Not for the Picky

Rating: 6/10 (29 January 2008)

Overall an enjoyable movie, but it might have been far better if it had followed the comics more closely... I was a little disappointed, and here's why ... but first the review.
Rogue, Anna Paquin is gorgeous, and this film had some nice pacing. Many of the characters are sidelined for most of the film, going so far as to alienate them even in death.
Some great effects and character interaction, I had fun.
What they did though is completely bastardize the X-MEN comics by throwing together elements from a What If comic, elements from X-men time lines that didn't even align, and left out major players and relationships.
1 Handling of Dark Phoenix I was really looking forward to them creating Dark Phoenix as larger then life as in the comic, but they instead opted to portray her with a more zombie look than her fire aspect from the comics which were beautifully deadly.
Check out the pictures here of Dark Phoenix, her costume and intensity... why didn't they have those elements in the film?
Also in the comic "What if Phoenix Had Not Died?", what brings Jean down is her own torment at having killed Scott, her true love from her innocent life... in the movie Scott dies and no one seems to give it a second thought? A huge disappointment for me was since this movie was largely based on a What if comic, in which Dark Phoenix kills Scott and Professor X, in the end she destroys the entire world after realizing she had killed her one true love. hell she might have even destroyed the universe.
I didn't expect that, but I did expect her to come down from her Dark Phoenix trip by acknowledging she had killed Cyclops, remember him? Her true love? But no, no mention of his death at all! To me that's just lazy writing.
What a loss, they really could have used that, it would have made more sense than Jean saying to Wolverine, "save me".
Jean has the power of a phoenix. A phoenix always rises from its ashes.
Phoenix is the most powerful mutant (I believe), and a tragedy. She is nearly archetypal in importance.
2 Kitty/Colossus In the comics Kitty and Colossus were a pair until he killed for the first time and gets all scary and estranged from her, things don't get any better when (now correct me if I'm wrong) Kitty dies in the comics and he completely loses it after that.
Kitty Pryde - Too short and stubby in the comics she was about 5'9" and slim and very bouncy like a kitten.
3 Colossus He didn't even fight at the island that we saw, and we saw nothing of his awesome look from the comics.
4 Wolverine I mean Wolverine's height has really fluctuated over the past few years in the "core" X-titles, but all of us real fans know he is only 5'3". Hugh Jackman is Wolverine Even though he's 6'2, there really is no question about it. Just as Christopher Reeve was the quintessential Superman. So I let the height thing slide.
5 Juggernaut In a comic book where Wolverine is standing next to him, he is standing on top of a bar... and Juggs is STILL 4 feet taller than Wolverine, not to mention his arms are the size of wolverine's torso... though Jugg is like 9' tall in the comics so you'd have to CGI him to make him look right I suppose. Also his helmet looked like crap.
6 Finale In the comics, when Professor X died, Magneto becomes a good guy and takes over as leader of the X-Men. I'd like to point out that Professor X did not die by the hand of Jean in the comics, that death is from a "What If" issue called "What if Phoenix Had Not Died" and exists completely outside the X-men universe) Turning Magneto into "one of them" was just stupid writing.
7 Sentinels The sentinels were hardcore and didn't come til later and nearly killed every mutant and became the toughest fights for the X-men, if I am remembering the comics correctly, it's been awhile, but they were only shown once in the film during a holographic training session.
In closing we must remember the "cure" Suppresses mutant gene X, doesn't get rid of, which means it could dissipate over time and lead into a fourth installment.
Speculation? X4 will possibly align with the comics with Magneto replacing Professor X as leader of the X men against the Sentinels... maybe... and introduce the Kitty/Collosus love story, and Wolvie's fascination with Asian bombshells post Jean.