Substantially better than the first film

Rating: 8/10 (27 January 2012)

This movie sort of begins where the previous one ended. Magneto has been defeated and is currently in a plastic prison, while Wolverine has returned to Northern Canada to check out an abandoned military facility that Xavier has discovered. Where the first film was merely an introduction to the X-men (and sort of focused on Rouge, as she was the first character we meet), this film has more of a focus on Wolverine, however we learn a little about his past, and also meet Colonel William Stryker, however at the end of the film his memories have not returned.
The movie opens with an attack upon the president by a mutant known as Nightcrawler (I reckon Nightcrawler is cool). His power is the power to teleport short distances, and while he can teleport through walls, he prefers not to as he could materialise inside the wall. He is can also climb walls and ceilings, as well as having a tail that acts as a third arm. While Nightcrawler attacked the president, it quickly becomes evident that he did so against his will.
William Stryker is a long time nemesis of Wolverine (not that Wolverine realises it) and has gained control of Magneto's prison. He uses Magneto not only to test his mind control drug, but also obtains detailed information on Carebro, Xavier's super computer. A quite mention of Carebro is that it is a computer that can only be operated by a telepath, and in the films enables the user to make a telephathic link with anybody in the world. It can also locate anybody in the world, but was made to enable Xavier to locate mutants. However, in the comics it is actually substantially more powerful in that it enables Xavier (and Jean Grey) the ability to astrally project, that is to travel anywhere in the world without actually leaving the room.
This film, to me, is much better than the first as there are more twists to the plot, and it is not simply a Magneto vs X-men, as was the case in the first and last films. In this film, Striker is the antagonist, and Magneto actually attempts to assist the X-men, though for his own special purposes. Xavier is kidnapped, and a powerful telepath is used to send him into a fantasy world so as to trick him into using Cerebro to pretty much kill all mutants. Adding a further twist is that the telepath (Jason 143) is Stryker's son whom he has attempted to lobotomise due to his power, though this eventually failed.
This is probably my favourite of the X-men films (excluding the prequel Wolverine), and it is not the last time we will see Stryker. I cannot say much about continuity in this film, particularly since it appears that the events relating to Jason and Stryker's dealings with Professor Xavier occur between the prequel Wolverine and this film. We do get glimpses of Wolverine's past, particularly when he enters in room where it is believed his skeleton was coated with Adamantium. However it is unclear in this film whether he lost his memory in the process or not (I believe that he did not, though this becomes much clearer in the prequel).