X-Men: Dark Phoenix (2019)

[benteen]

22 hours ago, Dandesun said:

Also, I remain annoyed as hell in the original comic storyline that no one in the group of Everyone But Hank and Jean thought to use a GOD DAMN PHONE and maybe call the Professor and be all 'We fought Magneto in his volcano base and... Hank and Jean are DEAD!' and Charles would be all 'No... they're RIGHT FUCKING HERE thinking that YOU ALL are dead! Don't we have protocols for this?!'

Yeah, in fairness I have to admit that storyline has a couple of issues.  The ones you named.  Plus, the X-Men actually run into Misty Knight in Japan, who was Jean's roommate at the time and NOBODY brings up Jean at all. 

In fairness, after escaping the volcano the X-Men ended up in The Savage Land.  That is a kind of hidden corner place in the Marvel Universe.

Issues aside, I love the X-Men's "World Tour" storyline.  We hit several different locations (The Savage Land, Japan and Calgary) which John Byrne's art really brings to life, meet some new (Alpha Flight) and familiar faces (Sunfire) and brought the team even closer together.  We even get to see them celebrating Christmas  I appreciate that Claremont took his time with storylines and when the team gets back, he gives us one of those downtime issues that he could write so well.  A few issues later and we are treated to an unbelievable run of classic stories.  The Proteus Saga, The Dark Phoenix Saga and Days of Future Past.  THAT is why I wish the X-Men could be a Netflix storyline.

Anyway, got to watch this trailer with audio and I can't say I'm impressed with it.  Hopefully I'll be wrong.  The sooner Marvel gets the X-Men back, the better.  I have no doubt they could do a legit Dark Phoenix storyline but is there going to be any demand to see this concept on the screen for the third time?

Edited March 1, 2019 by benteen

[IWantCandy71]

I am glad

Spoiler

Raven/Mystique dies. I've never cared about any incarnation of the character. It doesn't help that there is just something off putting about Jennifer Lawrence's performance of her. IDK what it is. I just can't stand her as Mystique.  And if Erik is crying over HER ? Come on, now. NO. But now that I know she's gonna kick it, I might actually pay to see this.

My niece begged me to see this when we saw the trailer before "Glass". She is a major James McAvoy fan. I had to bite my lip to remind her that I already sat through Aquaman for her and one of my other nieces, and I have a "one crappy movie in the theater" rule per year. But because June is our birth month and it comes out right before both our birthdays, I will probably take her.

*grumbles*

Anyway, now that I know that person dies, I have a personal investment. I have never read those comics, but as far as how Charles is portrayed, he's even worse in the comics, is he not ? So maybe it's not that they are trashing him..maybe they are just showing how he becomes in that universe ? IDK. I like James McAvoy and Fassbender and Chastain(a tiny bit, honestly she's overrated) , so I'll likely bite the bullet and go, but probably on cheap Tuesday or something.

I'm pretty sick of the franchise, though. As someone else already said, Apocalypse was hot garbage. And hasn't James already said he's "sick of playing posh English dudes ?" If I didn't know Prof X lives to a ripe old age, I'd be good with Charles dying in this film so I don't have to bother with more of them. My darling niece not withstanding, although I know she'd be wailing like a banshee if that happened.

Edited March 1, 2019 by IWantCandy71

[Skyflower]

Trailer is not spectacular but still leaving you curious. 

[starri]

This one's better.  But I still don't think it's a "rush to the theater" movie for me.

[Wiendish Fitch]

Oh, my, I have another thing to gripe about (I can tell you're all thrilled)...

Why in the name of Stan Lee does Magneto not have his signature grey hair yet?!?!? If James McAvoy can shave his head to play Xavier, then Michael Fassbender can get his hair dyed and call it a day! 

[Dandesun]

"Her power is a song within her..."

Okay, anyone showing Biggest Drama Queen of All Time Erik that he ain't the end all and be all of draaaaamaaaaaa gets a nod from me.

Also, I will be spoiling the hell out of myself with this one because if Jean DOES kill Mystique, I will go to the theater and see that play out on the big screen.

Also also, there are an awful lot of people going 'yeah, kill her' with only Scott being all 'ummm... not cool, guys.' Hank's probably on the 'Let's help Jean' bandwagon until she (hopefully) kills Mystique and then he gets all growly and shit.

(Yeah, the Hank/Mystique romance doesn't really do it for me, either, but pretty much nothing involving Move!Mystique excites me at all.)

[Wiendish Fitch]

38 minutes ago, Dandesun said:

(Yeah, the Hank/Mystique romance doesn't really do it for me, either, but pretty much nothing involving Move!Mystique excites me at all.)

