for her to become such a major character in X-lore.
-- Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart are perfectly cast even if they aren't exactly 1:1 the character from the comics.
-- The movie explains the complicated the X-Mythos, without doing origin stories or explaining things too much.
-- Anna Paquin's Rogue is great.

Cons:
-- Visual style and aesthetic with some exceptions is quite drab and dull. Most scenes are staged at night.
-- Halle Berry's Storm did not get to do enough.
-- Scott and Jean are too old looking. Though I do like Famke Jansen otherwise.
-- Structure is weak. Magneto's Auschwitz prologue doesn't really add much or have anything to do with the rest of the movie (as opposed to First Class which is his origin story). Some bits of dialogue allude to subplots that seem to be left off (i.e. Senator Kelly's death with Magneto muttering vaguel, "Are you sure that's what you saw?").
-- Action scenes haven't aged well.
-- Scott Summers got shafted at Logan's expense.

I agree with all that you say except the part about Auschwitz. The death camp opening gives you a very clear picture of what's driving Magneto so. It also establishes the stakes for the mutants; it gives shape to the shadow of dread that both The X-Men and The Brotherhood live. One could argue that showing Magneto's tattoo would have been enough, but it wouldn't have conveyed that tragedy of having his parents ripped from him with nearly as much force as the scene did.

[Scott Taylor]

X-Men was decent, pretty entertaining and true to the X-Men visually. The actual characters were different from what I knew and loved at a time, but hey I was also pretty much resigned to never seeing a decent movie set in the Marvel Universe. This movie came out of nowhere, it seemed, and pleasantly surprised me.

Sabertooth looked right, even if he was an idiot with nothing much to do. Still cool! Other characters were done really well, in looks mainly. Honestly I didn't like Rogue at all, in looks or character, but c'est la vie. Wolverine had the perfect look really. He was too tall, man so what! The hair, the whiskers the attitude, the overacting was all brilliant.

So yes, hail to the original X-Men film. Very happy it was made, and overall I'm happy with the whole Fox X-universe. Its got clinkers, for sure, but the highs are pretty damned high.

[Castle]

Storm: Do you know what happens to a toad when it’s struck by lightning? The same thing that happens to everything else.


Another reason to hate Joss Whedon.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I agree with all that you say except the part about Auschwitz. The death camp opening gives you a very clear picture of what's driving Magneto so. It also establishes the stakes for the mutants; it gives shape to the shadow of dread that both The X-Men and The Brotherhood live. One could argue that showing Magneto's tattoo would have been enough, but it wouldn't have conveyed that tragedy of having his parents ripped from him with nearly as much force as the scene did.

The mutant registration act that Senator Kelly talks about conveys that better, in my view. As does the numbers on his arm and that speech Magneto gives when he sails with Rogue to Liberty Island.

The Auschwitz prologue doesn't explore or explain the persecution of mutants. The victims there were persecuted because they were Jewish not because one of them was mutant. Auschwitz is important for us to understand Magneto but it's not important at all to explain the X-Men Mythos and Concept. Since Magneto in the first movie is largely an extremist villain who is charismatic, but not really the protagonist (Wolverine is) it doesn't add anything to the movie. And using that as a prologue feels a bit like "this is a serious dark movie, how serious, we start with the holocaust".

I mean there's so much stuff in X-men 1 that feels like a set-up for stuff that seemed to pay off for something but is just left hanging in the movie. For instance, when Magneto sees Logan's dogtags and gets it from Sabretooth, there's a shot of him looking at the numbers on his arm. Does that allude to some World War II connection between Wolverine and Magneto (i.e. Jackman's Logan was part of the group that freed Magneto from the camps, which we saw play out in X-Men Evolution). Watching that movie I felt that inevitably we are going to get that moment that Wolverine is tempted by Magneto out of a connection to a past, and also drive home just how old Logan actually could be. But it's not addressed at all in the movie, it's left like a canker.

The movie is also very low-energy in dialogue scenes...kind of like proto-mumblecore. The dialogue intonations are quite weird and self-serious.

