Dark Phoenix

Turner’s damaged conviction holds Dark Phoenix together, giving it a treacherous life force.

While not entirely successful, the film’s sense of finality gives the main players space to grow, unhampered by the usual carousel of upcoming sequels and spin-offs.

Which points us to the real issue with this film and so many like it. These super heroic and super histrionic spectacles are multiplying so rapidly that they are recycling their own tropes at such a rate that it is almost impossible to be surprised anymore.

Rather than being thought-provoking or streamlined, instead Dark Phoenix is a frustratingly anticlimactic, familiar tale of misunderstood mutants.

For all the energetic hurling around of heavy machinery, the movie feels inert and lazy.

The film is an all-too-fitting whimper of a conclusion to a franchise that never remotely fulfilled its potential.

Superheroes do progressive politics these days as a matter of course, and here it just feels like shtick – a box to be dutifully checked, rather than a theme to be meaningfully explored.

i feel very bad that this movie wasn’t great, really. i love jean and the x-men! they are my favorite marvel team! i will give a 10 just the score is too low

Well I thought we would have learned from the last chapter but I guess not... About as fun as the Fantastic Four reboot. Take your chances.

I appreciate how the powers-that-be let Kinberg take a stab at his own X-Men movie after years of being a behind-the-scenes creative. That said, this one is hit-or-miss. These actors are reliably good again, but the story does not resemble the Phoenix Saga from the comics in the slightest. What it does tell is fine enough, and Sophie Turner capably channels the rage of Jean Grey when necessary. The villains are quite pitiful, though. Shame on this movie for casting Jessica Chastain in such a poor role. That said, Fassbender is expectedly awesome, the final fight scene on the train is great fun, and they give Nightcrawler an incredible moment of violence. What tipped the scales to me not liking the movie despite its positives? The vibes are off. Kinberg is a talented writer and producer, but as a director he doesn't set the mood well enough. Scenes that were supposed to be tense and ominous were just... there. Something was missing.

Terrible, absolutely terrible, worst X Men film I have ever seen (I haven't seen New Mutants though). It is visually appalling and has one of the most boring and uninspired storylines I have seen in my life. It has a terrible villain, accompanied by a lifeless performance from the actress, and it completely abandoned plotlines from Apocalypse and sidelined multiple great characters (Quicksilver) in favour of...well, nothing. There was one cool scene on a prison train where the X-Men were showing of their powers, giving all of them time to shine, but only for about ten minutes.

No, just no! Why? Why is it yet again about the past, when Logan worked so well? Why does it disregard almost the entire timeline? Why is it so soulless? These are all questions that baffle me. We have seen this story in a much better way in Last Stand, here it is just a mess. The characters' thinking is contradictory, and the action scenes are weak. The whole film feels very pointless, and was a big reason why the standalone X-men films ceased existing.