Heck, does it even count as a romance? Let's see:

First Class: Tepid flirting, an almost-kiss, an argument where Hank is a douche, Mystique leaves him without a second thought. 

Days of Future Past: Hank appears to still have the hots for Mystique, they exchange glances.

Apocalypse: Extremely vague hints that Hank still has the hots for Mystique (because there are apparently no other female mutants in the entire world) and that she... eh, might not toss him out of bed for eating crackers (thank goodness he hasn't aged a day!). Glances exchanged at the end. Heavens, one is fit to swoon at the searing passion.

I mean, I know Jennifer Lawrence and Nicholas Hoult used to date, so that did give the whole thing a cute subtext,  but they have long since broken up. Now they're just continuing a kinda-sorta subplot that didn't need to exist in the first place.

[Bruinsfan]

Maybe he's worried that if he gets together with someone who isn't also blue, babies that clash horribly with themselves will result?

Poor Hank, destined to have no fun in life until the Fox/Disney merger integrates the X-Men and Avengers franchises AND the latter introduces Wonder Man.

[SimoneS]

I would not characterize Hank and Mystique's relationship as a romance. Hank had a crush on on her, while she always seemed more into Eric to me. 

Edited April 18, 2019 by SimoneS

[GHScorpiosRule]

Saw the trailer/preview tonight. It looks STUPID. And just with the first X-Men movie, Scott looks like a boy in front of Sophie’s Jean. And what’s with the

face splitting like a cracked egg when she’s going all “Dark Phoenix??”

UGH.

[AD35]

On 4/17/2019 at 3:38 PM, Dandesun said:

Okay, anyone showing Biggest Drama Queen of All Time Erik that he ain't the end all and be all of draaaaamaaaaaa gets a nod from me.

I'll admit seeing Magneto getting his ass handed to him in a straight up fight has piqued my interest in seeing the movie, but I'm not  going in with my expectations sky high.  The Last Stand has left a bad taste in my mouth that's still there.  When Marvel Studios starts creating their own series of  X-Men films, the Dark Phoenix storyline is one I hope they steer clear from.

[Fukui San]

My only remaining desire from the X-Men franchise is one of the scenes where they all play softball for five minutes before whatever action starts. And Kitty Pride is the one with the unhittable fastball for some reason. Just bring over one of those everyday life scenes from the comics and I'll buy a ticket.

Also, there are the comics scenes where Nightcrawler tickles girls to death with his tail, but that probably won't fly in the #metoo age.

[Ubiquitous]

I was VERY disappointed with their treatment of the Phoenix story in X-Men 3, so I feel ambiguous about this one. I'd love to see the story done right, but I don't imagine doing it as  a stand alone is going to work.

[cambridgeguy]

The initial set of reviews seems underwhelming, which isn't exactly surprising.  The Dark Phoenix saga really is too much to cram into one film, especially when we haven't really gotten to know Jean, Scott, etc.  It would be like jumping into Infinity War and Endgame with just the Iron Man and Captain America movies coming before it.  In some ways this has always been the problem with the X-Men movie franchise - they focus almost exclusively on a small number of people (Wolverine, Xavier, Magneto, Jennifer Lawrence Mystique), which really hurts when a film hinges on one of the other characters.

On the plus side, no matter how this ends at least it won't spend all of its time focusing on how much Logan is suffering.  That automatically makes it better than the Last Stand.

[ApathyMonger]

I watched X-Men: The Last Stand for the first time this morning, then watched Dark Phoenix this evening. Dark Phoenix is definitely better than both Last Stand and Apocalypse, but is still disappointing.

The Good:

- I like the Magneto stuff. I don't for a second buy that the US government would give him land for an all-mutant colony, but it's a nice place to leave him.

- Some of the Phoenix stuff is well done, if rushed. Sophie Turner does as well as she can.

- I like the acknowledgement that Xavier acts like a dick a lot of the time.

- The effects are pretty good.

The Bad:

- Everything with Chastain and the alien plot is awful. They've no names, no personality, no nuance, and only exist because there needs to be big action scenes in the movie. I don't know why Chastain took this role, but she doesn't bring anything to it. I'm not sure who could, but it's painful every time she's on screen.

- Storm, Nightcrawler, and Quicksilver get nothing to do outside of action scenes, and even there Quicksilver is sidelined for the second half of the movie.

- There is no reason for the movie to be set in 1992, and if it weren't for the chyron at the start, there would be no way to tell. There's no 90s music, fashion, references, etc. It's just the 90s because they went 60s, 70s, 80s.