[caj]

Don't think X-Men 1 has aged very well. Having said that there's stuff to take note of in the movie.

Pros:
-- Visually, its biggest contribution is the Room-Sized Cerebro which was imported into the comics, and that's still grand and interesting.
-- Rebecca Romijn's Mystique with her full body blue suit is an arresting visual look and a big factor for her to become such a major character in X-lore.
-- Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart are perfectly cast even if they aren't exactly 1:1 the character from the comics.
-- The movie explains the complicated the X-Mythos, without doing origin stories or explaining things too much.
-- Anna Paquin's Rogue is great.

Cons:
-- Visual style and aesthetic with some exceptions is quite drab and dull. Most scenes are staged at night.
-- Halle Berry's Storm did not get to do enough.
-- Scott and Jean are too old looking. Though I do like Famke Jansen otherwise.
-- Structure is weak. Magneto's Auschwitz prologue doesn't really add much or have anything to do with the rest of the movie (as opposed to First Class which is his origin story). Some bits of dialogue allude to subplots that seem to be left off (i.e. Senator Kelly's death with Magneto muttering vaguel, "Are you sure that's what you saw?").
-- Action scenes haven't aged well.
-- Scott Summers got shafted at Logan's expense.

Agree with 99% of this. I though Paquin was the wrong choice for Rogue. But I will agree that she did well with what they gave her to do.

Scott Summers got shafted in all three movies he was in. He was basically a guest-star in 2 & 3.

[DrNewGod]

The mutant registration act that Senator Kelly talks about conveys that better, in my view. As does the numbers on his arm and that speech Magneto gives when he sails with Rogue to Liberty Island.

The Auschwitz prologue doesn't explore or explain the persecution of mutants. The victims there were persecuted because they were Jewish not because one of them was mutant. Auschwitz is important for us to understand Magneto but it's not important at all to explain the X-Men Mythos and Concept. Since Magneto in the first movie is largely an extremist villain who is charismatic, but not really the protagonist (Wolverine is) it doesn't add anything to the movie. And using that as a prologue feels a bit like "this is a serious dark movie, how serious, we start with the holocaust"...

LGBTQ people and POC probably have a pretty vivid picture of what danger a rabble-rousing Senator pontificating represents. Most people born in privilege probably don't. A large chunk of the audience needed something visceral to remind them of where that kind of grandstanding can go.

Yes, Auschwitz was not aimed at mutants, but we're given the connection by Magneto talking about what those in power might do to those "born different." "Different" at Auschwitz meant a lot of things in addition to Jewish: Romani, Slavic, Polish...it's easy to see how Magneto would see his experiences with The Final Solution in Sen. Kelly's speech.

As for the dog-tag, I don't remember if Magneto actually looks at his arm, or if that's a camera angle for the audience's benefit. I'll have to rewatch it.

Yes, the dialogue is kind of plodding in most places.

[Scott Taylor]

The Auschwitz scene was neat, to me, because it was pure fan service. Virtue signaling for X-Men fans. A lot of the stuff in the film is that way, actually. Cap picked up the hammer for largely the same reason.

[BeastieRunner]

I liked everything about the first two X-Men films except Rogue. Great actress ... not Rogue in the movies. She could've been another mutant and nothing would've been lost for me.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I liked everything about the first two X-Men films except Rogue. Great actress ... not Rogue in the movies. Should could've been another mutant and nothing would've been lost for me.

I actually think Anna Paquin's character would have made more sense if she was Kitty Pryde. I mean she's basically the young tagalong kid who serves as the teen reader surrogate into the now older established X-Men. If it was Kitty, her being Jewish, would also have made a strong connection with Mags.

She's got nothing Comics!Rogue-like about her at all in terms of characterization or personality. Just the powers and skunk stripe. But Anna Paquin sells that character very well in the first movie (she has a smaller role in the second one).

Scott Summers got shafted in all three movies he was in. He was basically a guest-star in 2 & 3.

When the MCU come around, their priority has to be to get Cyclops right. Get Storm right. Jean Grey, well they cast well with Sophie Turner second time around but they wasted her in terrible movies.

