Quik Flix Hit

Summer Movie Series

X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)

Rated PG-13

Twentieth Century Fox/Marvel Entertainment

So here we are, another X-Men movie. This one’s a linking film between 2011’s look-they’re-all-young-now prequel, X-Men: First Class, and series proper, where they are old dudes and dudettes. Elements of this film were established in 2013’s standalone feature, The Wolverine.

It’s not as confusing as it seems—if you even bother to try and sort through it all. It’s enough to know that some time in the future, the human and mutant races are under siege and nearing extinction. Professor X (Patrick Stewart), Magneto (Ian McKellen) and the few remaining good/bad mutants are in a last-stand battle to stave off lab-created supermutants. These genetic robotic-mutant monstrosities can adapt to any of its foes’ varied mutant powers, making the supermutants all but invincible.

Once all seems lost, a Hail Mary time-traveling gimmick is employed that allows Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) to be mentally catapulted 50 years back in time to his younger body. Hot-headed Wolverine isn’t the best representative to send on this mission to destroy the enemy before it’s even created, but his near-indestructible Adamantium frame and mental constitution make him the only one capable of making the journey. Not only must he stop an as-yet-created enemy, he must convince now-younger Professor X (James McAvoy) and Magneto (Michael Fassbender) to assist him. That second part may be harder than the first since the two mutant leaders are respectively suicidally depressed and incarcerated in a super-prison—and hate each other to boot. (See the previous film if you don’t understand how this came to be.)

Stopping the supermutants—created through a nefarious Vietnam-era government program—involves stopping rogue mutant Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence). The last movie saw her blue-hued, shape-shifting mutant making romantic gestures with both Professor X and Magnetic. Her now-bitter character’s actions put her on a collision course with mad scientist Dr. Trask (a great Peter Dinklage), which will ultimately create the bleak future. All of this occurs at a brisk pace, is action packed and—thankfully—humorous.

Fassbender, McAvoy and Lawrence bring needed dimension to the proceedings, and Jackman’s always engaging, particularly in the ’70s setting. Despite occasionally cutting back to the future, the original X-Men crew, including Storm (Halle Berry) and Kitty Pride (Ellen Page) get limited screen time.

How many more of these films can they make? I like them and the creators still find space to employ the mutant/societal outcast trope effectively, but I think the series is running out of road.

| Marvin Brown’s Movie Review Archive