- No cool side characters. There's an entire school of mutants, and Magneto has a full-on colony, but aside from a Dazzler cameo, the only new power we see is a guy who can whip his hair. There's a character credited as Selene, but she doesn't do anything. Even almost all the characters introduced in Apocalypse are gone.

- The Cyclops/Jean Grey isn't developed nearly enough for it to matter as much as it needs to. Tye Sheridan isn't very good either.

- The action scenes feel very perfunctory. It's a $200M movie (the highest ever for a directorial debut), and looks it, but the action feels pointless. The smaller character moments are what work, but the movie thinks it needs big, city-destroying action, most of which falls flat.

Edited June 5, 2019 by ApathyMonger

[JessePinkman]

Oh boy.

Have you ever wanted a movie to be worse than it is? I so wanted this to be bad. With the reviews and the RT score and the bungling of this franchise I was hopeful for an actively bad movie. That I would have enjoyed.

But this...this was very...there. Competently acted and directed. Not well written but not in a “the dialogue was bad” sort of way because it wasn’t, it was just endless cliches (every single thing Jessica Chastain says in this movie could have been lifted from dozens of other movies) and a meandering, repetitious plot. 

I swear after the first 15 minutes the movie was the same scene repeated 3 times until the end. The whole enterprise felt purposeless. I’m not sure why they made this movie and they don’t seem sure as to why either.

The acting was uniformly good. Even Jennifer Lawrence showed up. It’s a real shame Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy will never be able to play these characters in a good movie because they are perfectly cast. 

The biggest praise I have for this movie is that for the first time in an X-film I felt that they really let the characters individual powers shine. The use of Nightcrawler’s BAMFing was excellent (and the fact that they paid attention to the fact that he needs to be able to see/visualize where he’s going is a detail I didn’t expect them to keep up with). Storm actually got to control the weather. Other than Cyclops’ beams leaving little fires (they’re concussive blasts, not lasers) I was delighted with how they used everyone’s abilities.

I won’t bother going over plot holes or Scott cursing or Kurt of all people snapping people’s necks (phew the Catholic guilt) because what’s the point? We’re done.

[Anduin]

So who is Jessica Chastain playing? IMDB lists her as Vuk. I'm guessing she's a new character, but what role does she fill? It looks from the trailers like she's encouraging Jean. Some mix of Jason Wyngarde and Emma Frost?

[JessePinkman]

25 minutes ago, Anduin said:

So who is Jessica Chastain playing? IMDB lists her as Vuk. I'm guessing she's a new character, but what role does she fill? It looks from the trailers like she's encouraging Jean. Some mix of Jason Wyngarde and Emma Frost?

Sort of? She’s an alien from...alien planet. She and her fellow aliens followed the Phoenix force to earth, she killed a woman and took her form. They want o use the force to destroy humanity so they can take over earth (I think?). Once Jean wants nothing to do with the Phoenix Vuk tries to take it for herself.

She’s got very little characterization, she’s basically there because they needed a villain eventually.

[Anduin]

1 hour ago, JessePinkman said:

Sort of? She’s an alien from...alien planet. She and her fellow aliens followed the Phoenix force to earth, she killed a woman and took her form. They want o use the force to destroy humanity so they can take over earth (I think?). Once Jean wants nothing to do with the Phoenix Vuk tries to take it for herself.

She’s got very little characterization, she’s basically there because they needed a villain eventually.

Interesting, thanks. Glad I missed it. After suffering through Apocalypse, I couldn't make myself go to another X-Men movie.

[ApathyMonger]

3 hours ago, Anduin said:

So who is Jessica Chastain playing? IMDB lists her as Vuk. I'm guessing she's a new character, but what role does she fill? It looks from the trailers like she's encouraging Jean. Some mix of Jason Wyngarde and Emma Frost?

She's an alien, one of the Broccoli people who get genocided in the comic. Their planet was destroyed by the Phoenix so they want the Phoenix to destroy all the humans so that they can take over our planet. It's a bad plan that doesn't make sense at all, and they're only there to be the bad guys.

[Anduin]

1 hour ago, ApathyMonger said:

She's an alien, one of the Broccoli people who get genocided in the comic. Their planet was destroyed by the Phoenix so they want the Phoenix to destroy all the humans so that they can take over our planet. It's a bad plan that doesn't make sense at all, and they're only there to be the bad guys.

Wow. That's some not great writing by Kinberg.

[SimoneS]

12 hours ago, JessePinkman said:

 It’s a real shame Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy will never be able to play these characters in a good movie because they are perfectly cast. 

