X-Men Apocalypse [Movie Review]

Ah, summer blockbuster movies. So much fun.
I kinda wish I had watched both First Class and Days of Future Past before seeing this... just so they were fresh in my mind.

Important role, not even named, and important role.
Way to go movie. C'mon man, give her some more screen time and lines.

 At least my failure to watch those movies again did not detract from the experience. I imagine that it might have added to it, just a bit.

4 out of 5 stars

This was a very fun movie.
There were some fun themes.
The action was great, and there are some very funny moments.

But there were just a few things that could have been better.

I like Jennifer Lawrence better in this than Hunger Games.
I think her character is actually deeper in X-men.

I love the Quicksilver speed scenes. So awesome and funny!

Lets start with the good.

Oh yeah...
SPOILER WARNING!

The good things:
1. Any and all scenes with Quicksilver. Especially the running scenes. He's great. It's kinda too bad that in the MCU they had to have him shot dead. Thankfully he looks like he has a good spot in the X-men movies.

Big Apocalypse. From the Trailer... everyone's seen this already.

2. New actors in old roles. I actually like the kid who plays Scott (Cyclops). He does a good job in the role. I even accept Sophie Turner as Jean Grey. Sure it is hard to disconnect her from her role as Sansa Stark in Game of Thrones... but she does well enough in the role. I like the new Kurt Wagner too.

3. The ancient Egypt stuff. Always fun. Possibly why I enjoyed Gods of Egypt as much as I did.

It's 'Sir-barely-appearing-in-this-film.'

4. The overall plot is strong enough. However there is a codicil coming later... the action is certainly good. The humor is very funny. I laughed quite a bit during the movie. They certainly knew when to alter up the pace with humor. It made a good counter point with the action and the expository scenes.

5. Mind over Muscles. I don't want to say more... but it is a theme of the movie. I know I said Spoilers, but some things I'm going to keep quiet about.

6. Unexpected roles. Not a lot of this, but some of this occured and I liked it.

It's the Four Horsemen... but who is who?
Which is Famine, Pestilence, War, or Death?

Now the Not so Good:

1. In spite of all the build up to Oliva Munn's Psylocke, her character was not given much depth. I was sad about this. They really could have done more with her... and perhaps they are saving that for another film, but there needed to be more depth to her character.

This is just a spectacular scene with an awesome ending.

2. But leads us into the biggest issue. Very flat villains. Apocalypse, Arch Angel, and Psylocke are very flat. So is the military dude whose name I shall not mention. The other two have some depth. Magneto has the most because he has the build up of the prior two movies to help... they do add more here as well, but it helped with the prior movies.

3. The flat villains leads to something else. The movie goes by rather quickly for two and half hours. No seriously... I could have gladly sat for another half an hour for a bit more depth to the villains. I really wish they had given us more depth. Supposedly Apocalypse is like one of the biggest baddest villains in X-men comics (not that I've read them), but we really needed a bit more enlightenment on him. More of the past would have helped. More depth to Psylocke would have been nice.

That being said, yes the movie is fun.
It has it's problems, but all of the X-men movies have had some issues. They are still fun, and collectively they are certainly a good series. I look forward to whatever t is they teased at the end of this film. Yes, you need to sit through the very long credits for the post credits scene. Do it. Hold your bladder and wait for the end.

Oh, I've got one more thing to say.
Is Erik Lehnsherr (Magneto) the single most shat upon character in all of X-men? I mean yes Logan has it bad, and so does Charles Xavier in many ways... but seriously Erik constantly gets the short end of the stick. His life has just been a living hell (from the loss of his parents at Auschwitz to what happens in this movie), so it is easy to understand his villain motivations. Life keeps on shitting on him, not even giving him lemons - lemons would be great compared to what Erik gets. You really feel for him, even as a villain, he is understandable and relatable.  

I completely advocate seeing this movie. 

Go see it.

This is the same guy in two roles. He is Apocalypse in this and Poe Dameron from The Force Awakens.
He was also in Ex-Machina. Yeah...