The war has begun

Rating: 9/10 (4 May 2009)

I base this on the 2-Disc release. It has started, and it simply rocks. This whole thing builds on almost all of what the first set up and did, in so many ways, and in fact goes places only a follow-up could. Now that the world and the universe have been established, they could afford to do interesting stuff with what they had, and this the romance is just part of it. The new is also impeccable... the villain, the addition of Nightcrawler, so much is brought to the table with this, food for thought, complexity, dense, more than meets the eye. This is bigger than its predecessor, and without becoming pure fluff in the process. The action is grander, without being the main focus. The themes are the same, with a couple of different explorations of them this time around. The attention to detail is still amazing. The plot is well-done, nice script, very intriguing, and the pacing is spot-on, never standing still and not overwhelming, either. The nods to the comics are marvelous. The humor is well-done and fitting. The dialog is mostly good and well-delivered. The effects are incredible, and better than before. There are utterly stunning visuals in this. The fights are memorable and awesome. The ending of X-Men pays off majorly in this. This is quite dramatic. The orchestral score is fantastic. The powers are used well, such as the morphing(in this as well as the entry before it), and they look excellent. Production design is spectacular. The costumes, the tone in general remains true to the realistic approach. Cummings is well-cast, as well as Cox and Hu. The acting is, with few exceptions, invariably magnificent. There are strong women role models in this one, too. The problem of X1 has not been solved in this, in fact, if anything, it's made worse. There is an even greater amount of characters, and far from everyone gets to be developed in this. It does tend to work and there are fairly solid arcs in this. The abilities yet again have to be written around or out of the way entirely. These don't cost it a lot of points overall, I would say. There is relatively mild and infrequent language in this, and the sensuality is somewhat present, not necessarily strong. The DVD holds extras, including featurettes, interviews, behind-the-scenes stuff, extended/deleted scenes, plenty of galleries and two commentary tracks, one of Bryan Singer, and one of various crew-members, both well worth listening to. I recommend this to fans of the graphic novels, just watch the movie series from the 2000 film, and know that these translations, interpretations, not direct adaptations with everything accurate to the books. Those into science fiction ought to enjoy it, as well. And proof that sequels can match, and, arguably, surpass, the original, is always something to take note of. 9/10