So freaking true! Perfecting casting wasted on mediocre movies. I really hope that Marvel considers keeping both Fassbender and McAvoy in the roles when it reboots the X-Men franchise.

[WritinMan]

12 hours ago, JessePinkman said:

It’s a real shame Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy will never be able to play these characters in a good movie because they are perfectly cast. 

They did: X-Men: First Class and X-Men: Days of Future Past.

[JessePinkman]

28 minutes ago, WritinMan said:

They did: X-Men: First Class and X-Men: Days of Future Past.

Yeah, I said a good movie.

I am one of the few that categorically hates both of those films (DoFP less so).

[SimoneS]

2 hours ago, JessePinkman said:

Yeah, I said a good movie.

I am one of the few that categorically hates both of those films (DoFP less so).

Bwah! First Class wasn't great, but I will take it over DoFP any day of the week. Fassbender and McAvoy made me fall in love with their portrayal of younger Eric and Charles. The bond of love and friendship that the actors forged between their characters in First Class is the only reason that I can believe that Charles can forgive Eric for paralyzing him and killing tons of people and that Eric can forgive and tolerate Charles' naivete and self-righteousness that has gotten so many mutants killed.

Edited June 7, 2019 by SimoneS

[thuganomics85]

I didn't think it was as bad as I thought it would be, but it was just... well, there.  It really did just feel like lackluster and while it had both moments that were kind of cool and moments that were stupid or silly, nothing about it provoked any real response from me.  I just have no emotional involvement anymore, which is sad considering how much I enjoyed the first two films (and, of course, Logan), and the X-Men had always been some of my favorite comic book characters.

Even had I not seen the trailers or known any of the behind the scenes stuff that has gone on, I would have called Raven/Mystique's death in the first frame since Jennifer Lawrence actually seemed to be care again this go around.  Not saying it is her most energetic performance still, but she actually was putting some effort compared to her phoned in performances for Days of Future Past and Apocalypse.  There was a general sense that she was happy to be freed of this franchise, and was going to at least attempt to go out on a high note.  And she certainly got her wish, even though it is likely everyone is going to be getting rebooted soon.

Although, I'm guessing Evan Peters also didn't have much time for this either, since Quicksilver got taken out of commission pretty quickly.  Granted, he probably still had almost as many lines as Storm, who didn't get knocked out, but they continue not to do really anything significant with her.

Despite my love for Jessica Chastain (and Ato Essandoh as her henchman), the entire alien concept was just a bust for me.  It never felt like they brought anything to the table.  They probably could have created a better story if they simply stuck with the remaining X-Men trying to prevent Erik and Hank from killing Jean.  Or maybe have other X-Men side with Hank and create their own version of a Civil War.  Instead, we had these boring aliens coming off like the most generic villains of all time.

It seems like Sophie Turner is getting a whole bunch of mixed reactions; ranging from those who think she was a highlight to those who though she was horrible; but I thought she was fine for what she was given.  A few off moments, but nothing too noticeable.  I still wonder if some of it was her having to do an American accent.

James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender continue to be the best and I wish they had better films to work with.  Also, I guess it about eight years, Charles and Erik are going to drastically age to the point that they start looking like Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen?

What was the whole point of the Dazzler cameo?  I certainly hope this role wasn't the only reason Halston Sage left The Orville.

I did think the final act was a highlight, which is funny since that was apparently where all of the reshoots took place.

Han Zimmer's score might have been almost too good, but I appreciate it anyway!

All in all, not the worst that the X-Men franchise has to offer, but being better than The Last Stand or Apocalypse really isn't that much of a complement, and instead of being a good send-off for the franchise, it is probably going to be a film I forget about months from now.  And this seriously cost $200 million to make?  Man, where did all that money go?  Certainly not making sure that the writing was good or make the action sequences anything more than passably entertaining. 

Edited June 8, 2019 by thuganomics85

[ruby24]

Did Charles and Erik actually have scenes together in this movie? I feel like the movies they've been in haven't given them enough scenes together, considering their friendship is the best part of these movies. The last one they barely interacted.

[ShadowHunter]

Sophie Turner was alright. She is good in a supporting role maybe she should do a rom com. I just dont feel yet she is someone a whole movie should be built around. 

Do not care that Jlaw showed a drop more life to her.  She was still a drag to watch. Honestly I have not liked her last batch of movies anyway.

I did not like the line "The Woman are always saving the Man around here" lol. It did not feel earned it felt like an agenda. 

I assume Evan Peters had a busy schedule so he was just written out. At least he had a reason for being gone as the rest if the X-Men felt wasted to me.  

