More of the same thing

Rating: Null/10 (25 May 2006)

This 3rd installment of the X-men series in more of the same thing, actually heavier on special effects and lighter on characters. Lighter on development, that is, but not in numbers  someone counted as many as 17 new mutants arriving on the scene although some of them are just a fleeting glimpse.
For reasons stated above, this is the most comic-like of the three, right from dialogues such as the one at the first encounter of Wolverine and Beast:
Beast: I heard you're quite an animal
Wolverine: Look who's talking
One of the key attractions, the reborn, split-personality Jean Grey/Phoenix, is as old as the familiar Jekyll/Hyde and gets somewhat tiresome. Ditto (tiresome, that is) the Logan/Jean/Scott triangle. What I would like to have seen a little more of is the pathetically underused Anna Paquin. Some may still remember way back to how the series started, at the beginning of the original X-men, with the chance encounter of Logan and Marie (Rouge). There we have what I think is the most intriguing relationship, one that dances tantalizingly between friendship and romance. There was a little more development in X-2, but hardly anything here in the current installment.
For those who must have some philosophizing, I suppose we can talk about CHOICES  those who prefer to remain mutants can have their choice, as do those who'd rather be "cured", as in the case of Rouge.
In the show I went to, most of the audience either missed or disregarded the alert right before the ending credit roll and left. The few who stayed patiently through the 10 minutes of credit roll were rewarded with the last 5 seconds of the movie, a hint of number 4 in the works. Much, of course, depends on how number 3 is received.