X-Men 2 [M]

Having left Charles Xavier’s ‘School For the Gifted’, Logan is determined to find some clues to his past and learn how he came to have ammonium grafted to his skeleton. But he’s not away for long and his return coincides with an attack on the school and the kidnapping of many its students. Not only that, but Charles Xavier is also captured and held prisoner for the sole purpose of powering a replica Cerebro that’s part of a new government conspiracy to solve the ‘mutant problem’. To prevent the coming of a war and ensure mutant survival, Logan teams up again with the X-Men and this time he’s not dubious about choosing sides. 

The compelling thing about all these superhero/supernatural comic book movies where there are all these people with different powers all assembled in one place is the envy factor. We see all these characters and fantasise about what it would be like to have a cool power like they do and what our specific power would me. I quite like the thought of having Mystique’s power: being a shape-shifter would be freaking awesome and I’d never be so bothered about my body size or shape or anything really. It’d be wonderful! 

Having left Charles Xavier’s ‘School For the Gifted’, Logan is determined to find some clues to his past and learn how he came to have ammonium grafted to his skeleton. But he’s not away for long and his return coincides with an attack on the school and the kidnapping of many its students. Not only that, but Charles Xavier is also captured and held prisoner for the sole purpose of powering a replica Cerebro that’s part of a new government conspiracy to solve the ‘mutant problem’. To prevent the coming of a war and ensure mutant survival, Logan teams up again with the X-Men and this time he’s not dubious about choosing sides. 

It’s the truth universally acknowledged that sequels to, particularly action or science fiction movies, become a lot more complex in terms of plotlines and the intricacies of them. It’s really hard to establish a balance and X-Men 2 unfortunately falls shy of it by just that little bit. For the most part the multiple stories that we’ve got going on all fit together well and they’re all interlinked quite nicely. We’ve got Logan’s story about him trying to find out about his past, then we have the attack on the President sparking the government plan to eradicate the ‘mutant problem’. This second plotline links to the first via the character of William Stryker who is a key figure in Logan’s past as well as that of both Erik and Charles. The third story also centres on Stryker and takes the shape of a revenge story, which links Stryker more strongly to Xavier. Finally, we’ve got the love triangle story between Jean, Logan, and Scott. This is where the movie flounders a little because this whole story doesn’t receive as much screen time and isn’t woven in as solidly as it could have been. It’s almost like the writers knew they had to insert it somewhere, but really struggled to find the right place in which to do so. Having said that, the whole love story is the weaker one and I don’t think it really comes through here anyway. 

The special effects in this movie are really cool without becoming over the top, which is always great. There is just so much fun that computer wizards and the special effects departments can have when making movies with mutants and I love that they didn’t try to impress audiences by overdoing everything. Magneto’s powers with metal are still captivating, the only shreds of comedy that make their way into the movie come in the form of Bobby’s use of his powers (that’s something that annoyed me with this movie, the funny and snide banter between Scott and Logan completely disappeared and everything became sort of serious), Jean’s powers begin to evolve and get pretty impressive, and we’re introduced to a new character: Kurt Wagner /Incredible Night Crawler, a teleporter. The special effects behind his teleportation are really cool like snaky wisps of navy blue fog; it’s all gothic and awesome. I love him. 

Starring Hugh Jackman, Halle Berry, James Marsden, Famke Janssen, Anna Paquin, Rebecca Romijn, Alan Cumming, Brian Cox, Shawn Ashmore, Kelly Hu, Aaron Stanford, Ian McKellen, and Patrick Stewart, X-Men 2 is a great movie that doesn’t quite live up to the first, but definitely comes close. Filled with action, kick-arse special effects, romance, drama, suspense, and the tiniest hint of comedy, it’s one that is worth having in the collection; part of a great series of action movies.