I went to the theater expecting the worst. It's now public known that production had problems, and here are some of them: It all began with X-Men rights coming back to Marvel/Disney in the meantime production started, forcing the story to be rewritten as a closure to X-Men/Fox era before mutants migrate to Marvel Cinematic Universe, instead of making it the 1st part of a new series, as it respectfully should've be; then, Kimberg's debut as a director, a bad choice for for him and for the franchise; Also (rumor or fact) dailies were disastrous, as some insiders stated during filming. Reshots, postponed release, and actors reprising their roles for the sake of their long term contracts.
Every single thing was telling us what was to come since the beginning.
The result isn't that bad as I expected, but it's very far from good or, at least, acceptable. It's not the worst movie of the franchise (Apocalypse still holds that title, imo), but it trully makes The Last Stand respectful when compared, as someone stated.
So Dark Phoenix, in a whole, is an inert product. Disposable in essence, that lives in a limbo between disinterest and lack of commitment.
The main problem of the movie isn't the movie itself, but the consistent changes that entire X-Men universe suffered on each new installment since the 1st movie, coming to an unbearable situation where chronology mistakes and character misinterpretation stopped being incidents to become part of its self destruction. Days Of Future Past did a good job trying to correct some of those, but it was totally ignored after that, leading the franchise to a predicted dead end.
Storyline was OK until Jean takes that cosmic energy bath. Supposing it was Phoenix energy, what was Apocalypse ending all about? Phoenix already lived inside her, it's not a power that can be consumed or transfered. Also, when she loses herself and characters react like Jean Grey was only bad behaving was like throwing away entire X-Men existence as a unity. Turning themselves against each other without consistent purposes was an awful plot development.
In the comics the conflicts between mutants emerges beyond their own differences when Phoenix entity finally reveals itself and basically split them in two opposite groups: those ones that believe Phoenix must be stopped even at the cost of Jean's life, and those who believe that it can be contained/controlled. X-Men decides to stand for Jean's side until the end for the reason already mentioned, and that Kimberg forgets completely until the last 30 minutes: they are a unit. That's when The Last Stand get kuddos, because that conflict, as it is, was preserved.
The story development is poor, and the aliens are there just to give an easy twist on everyone's behavior.
Particularly I think that Sophie Turner did a better job now than Apocalypse, but Kimberg definitely was more worried about closed 3rd person shots and dollying than on what the cast could offer. For that reason, seems that Turner sometimes doesn't know what she is doing. Most of the cast has no order of appearance or importance at all, some simply disappearing throughout storyline, and Lawrence appearences are only to fill innocuous scenes in a monstrosity called make up. Really, her make up gets worse and worse each new movie. There's a moment that a girl is holding her doll. Both Lawrence and doll were the same, but in the worst way. Lawrence was like dressed as evil Polly for the Halloween. That's why we must thank Rebecca Romjin and make up artists of the original trilogy every single day of our lives.
What Jessica Chastain is doing there is also a mistery. What she did any other support could have done and would have make no difference at all.
A movie that steps to nowhere. Something that we surely could have lived without.
Some X-Men sagas and vilains cannot be adapted for 2 hours. Dark Phoenix saga and Apocalipse are examples. Apocalypse was supposed to be for X-Men franchise what Thanos is for The Avengers. And Phoenix/Dark Phoenix Saga is not a problem to be solved by half dozen mutants. Phoenix is an entity observed by different civilizations across the universe. Make it so small and unimportant as Kimberg and Fox did is disrespectful for entire Marvel and Stan Lee legacy.
At least the 90's animated series did a fantastic adaptation of Phoenix/Dark Phoenix Saga. An adaptation that was so perfect that was pretty much ready to be live adapted, and seems that they never gave it a glance.
A shame.
Every single thing was telling us what was to come since the beginning.
The result isn't that bad as I expected, but it's very far from good or, at least, acceptable. It's not the worst movie of the franchise (Apocalypse still holds that title, imo), but it trully makes The Last Stand respectful when compared, as someone stated.
So Dark Phoenix, in a whole, is an inert product. Disposable in essence, that lives in a limbo between disinterest and lack of commitment.
The main problem of the movie isn't the movie itself, but the consistent changes that entire X-Men universe suffered on each new installment since the 1st movie, coming to an unbearable situation where chronology mistakes and character misinterpretation stopped being incidents to become part of its self destruction. Days Of Future Past did a good job trying to correct some of those, but it was totally ignored after that, leading the franchise to a predicted dead end.
Storyline was OK until Jean takes that cosmic energy bath. Supposing it was Phoenix energy, what was Apocalypse ending all about? Phoenix already lived inside her, it's not a power that can be consumed or transfered. Also, when she loses herself and characters react like Jean Grey was only bad behaving was like throwing away entire X-Men existence as a unity. Turning themselves against each other without consistent purposes was an awful plot development.
In the comics the conflicts between mutants emerges beyond their own differences when Phoenix entity finally reveals itself and basically split them in two opposite groups: those ones that believe Phoenix must be stopped even at the cost of Jean's life, and those who believe that it can be contained/controlled. X-Men decides to stand for Jean's side until the end for the reason already mentioned, and that Kimberg forgets completely until the last 30 minutes: they are a unit. That's when The Last Stand get kuddos, because that conflict, as it is, was preserved.
The story development is poor, and the aliens are there just to give an easy twist on everyone's behavior.
Particularly I think that Sophie Turner did a better job now than Apocalypse, but Kimberg definitely was more worried about closed 3rd person shots and dollying than on what the cast could offer. For that reason, seems that Turner sometimes doesn't know what she is doing. Most of the cast has no order of appearance or importance at all, some simply disappearing throughout storyline, and Lawrence appearences are only to fill innocuous scenes in a monstrosity called make up. Really, her make up gets worse and worse each new movie. There's a moment that a girl is holding her doll. Both Lawrence and doll were the same, but in the worst way. Lawrence was like dressed as evil Polly for the Halloween. That's why we must thank Rebecca Romjin and make up artists of the original trilogy every single day of our lives.
What Jessica Chastain is doing there is also a mistery. What she did any other support could have done and would have make no difference at all.
A movie that steps to nowhere. Something that we surely could have lived without.
Some X-Men sagas and vilains cannot be adapted for 2 hours. Dark Phoenix saga and Apocalipse are examples. Apocalypse was supposed to be for X-Men franchise what Thanos is for The Avengers. And Phoenix/Dark Phoenix Saga is not a problem to be solved by half dozen mutants. Phoenix is an entity observed by different civilizations across the universe. Make it so small and unimportant as Kimberg and Fox did is disrespectful for entire Marvel and Stan Lee legacy.
At least the 90's animated series did a fantastic adaptation of Phoenix/Dark Phoenix Saga. An adaptation that was so perfect that was pretty much ready to be live adapted, and seems that they never gave it a glance.
A shame.