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Reel Review: X-Men: Apocalypse

Bryan Singer has made a career with the X-Men franchise up to this point. After the failure of Batman and Robin, studios were not releasing comic book/superhero films for a few years. It looked like the genre had died. That was until X-Men in 2000, as Singer began with the resurrection of the comic book genre with not only a well-reviewed comic book film, but a commercially successful one on top. He followed X-Men up by directing two more X-Men films, culminating with the best work in the franchise and his career, X-Men: Days of Future Past.

With that being said, it was to no one’s surprise that the expectations were high for his 4th installment of the franchise, X-Men: Apocalypse. The film, although entertaining, did not live up to his previous efforts.

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The unbalance within the film was the most glaring issue. We are given a long winded overly saturated opening with the origin of Apocalypse. While warranted for the casual filmgoer, the telling of his creation halted the pacing of the film. While needing to know the powers that Apocalypse has, origin narratives of characters in a comic book film should be cut down to a minimum. The audience cares about the now, and concentrating a substantial amount of the opening of the film on Apocalypse might have checked out some of the viewers because on top of being long winded, it was at times sleep inducing and difficult to watch.

4b95ee42-856a-3d27-a622-50458bf9ec00Mid-film, the pacing turns to an overabundance of action, that while entertaining felt like it was all thrown at the end, instead of spacing it throughout the film. In between the unbalance of the film shines moments of what has made Singer the ideal director of this franchise. The film’s visual elegance aided in bringing to the screen the 1980’s. Once again, Quick Silver brought a fun, sensational, visually stunning scene in the film to the sounds of “Sweet Dreams” by the Eurythmics.

Additionally, a poignant and emotional punch to the gut were the early scenes with Magneto, who Singer has made into the most sympathetic figure in his latest two entries. Going back to  X-men: First Class, you get a full understanding of his disdain for those that are not mutants. Played brilliantly by Michael Fassbender, he has truly made this character his.

While Fassbender provided the best performance in the film, Sophie Turner (Jean Grey), Tye Sheridan (Cyclops), and Kodi Smit McPhee (Night Crawler) stood out as not only the most endearing but my favorite three, with Turner standing out the most. It will be exciting to see where the franchise goes with these characters in the next installment. With nods to fans of the X-Men comic books with easter eggs scattered within the film and in a post credit scene, there is just enough in this film, that warrants a visit to the theater.

Reel Talk gives X-Men:Apocalypse 2.5 Reels

2.5REEL

David Gonzalez
David Gonzalez is the founder and chief film critic of The Cinematic Reel (formally Reel Talk Inc.) and host of the Reel Chronicles and Chop Talk podcasts. As a Cuban American independent film critic, David writes fair and diverse criticism covering movies of all genres and spotlighting minority voices through Reel Talk. David has covered and reviewed films at Tribeca, TIFF, NYFF, Sundance, SXSW, and several other film festivals. He is a Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer-Approved Critic and a member of the Latino Entertainment Journalists Association (LEJA), New York Film Critics Online, Hollywood Film Critics Association, the North American Film Critic Association and the International Film Society Critics Association. As an avid film collector and awards watcher, David's finger is always on the industry's pulse. David informs and educates with knowledgeable and exciting content and has become a trusted resource for readers and listeners alike. Email him at david@reeltalkinc.com or follow him on Twitter and Instagram @reeltalkinc.

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