Review of X-Men: First Class

After the X-Men trilogy, the clock was wired back in Origins: Wolverine. Origins: Wolverine showed the origin story of the mutant Wolverine and it was only a mild success. However Marvel must have been happy about the movie because they decided to give the same treatment to the X-Men.

After a slow start, the movie truly begin when a CIA agent named Moira MacTaggert (Rose Byrne) discover a dangerous group of mutants called the Hellfire Club who are attempting to cause war between the US and the USSR. Unable to convince her superiors in the existence of mutants, she looks for help in the form of Charles Xavier, a Professor of Genetics at Oxford University. Unknown to MacTaggert, both Charles and his “sister” Raven/ Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) are mutants.

Charles help the CIA attack the Hellfire Club but the attack failed. Members of the Club, Sebastian Shaw (Kevin Bacon), Emma Frost (January Jones), Azazel (Jason Flemyng) and Riptide (Alex Gonzalez), are all mutants and they proved too powerful for the CIA. However the CIA did meet with Eric Lensherr, a Nazi-hunter who is chasing down Shaw for reason of his own. After this first meeting between Charles and Eric, they begin to gather a group band of mutants, including Havok (Lucas Till), Banshee (Caleb Landry Jones), Dr Hank McCoy (Nicholas Hoult), and Angel Salvadore (Zoë Kravitz) to go up against the Hellfire Club.

That is the basic story of the movie. Mutants are the next stage of human evolution and after years of believing themselves to be alone, they are starting to discover that there are other mutants out there. Humanity also begins to realize that there is a new species of human around and the movie traced their understandable reaction to the presence of their “successors”.

As you can probably tell from the summary, X-Men: First Class is a prequel to the first X-Men movie; this is a movie about the origin of the X-Men.

Set in 1962, the movie is about the first fateful meeting between Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) and Eric Lensherr (Michael Fassbender) and the group they setup that will eventually become the X-Men. How they met, how they became allies and friends, and what caused the spilt between them in the end; these are the events that keep the story going.

Personally, I found the movie to be pretty good. Perhaps not the best X-Men movie around, it is still much better than X-Men: Last Stand and Origins: Wolverine. There’s a lot going on but viewers are not overwhelmed as director Matthew Vaughn kept a tight grip on the story, rolling out the action sequence one after another while keeping everything fairly straightforward. The actors also did a good job with McAvoy especially good at being a playful Charles Xavier. A fairly faithful showing of the 1960s also helped me get into the movie.

However, X-Men: First Class has a few problems. The main negative is one they can’t help with. X-Men: First Class is a prequel so everyone knows what is going to happen. Much like the Star Wars prequel trilogy where everyone knows the Jedi will fall, the Sith will win and Darth Vader will be “born”, everyone knows that Charles and Eric will end up on opposite sides, the humans will try to kill the mutants, and Mystique will join Eric’s side of the mutant war. The surprise factor just isn’t there and that brings down the tension of the movie.

I also wonder if something was left on the editing floor because I found the end of the movie to be slightly abrupt. The way Eric “turned” against the humans was strange. One moment he was killing Shaw (oh please, that can’t be a surprise), the next he was fighting against humanity in the name of mutant society. Uh?

Still I found X-Men: First Class to be an excellent movie. It has good action scenes and it treads that fine line between paying attention to the past movies without paying homage to them. With this movie, the X-Men franchise is back on track.

Review of Kungfu Panda 2

With the money the original made, it will surprise no one that Dreamworks decided to make a sequel to Kungfu Panda. Kung Fu Panda 2 is the long awaited sequel and after watching it, I have to say it’s a pretty good movie.

The plot of the movie is simple and straightforward. Picking up directing from where Kungfu Panda left off, Kungfu Panda 2 has Po (Jack Black) protecting the Valley of Peace as the “Dragon Warrior”. However he is still a bumbling fool that drives his master, Master Shifu (Dustin Hoffman), up the wall. Master Shifu tells Po that although he is the “Dragon Warrior”, he still has a long way to go as he has not achieved inner peace. Po of course has no idea what Master Shifu is talking about.

Soon after, Master Shifu received a letter stating that Lord Shen (Gary Oldman) has taken over Gongmen City after defeating Master Thundering Rhino (Victor Garber), leader of the kung fu council protecting Gongmen City, with a new weapon; a cannon. Master Shifu send Po along the Furious Five to stop Lord Shen from using the weapon against all of China.

After reaching Gongmen City and being captured by Lord Shen’s followers, Po discovered his origins including the fact that Lord Shen was the one who killed his birth parents. Defeated by Lord Shen, Po was then rescued by a soothsayer (Michelle Yeoh) who brought Po back to the ruined village where he was born. Remembering his past, Po embraced himself, achieving the inner peace Master Shifu told him about.

Returning to Gongmen City, Po saves the Furious Five and together, they stop Lord Shen from unleashing his cannons on China.

First off, let’s get this out of the way. Kungfu Panda 2 is not as good as the original. The original has a fresh originality to it that the sequel has no way to replicate. However the movie did manage to keep the charm of the first movie.

Director Jennifer Yuh Nelson made a smart decision keeping Po as a bumbling fool instead of being a full fledged kungfu master. Couple that with some fun action sequence, look out for the first fight in Gongmen City, Kungfu Panda 2 retained most of the humor of the first movie.

I also like the fact the movie did not rest on its laurels. The kungfu world was expanded in the movie and Po’s friendship with the Five and his relationship with his foster father, Mr. Ping (James Hong), were also expanded on.

It might not be as good as the original, but with its blend of action, comedy, and visual effect, Kung Fu Panda 2 is a sequel that will please audiences. Bring on the next sequel!