Review: X-Men: Dark Phoenix (2019)

So, let’s talk about X-Men.

I must admit I’ve had more affinity for Stan Lee’s group of misfit Mutants for longer than the main Marvel universe—going back to the animated series of the nineties and its unbelievably awesome theme song. This also partially comes down to the film that at the least did a big chunk of the work in getting the ball rolling on the current superhero craze—2000’s X-Men. Having rewatched it recently, it hasn’t aged completely smoothly—the action is oddly low-key and some parts are cheesy, but it’s still watchable and has some very memorable moments, especially the opening.

To talk about the rest of the following series from 20^th Century Fox, well, it’s had its ups and downs. X-Men 2 was a definite improvement on the first, with another incredible intro scene; it was followed up by the Last Stand, which was…considerably cheesier, but just a little bit of fun because of that. Afterwards, the series focused on Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine for a bit, with the awful X-Men Origins and the serviceable if forgettable, well, ‘Wolverine’. Elsewhere, the main series got a surprisingly solid reboot with the very enjoyable First Class, which used its period setting to give it a nice flair of style. Days of Future Past, while a notch down, was still decent, and tied together the first part of the series with the current in a rather finalistic way.

Things stumbled slightly with Apocalypse—which had its moments, and to be honest, I didn’t even mind Oscar Isaac’s take on the character, but the climax went on for too long and the plot was feeling thinner. However, Jackman bounced back to give us one of the best comic book movies in recent years: Logan. It gave me what neither Marvel and DC simply can’t give right now—an ending that actually felt like an ending, some gloriously enjoyable bloody action, and some very intense performances from Jackman and the always awesome Patrick Stewart. Many like me cried manly tears at the end, which felt like a satisfying but solid capstone to the X-series.

But it didn’t end there. Fox wanted to start a third trilogy, but Disney entered into a massive deal to acquire dozens of IPs from them, which finalized fairly recently. The film they were making, Dark Phoenix—the second adaptation of the comic story of the same name since Last Stand—went through considerable reshoots, and was finally coughed up into cinemas as the effective end of a near twenty year era. So, with all the context given, how does it turn out?

Erm…not great. It’s not bad in the sense of being unwatchable—there’s some surprisingly decent visuals, some cool superpower showoffs here and there, and even the score is not half bad by superhero movie standards. Some of the actors try their best under the circumstances. But dear god, is the story incredibly haphazard.

The film starts off in the early 90s (unlike the last three films, there’s very little touched on the time period besides the aesthetic—even Captain Marvel did more), where the X-Men seem to be operating as actual superheroes for once. Jetting off into space to save a shuttle, they find things going wrong as Jean Grey—here played by Sophie Turner—ends up absorbing a swirl of energy that looks like a psychedelic puffball. This ends ups driving her to murderous tendencies and…well, let’s just say that if you’re expecting the supernova-inducing mania of her counterpart from the comic story, or even the Alcatraz annihilation in Last Stand, you might be disappointed.

James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender return as Professor Xavier and Magneto—both of them still do the best with what they have, even if their characters look very good for men that should by all rights be pushing sixty at this point in the story. The rest of the cast also try to give some real emotion, but it’s stunted by the slightly slapdash editing that cuts away from dialogue at the wrong sort of beat. The dialogue ranges from typical for this sort of film, to surprisingly decent, to laughably awkward.

Jessica Chastain plays the closest thing to a real baddie, Vuk, part of a group of shape-shifting aliens. It’s an angle very different to most of the films, and you can feel that Fox was hoping to start this new segment of the series with more of the far-out cosmic elements of the comics. Don’t expect the ones in this film to be all that compelling.

The action is…not terrible, but slightly underwhelming, and limited in scope next to the mayhem of prior films. There’s some cool superpower usage here and there, but you’ll probably leave the film with the feeling of ‘that’s it’? Once again, the reshoots and meddling seem to be to blame here, and while the film does seem to try under the circumstances, it just doesn’t come together.

As far as serving as a finale to the X-Men films as we know them, it doesn’t work that great, save for a slightly tacked-on coda before the end credits. And so, that’s how it ends—it don’t think it was as bad as some are making it out to be, but you’re not missing much by skipping out on this. I wouldn’t say it’s the worst of the X-films—that honor still goes to Origins for me—but it can be argued as the most mediocre. It adapts its comic storyline a tiny smidge better than Last Stand, but lacks the spectacle and entertaining stupidity of that film.

At the end of the day, I say pick Days of Future Past or Logan as the real finale to this series. Alongside Blade and 2002’s Spider-Man, X-Men helped the superhero genre recover from nineties disasters like Batman and Robin, and since it has given us hilarity in Deadpool and awesomeness in First Class, but our mutant chums have also made some major stumbles, including this one. Maybe that’s not what they should ultimately be remembered for, and even as they’re assimilated into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I’ll certainly prefer to remember the good bits. Time will tell what Disney does with them, but this is one film I’m definitely not counting among their past highlights.