Hilarious how Michael Fassbender kept calling Evan/Quicksilver his son all through the press tour and not even a mention in the movie. I thought the last film set up that he might find out in this one.  Fassbender was alright but I feel Magneto does the same thing in every movie now. Not enough love for Charles and Erik together.

This was not the film they should have ended on. It was mostly boring and it felt like nothing happened. A bland end. Still Last Stand was worse but that is not really saying much. 

[cambridgeguy]

8 hours ago, ShadowHunter said:

I did not like the line "The Woman are always saving the Man around here" lol. It did not feel earned it felt like an agenda. 

Deadpool did a much better job of naming his "forward thinking, gender neutral" team. 

[JessePinkman]

It also didn’t track with anything we’ve seen in this series. Kurt and Quicksilver had just saved everyone (including Jean!) and beyond that the women in this series (except Mystique because JLaw is a star) have been so marginalized that what she said doesn’t hold water.

[starri]

Ooof.  This is an outright bomb.

[nilyank]

On 6/8/2019 at 10:03 AM, ShadowHunter said:

Hilarious how Michael Fassbender kept calling Evan/Quicksilver his son all through the press tour and not even a mention in the movie. I thought the last film set up that he might find out in this one.  Fassbender was alright but I feel Magneto does the same thing in every movie now. Not enough love for Charles and Erik together.

After two previous films where they hinted the relationship and eventually revealing the truth, they didn't even a share a scene together. Quicksilver was taken out with an injury. 

Edited June 9, 2019 by nilyank

[Starfish35]

5 hours ago, starri said:

Ooof.  This is an outright bomb.

Yikes.

‘Dark Phoenix’ Bound To Lose $100M+

[Morrigan2575]

6 hours ago, starri said:

Ooof.  This is an outright bomb.

Not surprised. I think Dark Phoenix has been done to death at this point. Plus the movie is getting bad reviews and AoA wasn't well received.

I think people are just done with FOX's X-Men. 

That being said, as much as I can't wait for the MCU to reboot the X-Men i think they'll have to wait a few years and then go for something totally different.

[BooBear]

2 minutes ago, Morrigan2575 said:

Not surprised. I think Dark Phoenix has been done to death at this point. Plus the movie is getting bad reviews and AoA wasn't well received.

I think the entire Dark Phoenix saga is the problem. It is outdated. Plus many other stories ape it - I even feel GOT's ending was a rif on it.  I think when it was written women weren't powerful so it was great seeing a powerful woman who of course, would then not be able to handle it.   Cause women are weak you know and don't know how to deal with true power. But plenty of women handle power today and we don't go mad... so it is grating to me to even see the story. And I know it is the Phoenix force, blah blah blah, but I think the original writers had to jump through hoops to make that up so it wouldn't be considered sexist but it still is same old same old.. women can't handle power. 

[starri]

45 minutes ago, BooBear said:

I think the entire Dark Phoenix saga is the problem. It is outdated.

I think the bigger problem is that it requires you to have an emotional investment in Jean.  

[Morrigan2575]

12 hours ago, BooBear said:

I think the entire Dark Phoenix saga is the problem. It is outdated. 

11 hours ago, starri said:

I think the bigger problem is that it requires you to have an emotional investment in Jean.  

I agree with Starri. The Dark Phoenix Saga needs you to invest in Jean in order to work.

The problem is FOX always short cuts the story. In order to do Jean Grey/Dark Phoenix right you really need like 3 or 4 movies. 

It's really the ultimate character story but, it won't work if you're too busy focusing on Wolverine, Mystique or Xavier/Magneto.

Edited June 10, 2019 by Morrigan2575

[Andrew Wiggin]

1 hour ago, BooBear said:

I think the entire Dark Phoenix saga is the problem. It is outdated. Plus many other stories ape it - I even feel GOT's ending was a rif on it.  I think when it was written women weren't powerful so it was great seeing a powerful woman who of course, would then not be able to handle it.   Cause women are weak you know and don't know how to deal with true power. But plenty of women handle power today and we don't go mad... so it is grating to me to even see the story. And I know it is the Phoenix force, blah blah blah, but I think the original writers had to jump through hoops to make that up so it wouldn't be considered sexist but it still is same old same old.. women can't handle power. 

It has nothing to do with Genderpolitics,its only a Story and they wanted to use Jean later again.

If she could had handled that Power she would be gone from the Comics ,you cant have a Character that Powerful if its Male or Female it brakes the Story.

I didnt see the movie but from the Spoilers i read they put to mutch in the Movie.

The entire Mindwipe Storyline didnt happen in the Orginalstory,they Phönix Saga is enough Story and not enough Time to tell it .

