X-Men: The Last Stand

Directed by Brett Ratner
Written by Simon Kinberg and Zak Penn

Bad? Really bad. How bad? Really bad.

Where to start? The cheesed-out dialogue? The plot that was about four movies crammed into one? The bad special effects? Where? Where to start?

Rumors have been flying around for a year that Fox was really rushing along this project, and it shows. So, as much as I hate Ratner, maybe this movie would have been just as bad had Singer remained on the project? (Or, since Singer had already proven himself a serious, and seriously good, filmmaker in the past, the studio would have been more lenient with scheduling and rewrites and such. Who knows?)

As much as I like comics, I must confess that the first (and still only) X-Men book I've ever read was only last Christmas. Everything I know of the X-Men comes from the previous two movies, which I really like, as well as just those little anecdotal things that one picks up here and there (e.g., I know who Gambit is and could probably pick him out of a lineup, though I'm not quite sure what his powers are -- I know he's like some master thief or whatever, but I don't think that qualifies as a mutation). What I like about the previous two movies were that they were serious movies. Yes, they had funny moments, even stupid moments, but the movies themselves were always serious at their core. They never got silly, which is exactly why I always liked the X-Men movies so much more than, say, the Spiderman movies, both of which just feel silly to me.

And that's the problem with X3. X3 is a very silly film.

Not to mention disrepectful. Characters that were built up in the other two movies, even major characters, even arguably THE main character of the previous two films (won't say which here) are just...killed. Without anything resembling an honest emotion. One of them isn't even killed on camera, and no one ever really mentions him again. These characters are not so much killed as they are discarded. Ignored and, worst of all, disrespected.

Contrast with a movie like, say, Serenity, where major characters die, but their deaths actually matter, and more importantly are heartfelt. Killing off major characters is always a gamble, and not something ever to be done just to be edgy, or twisty, or because you're lazy, or because you just don't care.

So, other than that, what is there? Almost shockingly (and most certainly laughably) bad CGI, and extremely bad dialogue -- new character Angel (Ben Foster), for example, has exactly two lines in the entire film, both of them delivered in the worst comical Simpsons-parody-of-a-bad-soap-opera style imagineable, except this ain't a parody, and this ain't the Simpsons.

Alright, here's the plot: Jean Grey (Famke Jansenn) has come back from the dead, though it's never made quite clear why, or how, or even when (not to mention where she got that outfit). Only it's not really Jean Grey, but her heretofore never-mentioned alter-ego Phoenix, who has all the power of Jean Grey with none of the conscience, humanity, etc. Magneto (Ian McKellen)sees her as the perfect trump in his battle against the normals, who have created a "cure" for mutation and have weaponized it. So, the stage is set for the "final" battle between mutants who want to wipe out humans and mutants (led by Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), yadda yadda) who want to help defend the very humans who hate them. Along the way we have an obligatory and/or pointless romantic subplot or two, a bunch of characters die (have I mentioned?), at least one major character is "cured" (again, aren't we supposed to care? Goddamn you, why don't I care?) and there is some ridiculous business concerning the Golden Gate Bridge. Poor Ian McKellan. Poor Hugh Jackman. Poor everyone.

Stay tuned after tge credits for one more surprise twist! Could there really be another sequel in the works? Not bloody likely, although I hear Arnold Schwarzenegger is gonna be looking for work fairly soon.