Days of Future Past Days of Future Past News and Discussion - Part 4

Not happy with The Avengers comparison, but then I'm not surprised that it was their main goal with this film.

 

I'll just repost it for anyone who missed it:

I'm not surprised by the Avengers comparison at all, and I think it was necessary. I adore X2, for example, but in terms of scale, Avengers dwarfs it. If Singer can marry the cerebral, emotional character-based storytelling of his earlier X-Men films, with Avangers style action, we're going to end up with one hell of a film.

 

If they only brought back Stewart and McKellen then they wouldn't have the epic action scenes in the future mentioned in the tweets just now. You need lots and lots of mutants for that kind of action. What would be the better option - come up with a bunch of new characters no one really cares about, or use familiar faces who would be present in the time period?

I think one thing to keep in mind is that DoFP is going to be a completely unique proposition; they're not likely to make another film with multiple timelines and combined casts any time soon. Plus, while the old cast is back, the setting they're going to be in is completely different to anything we've seen in the OT. I think in that sense it's going to be like the new Wolverine movie - while they both take place after X3 the setting is going to be so radically different that it's likely to feel like a standalone thing.

As such, it's rather hard to say where the franchise will head to next after a film which is essentially a one-off. And one in which neither setting is likely to have a direct continuation (as in, I don't see another 70s-based X-Men movie or a movie based in the dark post-apocalyptic world).

I'd have no problem if The Avengers comparison is about the scale and visual effects, as long as it's not about the story and character depth (or lack of rather).

 

Avengers style action is fine but hopefully it has a good story and enough emotion to carry it, the emotion in FC was a highlight

Do have to wonder is cyclops will be one of them mutants

 

Agreed. Really hoping for something great here. Also really curious to see what other nods and surprise appearances the film has in store.

 

Like what I'm hearing! Loved the Avengers and glad they're aiming for this level of big.

 

Im not sure if this guy knows all the mutants confirmed to date, but this tweet tells me there will be some more mutants on that apocalyptic future.

I always thought the movie will be some cameos on the prisions and all of that, so this doesnt surprised me at all. My question now is if some of those cameos will have a great action momment too or not. I guess some will have, just like Colossus had a little action momment on X2, but with sentinels around this time, I guess the action of those cameos will be bigger than that lol

 

I have no problem with that. Avengers was amazing!

 

I think the comparison is apropos. And it also guarantees certain things: that the action sequences from X3 won't be restricted to only that film but rather Bryan will be embracing that too. I've never been worried about his story-telling ability; his films only lacked in the action department.

It also lays to rest a lot of concerns about certain mutants like Storm (in my opinion). Many have been concerned that her pregnancy will preclude her from being able to create powerful weather phenomena. And that's where SFX and body doubles can come into play. If this is going to be "Avengers" level crazy, they'll need serious power displays beyond just hand-to-hand combat. Storm is one of the few mutants that can deliver anything visually on the scale of what Thor did in The Avengers.

 

This is great! I loved the Avengers! I hope DOFP will be big in scale. So its confirmed that there will be more mutants??

 

same as Rogue.

When you have a character that can use the power of two or even three mutants at the same time, you know the spectacle can be HUGE.

Storm, Iceman, Colossus, Sunspot and Rogue.... just these 5 mutants alone can do DAMAGE. So.......

Im ready.

 

That would be a first. I've never seen an action-packed movie which is also cerebral. If Singer can achieve it, kudos to him.

The Avengers, like the majority of CBM, meant nothing to me in terms of character development. I've never cared much about those characters even in their solo movies, and The Avengers didn't change this; I still don't care. It was completely different with X-Men - I didn't know anything about the X-Men before I saw the first film and by the end I was emotionally drawn to the mutants. This is the one thing I care about when I think about the X-Men, much more than great CGI and 3D.

But since James McAvoy seemed to be quite enthusiastic about the script, and he's an actor invested in the emotional development of characters, it gave me some hope that at least Charles and some other characters will a have good, emotional character arcs, and it won't be just a CGI fest like The Avengers.

 

That was a complaint alot of people had about the first 2 films... that the XWorld seemed too small and they wanted a film with larger scale.

 

https://twitter.com/ShawnRAshmore/status/334693761353408513

All leads to think that this will be the Biggest and most epic X-Men movie of the whole franchise, and maybe..... the best team comic movie to date.