Edited June 9, 2019 by Andrew Wiggin

[ramble]

I was entertained by this but even as I watched it I knew it wasn’t great. The chemistry that McAvoy and Fassbender have is so much better than other duos that were showcased. Jean and Scott felt awkward and forced while Raven and Hank were just meh.

I was disappointed that Quicksilver didn’t get to reveal himself to Magneto. I did like seeing Eric’s mutant haven but my kiddo thought it looked like a cult encampment. Eric and Hank’s emotional moment over Raven’s death had more of an impact for me than her death itself. Jlaw often has such a flat affect to her that even her supposed emotional moments don’t resonate with me. 

As for Sophie T. as Jean I thought she was mildly okay. I don’t watch GOT and have no real opinion on her acting ability. However, this movie, which rested so heavily on her shoulders, seemed to fit uneasily. I sometimes felt like she was stating sentences rather than saying things in character, if that makes sense. In my opinion she seemed more on it as an actor with Jessica Chastain than her fellow mutants. 

Overall it wasn’t a bad way to spend a couple of hours on a hot summer afternoon, but it isn’t something I’ll actively seek out again. 

[Morrigan2575]

15 minutes ago, ramble said:

As for Sophie T. as Jean I thought she was mildly okay. I don’t watch GOT and have no real opinion on her acting ability. However, this movie, which rested so heavily on her shoulders, seemed to fit uneasily. I sometimes felt like she was stating sentences rather than saying things in character, if that makes sense. In my opinion she seemed more on it as an actor with Jessica Chastain than her fellow mutants. 

She's not a great actor, from GoT I'd argue that the younger cast, Kit Harington, Emilia Clarke, Sophie Turner and Maisie and the actor that plays Bran, are very weak actors.  However, i do find that with weak actors if you give them a strong actor to perform against they improve greatly.  That's probably what happened with Sophie/Jessica, you also see it on GoT with Kit/Peter Dinklage.

With regards to some of the plot choices, i'm reminded of a trailer review that Jeremy Jahns did where he said X-Men The Last Stand was the worst version of Dark Phoenix and, this movie decided to copy it.  I think that's a big failure.  I don't know if the writers were trying to tie this movie/story to the pre-First Class/DoFP timeline or just lazy.  However, Magento's Mutant Camp was in The Last Stand as was Jean's childhood trauma, neither of which are from the source material.  

The weird thing is they could have adapted, close to the story.  Have Jean get the powers on the space mission.  Have her lose control but, be good and still try to do right only to have weird Alien girl Jessica Chastain use telepathy to mess with Jean's mind and have her go Dark Phoenix.  Then end it with Jean making the choice to die rather than lose control and hurt people she loves.

As for the Jean Grey School, that's what it's currently called in the comics (unless they reset it since i stopped reading).  Jean and Xavier are both Dead, Logan's the headmaster and of course he'd rename the school after Jean 🙄

[JessePinkman]

‘Dark Phoenix’ Bound To Lose $100M+ After Worst Domestic Opening In ‘X-Men’ Series: Here’s Why

Quote

Now, Dark Phoenix was originally planned to be two movies, we hear, and during late pre-production, the studio changed gears and said it was to be one movie. Kinberg, we hear, was flexible and rewrote. Days of Future Past erased the timeline of The Last Stand, so a rebooted story about Jean Grey was possible here. Our sources tell us that testing Dark Phoenix was a continual headache, and the feature adaptation of Chris Claremont, John Byrne, and David Cockrum’s fan-beloved Dark Phoenix Saga comic was hard to get right.

We heard that in one cut, Jean Grey dies, which wasn’t received well. But overall, the major ending change-up, executed in reshoots, entailed going from an intimate ending with Jean Grey (Sophie Turner), Tye Sheridan (Cyclops), and Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) against Jessica Chastain’s Vuk. The feeling from the audience in testing was that they wanted to see all the X-Men heroes fighting in the end. There have been reports out there that the ending was changed-up because it was too similar to Captain Marvel. This isn’t true: No one on the Fox/Dark Phoenix production side had any intel of what Captain Marvel would be like before it was released. It was the all-team reshoot that pushed Dark Phoenix from its original Nov. 2 release date (which went to ultimate 4-time Oscar winner and Fox blockbuster finale pre-merger Bohemian Rhapsody) to Feb. 14. We understand Kinberg got to make the film he wanted to make, and was flexible about reshoots with the studio. But we also hear Fox production brass didn’t ride herd early enough, and by the time they did, production was too far down the road.

