Warning. Today's episode contains spoilers for every single Mutant movie, every single movie, every single Wolverine movie, all of them to be warned. Hello, my name is Jason Gazepcio and I am Rosie Knight, and welcome back to x ray Vision's week long coverage of all links Deadpool and Wolverine. We're dropping episodes every single day leading up to the release of that fine feature film, covering everything from both characters comments origins to the history of their film adaptations.
In today's episode, well, well, well, if you haven't been waiting for this since our very first episode, because this is mine and jason shed hyperfixation. It is the X Man and we are recapping every single Fox x Man movie and covering what you need to remember going into that pool of Wolvere and most importantly, working out if any of it makes sense.
Oh, that's gonna be the big question.
Of the night.
And who's who We're gonna be ranking our top five X Men movies after we recap every single one.
But first the X Men movies. Okay, I have just gotten done watching every single X Men movie in fictional chronological order, and that's how we will cover these and recap these films, try and figure out what's canon, what's not, what is the canon, how does it work? And I can't wait to get started, Rosie. Are you ready?
Oh baby, I'm ready.
This is it's all been laid into this my whole life.
First up, twenty eleven's X Men First Class. I think one of the best. It's got its problem, does it, But I think one of the spot But I think one of the best mutant movies that we have. In the early nineteen sixties, Charles Xavier a groovy. He actually says, oh, gvy baby, he's grooving.
This is as.
Yes, a Austin Powers esque version of Charles Xavier. He is, of course a rich kid. He joins forces with Nazi hunter Eric Lencher and CIA agent.
Wow, that's happened.
To recruit the very first version of the X Men. They do ask Logan to join.
He declined what he was up to He was busy.
He was like getting ready to go to Vietnam at this period.
That later more on that like.
Opposing them is apparently x Nazi Sebastian Shaw of the hell Fire.
Think why would you do?
Woh and his and his brotherhood of evil mutants so though he does not call them. Shaw wants to start World War three so that all the humans will die and that radiation poisoning will jump start mutant hegemony. The X Men of course stop them during the Cuban Missile crisis, of course, and Magneto takes revenge on Shaw who killed his family. Yeah, but Charles and Eric's partnership is fatally
torn apart and Charles is left sadly paralyzed. Also, we get the reveal that Magneto's helmet was originally Sebastian Shaw's and he just took it. Your thoughts about X Men first class?
Okay, best of all, justice for Darwin. We all know that's the worst part movie. Also, things that are fantastic about this movie James McAvoy and Michael He's great Goose two together they got the chemistry that set off a whole new era of Charles Magneto shipping. I love that Charles is very dumb in this movie.
He does not train the X Men. Also, he just gay.
They just send them in like.
It's a Cuban missile, just like go in r Ipter. Darwin, as I said, should never have died. Havoc loved to see him, read to see him. I'd love to see him here. He will reappear in these movies as they go on with a funny pillow up his shirt to show that he's gotten older things. I still annoy me about this movie, Mystique, Why why is she like going to Charles's house Like she's like an Oliver Twist orphan.
Yeah, like a little sheep shooting Oliver Twist.
I did some foods a cheese and he's just like he's just like, yes, you may live with me.
Now you are you could see yes.
You can take you are my m rich Yes, funny to see Azazel here because it's like is he meant?
We didn't know at the time when we were like okay, so is he not?
Cooler's dad also, like Mystique say, like, what's going on there?
Obviously have to say yeah.
Of course they'll have to have to mention Azazel. In the comics, I think he came out like the two thousands, sometimes like two thousand and tens. He had his origin and then was in Cannon Nightcrawler's Dad until like this year changed very recently, but when it came out, we were like.
Also so other things that I thought good about this movie. That always make me go like, oh my god, I can't believe they did that. The origin of Charles's paralysis where it's like during the Cube stopping the Cuba missile crisis, Magneto accidentally set a bullet to Charles's back and then he and they're holding each.
Other and he's like, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry. I was fantastic.
Like to me, I will say that this is actually like I do think at the time, I was like so blown away by it.
But this has been.
Trumped in my favorite when I look back of the best ones actually by the one that we'll talk about next.
But it is still up there, very it is. It is still it's very, very good.
But the times I think something we have to say is at the time this was like revolutionary post x three, we didn't know what's happening.
My expectations were nil below the ground. Yeah, we're nothing. I did not think First Class would be good, and I loved it.
And at the time there was kind of this talk of Mark Miller was gonna the comics creator, was gonna come and take over the Fox movies. Matthew Vaughnis, his friend Matthew Vaughan wrote and directed this with the help of some other people. So this was definitely like felt like it could be a restart for the franchise. And also there's just some funny stuff here where you can really tell they're trying to take from the MCU, like the Origin of Cerebro where it's like.
It's so grounded and real. No it's not, it's not. Come on.
