Eww, Mutants

"X-Men: First Class"

For over a decade, fans of the Star Wars franchise waited patiently for its prequels to hit the big screen.  Film geeks were curious to see how Anakin Skywalker, father of Luke Skywalker, turned to the dark side and eventually became one of Hollywood's greatest villains of all time, Darth Vader.  To much disappointment all three prequels, particularly the first two, left us with more questions than answers.  And the answers we did receive felt forced and tacked on.  Anakin's/Vader's origin story was, to say the least, a major cinematic letdown.  

You might be wondering where I'm going with this?  The purpose of a prequel is to tell the back story of something that was already experienced in the future.  In Matthew Vaughn's X-Men: First Class the film was supposed to show us how Charles Xavier (aka Prof. X) (James McAvoy) formed the first class of X-Men.  For those unfamiliar with Marvel's uncanny X-Men, this elite group of superheroes consists of people who are mutants.  These mutants can have internal or external powers.  Charles can read people's minds, his friend and Holocaust survivor Erik Lehsherr (aka Magneto) (Michael Fassbender) can move and manipulate metal at will, and Raven (aka Mystique) (Jennifer Lawrence) can assume the form of any person she wishes, male or female.  And then there is a whole host of other mutants that I'm not mentioning that also have extraordinary abilities.  

Together Charles and his merry band of mutants  must come together to learn how to harness and control their powers and ultimately stop the energy absorbing Sebastian Shaw (Kevin Bacon) from starting world war three.  The story takes place right on the eve of the Cuban Missile Crisis, so you can imagine how screwed humanity is going to be if the X-Men don't get their act together.  One reoccurring conflict that comes up in this film and the other X-Men flicks is humanities utter disgust and loathsome resentment they have toward any and all mutants.  Charles wants humans and mutants to coexist peacefully.  Considering what Erik has had to endure during his lifetime, he feels quite differently about humans and their specific hatred towards one race of being.

X-Men: First Class could have been one of the few decent summer blockbusters that Hollywood churned out in the ever deepening sea of prequels and sequels.  Instead the film misses it mark on a number of levels.  It's a not good film and certainly isn't a good prequel.  Much like Star Wars Episode Three: Revenge of the Sith, X-Men: First Class tries to cover too much ground in too little time.  The plot is thinly written making the film more of a character driven piece.  This is fine, except that the characters aren’t written that well either.  Much of their actions and motives for dealing with situations seem uninspired and lacking any sort of emotional drive.  Why should we care about them when we know what happens to them?  

It feels as though Vaughn and the other screenwriters are merely paying fan service to the comic book geeks.  The problem is the way they bring up the information that we already know from the film's successors.  How did Charles end up in a wheelchair?  What were Erik and Charles like before they were enemies?  Where did the names Professor X, Magneto, and Mystique come from?  The answers to all these questions feel contrived to the plot.  There also should have been a more gradual build up to the eventual break up between Charles and Erik, something for us to look forward to in a sequel.

X-Men: First Class is entertaining but only to a point.  It is clear that this film does connect the dots but does a sloppy job of it.  Despite some decent performances from Bacon, Fassbender, and McAvoy, they ultimately cannot save the film's synthetic script.  It has been announced Fox does plan to make a sequel.  I would hope that the screenwriters for that film do a better job of handling the material.  Bryan Singer's X-Men and X-Men 2: X-Men United stand tall to this predecessor.  Skip this film, for the answers it does give you are not worth knowing.