I understand in meetings, some marketing execs didn’t even realize the release date changes on Dark Phoenix, and weren’t cognizant of the fact that the film was opening up against another franchise this weekend (i.e. Secret Life of Pets 2). Says one source, “They never brought it up in meetings that we were on the same date.” Another bashed the marketing materials: “Sophie Turner is a beautiful actress, and they never showed that in any of the marketing materials. Instead, they made her look like a zombie.”

Once the merger happened, there was little for Disney to do. Materials were already up at CinemaCon at the beginning of April days after the merger. We hear Disney tried to push Dark Phoenix through its vertical integration, i.e. Disney Channel, but they didn’t have enough time and were inheriting a film that already had bad buzz with its reshoots and release date changes.

So you do all you can to distance yourselves from the source material (this story can't be told in. One. Movie. And the intimacy of Jean's death in the comic book is part of what makes it so memorable!), listen to focus groups who have no idea about the source material and wonder why your movie is a stinker? 

Man, can you imagine if the 19 year old X-Men franchise's last outing ended up premiering on the Disney Channel?

[cambridgeguy]

They actually posted the X-Women clip

My god, that's worse than I thought.  It had absolutely nothing to do with the conversation - Xavier being an egotistical glory hound who carelessly risks other people's lives has nothing to do with having a sexist team name!

[Dandesun]

6 hours ago, Morrigan2575 said:

As for the Jean Grey School, that's what it's currently called in the comics (unless they reset it since i stopped reading).  Jean and Xavier are both Dead, Logan's the headmaster and of course he'd rename the school after Jean 🙄

Wellll.... Jean's not dead anymore. Logan did die for awhile but he's back, too. So is Scott... who was also dead. Xavier is not back. Yet. (I mean, it's comics... it's just a matter of time.) While I do believe it's still called the Jean Grey School it was moved to sit in the middle of Central Park (after a brief stint in Limbo thanks to Illyana... who is also not dead but that's been the case for awhile.) Kitty was running things during the Jean Grey School when it was in Westchester, Limbo and then Central Park.

Of course, currently... there are precious few X-Men because X-Man (Nate Grey from the AoA alternate universe) created a Utopia world (I also think Legion had a lot to do with this, too) where everyone is a mutant but you're not allowed to have any personal relationships whether familial or romantic or sexual so there's no one AT the school (if it's even still there) and that's why Scott and Logan have teamed up to do whatever the hell it is they're doing. Scott's got this idea that there are precious few of them left so they're going to do what the X-Men do which is get rid of threats but what has been happening lately is people keep getting killed off for no reasonable reason any reader can fathom.

So... pretty typical X-Men, really.

[GHScorpiosRule]

On 6/9/2019 at 11:57 AM, starri said:

Ooof.  This is an outright bomb.

21 hours ago, Starfish35 said:

Yikes.

‘Dark Phoenix’ Bound To Lose $100M+

I know this is mean, but...

Because I knew this would stink. And the only reason I loved Days of Future Past was because it UNDID Last Stand.

And even if I learned after, that the animated 90s X-Men's take on Dark Phoenix was horrible, it had heart and stakes and I loved it. So, yeah. money saved from watching this drek.

Edited June 10, 2019 by GHScorpiosRule

[Dandesun]

3 hours ago, JessePinkman said:

So you do all you can to distance yourselves from the source material (this story can't be told in. One. Movie. And the intimacy of Jean's death in the comic book is part of what makes it so memorable!), listen to focus groups who have no idea about the source material and wonder why your movie is a stinker? 

Man, can you imagine if the 19 year old X-Men franchise's last outing ended up premiering on the Disney Channel?

Can you really call it distancing yourself when you have the same guy who wrote Last Stand directing Dark Phoenix? I mean, they started off wrong on so many counts. It does sound like they improved minutely on the fact that Jean/Phoenix doesn't exist for Logan to lust after/love but they still didn't do much to make her a character, did they?

3 minutes ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

Because I knew this would stink. And the only reason I loved Days of Future Past was because it UNDID Last Stand.

And even if I learned after, that the animated 90s X-Men's take on Dark Phoenix was horrible, it had heart and stakes and I loved it. So, yeah. money saved from watching this drek.

DoFP erasing Last Stand was so utterly delightful for me... that's probably why finding out the writer was the director for DP was such an incredible downer.

Here's the thing... if you're not going to spend any real time letting the audience know Jean in any real way then what's the point of doing this story? They spent all of their time with Charles, Erik and fucking Raven. They should have ended with them and not do yet another cock up of an iconic storyline that took FOUR YEARS to write!! The other characters were pretty much incidental so to suddenly put it all on Jean when we really don't know her all that well is just stupid.