 

the difference between the avengers and DOFP is with the avengers it was more the novalty of having these heroes together, it contained all the typical joss whedon tricks, twists, humour, badass one liners which made it a winner

but overall the avengers didn't have much in terms of story, infact whedon left it to the solo films to fill in gaps and obviously it was never intended to be about the story but more these characters together

now with DOFP there is time travel story and they are always tricky to do, that and with more characters then the avengers had, and with a story like this they can't go the avengers route and have very little story and all action

so what i'm saying is maybe in scale the action scenes will be bigger then previous X-men but it probably won't have the action scenes be pacey and take over the story like the avengers did, because thats the difference between these films, this film needs more time for story then the avengers did

 

the biggest X-men movie in terms of scale to date most likely

whether its the best X-men film is unknown, and whether it makes more then the avengers is unknown also

 

Yeah, but like you said this was eight years ago, things have changed. For one thing the reason Fox was trying to rap the series up, was because it was too difficult assembling the now A-List cast and concluded it would be easier to only partially do it in a series of Spin-Off films. Berry had become a diva, Ellen Page was gaining popularity, and McKlellen was acknowledging he was aging it was time to move on. Since then Catwoman among other poor casting choices has stunted Halie's celebrity level, Ellen Page has gone MIA in hollywood since Juno, and McKlellen has returned from retirement as Gandalf already. Neither actress has the leverage they did several years ago. Also the spin-off films were a bust. Wolverine Origins was panned and did not perform as well as expected and while First Class was well received it was only a footnote in comparison to the success of it's predecessors. Fox needs to change it's strategy and many of these actors need a shock of revival in their careers.

Okay but you're ignoring my point entirely. The audience has evidently lost faith in the series after they felt they were given two blatant cash grabs with Last Stand and Wolverine Origins and the First Class attempt didn't bring the money the studio desired. Brining the original cast back and the original director back, one more time, in order to introduce the new faces of the franchize is financially a good move. I also believe you are greatly over estimating the amount of work it took to get the cast back. Like I said, it's not difficult to get B/C list actors and actresses together when they could use a push to reobtain A list status.

No as long as the film is received well, the audience will accept it and return.

I'm saying that you're looking at things with a skewed view clouded by your excitement and your obvious love of the franchize. You keep using the phrase "anti-climactic", implying there is some sort of build up and excitement this is causing building up to something beyond this film. However the general audience doesn't view the so called climax of the this news to be beyond the horizon of this film, but to be climaxing when the two casts join together. My point is that yeah they can probably get a few of the actors back but they want to start fresh as well and avoid the problems so this very well could be the last one with the old crew.

Yeah the whole cast hasn't returned every time, Jackman is on his seventh reprisal with The Wolverine and will be on his eighth with this film, and Patrick Stewart has voiced/appeared as the Professor on even more occasions. There will always be a few that enjoy the work but it's not realistic to get the entire cast back indefinitely.

But they're not, in fact they've made a big point of saying that they're not. Kevin Fiege makes it clear in interviews he's not looking past Phase 2 which is taking place over the next 2-3 years, and only has general ideas for Phase 3 which very well could change. Anytime a studio tries to plan too far ahead they only inhibit their own creative process by cutting off the potential for new strokes of brilliance and as such they tend not to do this. Besides you never know who's going to die or whos gonna go nuts and cause the studio to distances themselves. Theres just too many variable to realistically plan more than 5 years ahead.

 

This is the same problem I had with The Avengers, Thor, & Captain America. The were great films in terms of scale, actions, and effects but they missed any emotional pull with the characters like I get with X1, X2, First Class, or even the Dark Knight series.

 

I find funny the comments from fans who say: 'the general audience lost interest in the original cast'

yeah, because if Fox and Singer did another movie with Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm, Rogue, Iceman, Kitty, Colossus, Angel, Nightcrawler and Gambit, with awesome effects and action sequences, the general audience would say: 'this looks boring, I wont watch'

 

Look on twitter and you'll find the majority of fans alike are asking about Jean Grey and Cyclops the most, specifically because they want to see Famke Janssen rise again as the all powerful Phoenix and also see James Marsden be the leader he was always meant to be.

 

Not surprised about the Avengers style comparison. The X-Men always had a story, but they were missing a good action scene where they work together helping each other taking out a big threat. The sentinels are the the biggest threat to the X-Men in this film world and they needed some good action scenes. If they can manage to get some Avengers style teamwork and action along with capturing the essence of the good story that is Days of Future Past then we might have a winner.

 

So he says it's Avengers style huge. But, we've known that.

 

I know about the image inducer...it's stupid! I wish they just went with him looking like a Beast all day every day