The ultimate X-Men ensemble fights a war for the survival of the species across two time periods in X-Men: Days of Future Past. The characters from the original X-Men film trilogy join forces with their younger selves from X-Men: First Class in an epic battle that must change the past – to save our future. The X-Men send Wolverine to the past in a desperate effort to change history and prevent an event that results in doom for both humans and mutants.
Let’s put Wolverine in X-Men: Days of Future Past and then get rid of all the witty banter of X-Men: First Class and not spend any money on makeup and special effects. What could have been an epic film turned out to be a snoozefest. There have been several great time travel films, Terminator is the first come to mind. Yet, X-Men: Days of Future Past fails to take the leap for greatness. Director Bryan Singer had a solid plot to work with but didn’t add the small details to make it a special film. Then there is Beast, the makeup department will get no awards for his look.
The best part of the film was the 20-minutes with Quicksliver played by Evan Peters. For a brief moment the fun was put back in the film. Then Professor X, Beast and Wolverine get a plane and leave Quicksliver in Washington D.C. Peters deserved a bigger part.
The biggest problem with X-Men: Days of Future Past is you know they’re going to win. That takes all the “sense of urgency” out of the film. Also, very early in the film when explaining time travel the film also trivializes death. So, even when Colossus and Iceman get ripped apart the audience isn’t shocked and or impressed.
Comic book nerds finally get their vengeance, this time travel film erases all memory of X-Men: The Last Stand (2006). Brett Ratner made a very bad film and it took almost two and half hours to fix his hot-mess. What X-Men: Days of Future Past does well is position the X-Men film to expand the universe and hopefully telling better stories.
Story: 8/10 • Cinematography: 7/10 • Acting: 8/10 • Overall 7.7/10 mutants