[BeastieRunner]

I actually think Anna Paquin's character would have made more sense if she was Kitty Pryde. I mean she's basically the young tagalong kid who serves as the teen reader surrogate into the now older established X-Men. If it was Kitty, her being Jewish, would also have made a strong connection with Mags.

She's got nothing Comics!Rogue-like about her at all in terms of characterization or personality. Just the powers and skunk stripe. But Anna Paquin sells that character very well in the first movie (she has a smaller role in the second one).

That's kinda of my point. Kitty, Jubilee, even a new mutant would've been fine. She's just not Rogue. She had great performances. I would've probably enjoyed the 1st 2 movies more if my lame COMIC NERD ALERT clarion wasn't going off.

It's really just me being nitpicky.

I really, really like that Kitty Pryde idea. That would've been perfect. Hindsight is 20/20, no?

[Synestra]

I agree that I don't think the first X-Men movie has aged well, especially in some of the dialogue and pacing. Regardless, its influence is undeniable, and I'm still able to watch and enjoy it. X2, while not perfect, is the strongest of the first 3.

As for the Auschwitz scene, I thought it provided insight and understanding into Magneto, so I always considered it a "Pro" to the first film.

When the MCU come around, their priority has to be to get Cyclops right. Get Storm right. Jean Grey, well they cast well with Sophie Turner second time around but they wasted her in terrible movies.

Yeah, I was really hoping they would leave the Dark Phoenix alone until the MCU got it so they could have a better chance of redeeming the story line. Now it's been done too soon and too many times, so it's best they focus on other stories now.

[Castle]

Rogue was 50% like the Evolution Rogue without the Gothic lifestyle and angst attitude. I didn't like the character at first but she grew on me with time after a rethought. Anna's Rogue is easy to believe .A person who always hurts people when she touches them is most likely to be an extra introvert. I hated Wolverine's crush on Jean but preferred the father daughter relationship of Wolverine and Rogue. They sold the movie.

Patrick Stewart was well cast as Xavier and a happy birthday to Patrick for turning 80.

Halley Berry was ok as Storm

Ian Mckellen was great in the role but was already looking too old.

James Marsden was well cast but underused.

My favourite character in the film was Senator Kelly. I think this was the first film to have a realistic comic book villain not just in appearance but in motivation. Meaning he was not necessarily a villain.

Few has said the movie is dated but compared to the throwaway manufactured comic films we have now, this movie remains a classic and easier to put on re-watch. John Campea said it was the most important comic film ever done. (not really)



The honour goes to Superman 1978 (not dissing Marvel to favour DC).However X-Men 1 was the most important film to lay the foundation to tell more adult driven believable superheroes films. dramas, without relying on too much action or campiness. Its the film that shifted the argument that comic films can go beyond brainless entertainment for kids, where it all about wearing animal costumes and marketing toys. If your favourite comic films are between Man of Steel, Logan, Joker, Deadpool, The Dark Knight, Watchmen, this movie and its sequel opened the doors for those films. I did not have time listen to Campea but I hope that is what he is implying.

I agree that I don't think the first X-Men movie has aged well, especially in some of the dialogue and pacing. Regardless, its influence is undeniable, and I'm still able to watch and enjoy it. X2, while not perfect, is the strongest of the first 3.

As for the Auschwitz scene, I thought it provided insight and understanding into Magneto, so I always considered it a "Pro" to the first film.


Yeah, I was really hoping they would leave the Dark Phoenix alone until the MCU got it so they could have a better chance of redeeming the story line. Now it's been done too soon and too many times, so it's best they focus on other stories now.

I don't think MCU would have a better chance to do it but not for the same reasons as Fox. Dark Phoenix is just a storyline that was not meant to be put on film. It is indeed best they focus on other stories.

When the MCU come around, their priority has to be to get Cyclops right. Get Storm right. Jean Grey, well they cast well with Sophie Turner second time around but they wasted her in terrible movies.

Sophie Turner was not well cast. No one in the newer movies were well cast. It is best to treat those films as fan-fictions.