Also, I gotta say I'm annoyed that Magneto stole his helmet from Sebastian show. I don't love that so silly. I think that's really really fucking silly. And it would have been much cooler if Magneto, even though he was ostensibly allies and kind of friends with Charles.
No, it makes sense that he would have made something to protect him, made it.
On his own, just to be like, say the funk out of it.
Also, Superducer Joe rightfully was like Darwin, some people might not know why you're mad about that.
Okay, dollar, Okay, so let's yeah, please explain. So Darwin can't die.
Power literally his whole power.
He evolved old Darwin because he evolves, right, So if you confront him with heat, he will immediately instantly evolve a resistance to that up to any level, right, because who knows what the kind of evolution, what kind of course it would take in his mutation. And so if you as you saw in the movie, if you put his head underwater, he will he will grow.
Gills, like you can't kill he is unkillable, and then he shouldn't be costing someone like Eddie get Daggy is such a great actor, and you're like, this is so cool.
This is someone who's been in you know, The Brising Full of sim Wahulk, Messiah Complex, Secret Invasion, He's been on X Factor.
This man he was in dorn of X, the recent stuff.
He is like a legendary character who can always recur and be around, and they just killed him off and he was a black character in a movie which which made.
It feel really bad, like not great, really.
Bad And also like that is one of the recurring issues that people have with this movie, which is wild still very.
Well thought of. Everyone is always thinking about justice pause that as we.
Go forward, one recurring theme will be even the best X movies, there's no perfect exa no, no, Like the best X movie probably doesn't rise to the level of the five or seven best.
Consistency and the thoughtfulness.
Because also something I've watched First Class so many times now, like definitely in the double digits. And something else that kind of comes to is like they do the thing where like the characters that join Magneto to be on his like bad team, you get like the characters of Color go over there always and you're always just like could have been a bit more fully because pixy joints.
Yeah.
Also I love Zoe Kravitz, but like interesting, like there's just so many choices that where it's like the character is supposed to be like this really normal looking woman and then you cast like the most beautiful woman of the who.
By the way, gives a inert performance as even a lot to go with, not given a lot why she switches sides? Don't you don't ever feel it? That should be a big moment. So really good movie but imperfect. Yeah, and that brings us to our next movie, twenty fourteenths
X Men Days of Future Past. To avoid a dystopian future twenty first century, Wolverine and the scraps of the X Men concoct a mission to send Logan's mind back into his body in the year nineteen seventy three, the year the Knicks last one an NBA time, especially for I think that's I think that's why they picked that is in prison for killing JFK. Spoiler, he did not kill JFK, who was a mutant. He was trying to protect JFK.
A fucking think about this all the time. Charles is like, this is it.
He's like, you know, forget the fact that you paralyzed me, like whatever else. He's like, I'm upset because how could you do it?
How could you do it?
Eric?
And he killed and Charles I was trying to stop the bullet. And he looks and he goes, he was one of us, Charles, Charles.
His mutation was an ability to endlessly cheat on his wife. Yeah, he could have endless affairs, Charles. It was amazing, all right. So free Magneto. We must say that Logan, with the help of Charles, no longer in a wheelchair because he's taking wonder drugs that give him the use of his legs back, but dead in his psychic ability.
Actually quite an interesting like rinkle like a.
Beast. And Magneto's son Quicksilver go and free Magneto from prison in a set piece that I think is one of the best set pieces in.
All the best in the MCU too. That specific so good.
It's just wonderful, wonder wonderful. Quicksilver then leaves the scene, but now together the X Men plus Magneto stop Mystique, now leading her own team from assassinating ball Over Trask, who is the creator of the Sentinels. This stops the Sentinel project. Trash goes to prison and the timeline is altered, allowing the Xavier School for Gifted Children to flourish through
the eighties, nineties, and two thousand's. Magneto decides to run away to live in Poland, and then the Stinger is We see Apocalypse, his power rising back in the days of H and E. We watch him build the Pyramids. Your thoughts about X Men, Ok, he's a future past. I think this is a really hard film story wise to pull off, and I think they did a really good Yeah.
When I was when I first saw this movie, I was like, oh, justice for Katy Pride, because you know it's Kitty who goes back in the original stories.
And but I will say I actually think this movie holds up very well.
I love the opening where we get they do like a cold open where every X men gets killed, which I think is really cool. You also get in this Bishop love to see him blink. You get some really cool X Men. You also get to see this kind of future version of Magneto and Charles where they've come back together as a team to kind of help.
I like the jeweling timelines.
I do think that Evan Peters is, like legit a fantastic casting for Quicksilver, and I so bree that the MCU was harmed by this representation because their representation was not equal or near equal, even though.
I am Aaron Taylor, Aaron Taylor, John's I'm gonn Aaron Taylor has super speed but could not avoid the bullets exactly and then gets got.
And if you haven't seen this sequence, just go on YouTube and watch it.
It's a sequence where Quicksilver goes around a kind of kitchen in the prison and changes everything so that.
