X3 Forum Debate #6: "Same Universe"

[X-Maniac]

Hey, that's pretty cool. How was the movie?

It follows the light, humorous tone of the previous FF movie, then takes off into more epic territory. Worldlwide locations flash on screen with the sound of them being typed (like Casino Royale), Surfer is awesome, action scenes are great, Doom suffers a little (as Phoenix did in X3) from vicious editing. Leaps ahead of first movie... but bear in mind the cheesy humour is still there and some length would have added substance to some serious/momentous scenes that tend to rush past a little. This isn’t a dark, brooding thing like Batman Begins or Superman Returns. I think any self-appointed arbiters of taste and quality will not like it at all. I preferred it to Spider-Man 3. It’s like X3 but more complete, like Spider-Man 3 but tigter and less self-indulgent, like Pirates but shorter and less pretentious of being serious.

I think if you want a ‘realistic’ superhero movie, watch Unbreakable. As soon as you get costumes, masks, codenames, capes, aliens or extraordinary powers (any or all of those), you ain’t talking realism any more.

As soon as i mentioned to people at work about ‘invisibility’ and stretchy limbs or being able to burst into flame, they laughed and said it sounded fun if you are into that sort of thing. ‘Batman Begins’ was dark and serious, I contended. ‘Oh yes, a man dressed as a bat’ came the reply. That’s not to say that superhero movies should be cheesy and take the piss out of themselves.... but they are never going to be taken as seriously as The Godfather or Schindler’s List or anything totally reality-based. Fantastic Four have very obviously extreme powers (a man covered in orange rock etc) - anyone wanting reality wouldn’t be sitting in the cinema in the first place. Bryan Singer only managed more seriousness in X-Men by setting most of it in darkness, ditching most bizarre looking characters (Angel,.Beast, Blob, etc) and by focusing on a heavy socio-political message of oppression/discrimination. The Fantastic Four’s theme is not discrimination, it’s the struggles of those who are celebrities, plus a dysfunctional family dynamic (which was regrettably stolen from under their feet by The Incredibles, so it doesn’t appear that original).

 

[Legion]

X3 isnt in the same universe because the story is based on stories in the comics and thus the fight scenes involved a group of superheroes fighting together for a cause. Although this movie is criticized for wolverine taking cyclops' role and the story revolving around him, I feel like this is the only movie where the x-men are a team.

In X1 when the movie starts, the only x-men are cyclops, jean, and storm. Wolverine puts on a costume to help rescue rogue, but he takes off at the end, he comes back in X2 but he's still not an X-man.

The first 2 films may have had a more "real" feel but thats because wolverine did all of the fighting and his powers are less extraodinary than that of the other characters who were downplayed to make him look better.

The story line in X1 with magneto's machine that turns people into mutants always seemed like a plot from an x-men video game or in the really old x-men where magneto makes a costume to drain angel's powers...the magneto I love was more militant and not afraid to get his hands dirty, which is more like X3. The first two films made him out to be more of a schemer and I still dont get how he changed so much from X1-2 where he tried to change the world leaders to mutants to sympathize with his cause, to trying to kill all humans on earth.

Overall i enjoyed all the films but for the third film to be great the first two needed to be alot better as well.