Fantastic story with great characters and effects, perhaps the finest comic adaptation to date

Rating: 9/10 (20 March 2005)

I really liked X-Men, it was one of the few comic adaptations that really made it big, and also made it right. So I was keen to see if X2 had managed to carry the successful conversion to the big screen again. Word of mouth had it that it was good, but I didn't realise just how good.
The movie is excellent. Truly as a movie fan there's not much I can find wrong with this film, and as a comic fan there's not much I can find wrong with the adaptation. If I were pressed then Cyclops is perhaps too wooden and Storm not quite angry enough, but these are tiny failings, tiny.
The story is very well written and the characters paths pulled together very skillfully. The introduction of Nightcrawler is superbly done, with the first action scene kicking the action and effects into top gear. Alan Cumming plays the character wonderfully, and despite my first thoughts at being such an odd choice, he fills the role perfectly.
Each strand of the story that involves each character begins to pull in different directions, but as the story moves along the strands cross and begin to merge, before all of the characters return to fight the one cause, and the one enemy. What is so different for this movie is the fight as truly moved to humans against X-Men, the war is upon them.
Acting talent abounds here, with Brian Cox, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, and they all manage to lift the performance of even the smallest character. The weakest links are slight blemishes and really require some serious investigation, Cyclops slightly wooden style and the slightly bland performance of Halle Berry who seems to fail to capture the true anger and strength of the Storm character.
Let's be honest though, I am nitpicking, and otherwise this is a truly excellent movie, great entertainment and tension throughout. It's also one of the best comic book adaptations, perhaps even the best to date.