Not that the first attempt was all that much better. Jean wasn't really much of a character in the first X-trilogy they did, either. She was little more than the Object of Logan's Desire and... whatever. (I've always hated that non-pairing anyway.) And I really wish these various writers would stop looking at a force of life, death, rebirth is the Ultimate Evil because it's really, really not.

Anyway, like I said... if this was the way for the Fox X-Men series to go out then they should have focused on the characters they've actually spent time on. They already let Logan go out well... they focused the X-movies on Charles and Erik as well. Finish that off. Hell, they could have done it so the big finale was Charles wiping Erik's mind a la Fatal Attractions (which would have had extra oomph given the clear chemistry that Fassbender and McAvoy have had) -- instead of Magneto ripping out the adamantium in Wolverine's skeleton, have him do something to Mystique since they've been clashing over her since the First Class reboot and Charles Just. Being. Done. (Obviously, Erik would have been battling the rest of the team as well...)

The point is, Fatal Attractions and Charles wiping Magneto's mind is a major point in X-history and they've already done the legwork in establishing the tragic/combative/co-dependent relationship between them. Follow through with that, tie it with a bow and when Disney, Marvel Studio takes over they can focus on other fucking characters for a change.

[JessePinkman]

11 minutes ago, Dandesun said:

Can you really call it distancing yourself when you have the same guy who wrote Last Stand directing Dark Phoenix? 

I was talking about them distancing themselves from Claremont's Phoenix saga.

I decided after X3 that they don't care at all about telling this story. They care about the concept of the Phoenix because it is iconic and so many other comic book stories have aped it. It's exactly as popular as they imagine except they don't care about it. They just want to slap the Phoenix name or imagery into the movie and say "Here's a thing! Look at it!".

Edited June 10, 2019 by JessePinkman

[Matt K]

Honestly, they should have just adapted Onslaught instead.  If your core cast is Prof X, Magneto and Mystique (who now happens to be Charles's adopted sister) having Charles go bad would work more to their strengths with characters we've seen in three movies so far (not me though, I skipped Apocalypse).  It seems though Fox was pushing for Dark Phoenix since after First Class came out.  I guess it's the only story execs seem to know.

[tennisgurl]

Oh God, that X-Women line was BAD. It was so painfully awkward and nonsensical it actually made me cringe. Anyone who said that the girl power shot in Endgame was cheesy needs to take a gander at this.

[Morrigan2575]

3 hours ago, Dandesun said:

Anyway, like I said... if this was the way for the Fox X-Men series to go out then they should have focused on the characters they've actually spent time on. They already let Logan go out well... they focused the X-movies on Charles and Erik as well

They could have done a cool version of Onslaught. Start the final movie with Charles shutting down Magneto's brain to protect people.

Have the movie introduce this new mystery villain while having Charles acting odd (talking to himself, seeing Erik, etc). Finally have the reveal that mystery villain (Onslaught) was an alternate personality of Charles/Erik and then have Charles/Erik somehow team up to stop this new villain created from Charles' mutant powers.

I don't know why but, they're always obsessed with Dark Phoenix when their are other crossover events that are really really good (X-Cutioners Song is a personal favorite)

Edited June 10, 2019 by Morrigan2575

[Dandesun]

30 minutes ago, Morrigan2575 said:

They could have done a cool version of Onslaught. Start the final movie with Charles shutting down Magneto's brain to protect people.

Have the movie introduce this new mystery villain while having Charles acting odd (talking to himself, seeing Erik, etc). Finally have the reveal that mystery villain (Onslaught) was an alternate personality of Charles/Erik and then have Charles/Erik somehow team up to stop this new villain created from Charles' mutant powers.

I don't know why but, they're always obsessed with Dark Phoenix when their are other crossover events that are really really good (X-Cutioners Song is a personal favorite)

X-Cutioner's Song would require a mini-series just to explain who Cable and Stryfe are, how they came to be, and how they both ended up old and in the future in the first place.

I still say that only people who read super hero comics or watch soap operas (or both) would ever be able to follow the entirety of the Summers-Grey clan. Say what you will about the Guthries or the Rasputins or even the Darkholme-Creeds, the Summers-Grey clan is out. there.

Plus,  you know, Mr. Sinister... and truly, I want so badly for someone to embrace the full on glam-goth aesthetic that Sinister has got going on and run with that shit. He's this combination of Dr. Frankenstein, Dr. Frankenfurter, Moriarty, David Bowie and the entirety of Velvet Goldmine.

Also, anyone attempting to do Stryfe's armor in the real world has my respect.