To the tune of Jim Croche's Time in a Bottle.
Which is also one of the best needle drops. And it's just one or such a fun scene.
They have a lot of fun playing with the idea that this is Magneto's son, and this kind of like implications but not like the two of them kind of realizing but not wanting.
To deal with it. I thought it was great, but I still enjoy this movie. This has high rewatchability factor.
I completely agree. I think the dueling timeliness pulled off really really well, adds a lot of tension to the story. It's just fantastic. One more note, it features a cameo by Chris Claire. Yes any opening congressional hearing scene, and he has a line which is wild, So that is fun.
They can I think that that might be a couple of other little comic book creators in that too. I think they put together a little a little rost, so that's always nice to see.
Another thing we're going to try and unwrap is to continue this podcast, which requires us to run ads. Here's one right now, Yeah, okay, we're back. So that takes us through the early nineteen seventies history of Charles Xavier and the X Men and Wolverine. We should note that during the course of this movie, Charles stops taking his legs drug and thus develops his psychic powers back, and that brings us to two thousand and nines X Men origins V We open it like different in the late
nineteenth century. Yes, we open in the late nineteenth century early twentieth century or thereabouts, where a young mutant named Logan runs away from his abusive family with a weird older kid named Victor Creed, also a mutant. We discover they then go on to fight in every single war up to Vietnam. Shouts to Logan and Victor Creed for fighting for the North during the Civil War.
Very happy to see that.
In the late seventies where they've been held in the brig apparently because of their actions during the Vietnam War. They're just hard to control, these two. They are then recruited by WILLIAMS. Stryker, who's putting together a top team of the world's best killers called the WEAPONEX Project. That project includes a young pre Deadpool Wilson played by Ryan Reynolds, who is honestly the bright point of this movie. Like his little dialogue parts when they're like going on flyo
off to missions, Logan eventually gets tired. The year is now like nineteen seventy eight, seventy nine. Logan eventually gets tired of just like murdering people around the world for William Striker, so he quits. He moves to Canada, where he falls in love with the mutant Silver Fox. Although I don't think it's like obvious that she's a mutant.
Butted and suggested, yeah, it's employed.
He falls in love with Silver Fox, who is a school teacher. Sabertooth then kills Silver Fox to get revenge. Logan lets Striker lace his body without Americaan so that he can do this crazy idea so that he can get rid of Victor once and for all. But then he finds out that actually Silver Fox is alive and
that Victor Creed faked her death. Meanwhile, Logan and Victor Creed team up to take out the super Weapon X Ultimate Product, Deadpool, who has all the powers of various young mutants, including Scott Summer's I Beams and the Healing Factor, and he can teleport like either Blinker Nightcrawler. And the end, Striker shoots Logan in the head with an adamantium bullet and this causes him to forget All his memories are shattered and he doesn't remember anything that he's ever done.
Your thoughts about this movie be ranged unhinged movie raged.
I love it. I do watch this movie like a lot because it's actually it's also it's mos hilarious.
That is very funny. It's really funny funny.
There is a legendary scene in this movie, a legendary in my house at least, but where Wolverine like he's first getting the clause and he's like he's like running around and he ends up in like these people's bond and they're like, you can stay in our house, and then he's like chopping.
Up the sing and just like so many comedic moments.
And I do think sometimes they were trying to be comedic, but sometimes they definitely weren't.
Yeah, just absolutely wild that.
This was the route that they went, because you've got to remember, at this point in time when they made this movie, Wolverine is like the big seller of every x Men movie. He's the big seller in all the comics. A Wolverine movie, you would expect it to make a lot of money. This movie did make a lot of money, though it was not critically acclaimed, it did not have
like a great legacy. But it's just hilarious because when you rewatch it, you're like guys, there's like fifty million stories you could have done, and this is what you did. Must shout out that something that we were all shocked about and has been giving us much joy. That Aaron, our super producer, told us Troy sevon is young logan.
That's I mean crazy stuff to look back and see that that was pointed out to Aaron. You know what.
Other Yeah, yeah, Taylor Kitch as Gambit.
I want to say. Other notes. One thing that I noted from watching all of these movies is you can really date them by the casting. So for instance, Days of Future Pa, you knew the Game of Thrones was popping because Peter dinkla is bolevard test exactly. And then here we are. You know that Friday Night Lights was hitting on all cylinders because there is our guy, Taylor Kitsch, who you know, Hollywood was thinking, is this guy movie? This guy, let's see, Let's put him gambit, Let's put
him as gambit. Let's put him in the adaptation of the sci fi classic John Carter, which bombed spectacularly, thus ending Taylor Kitch's run as a potential movie star. Also, we should note that David Harbor, Yeah, Stranger Things fame auditioned for the role of the Blob, but was turned down, apparently according to him, for being too fat, which is crazy because.
Like Derange, again, the character is on the edge of twenty ten.
What are we doing?
We go to make him less fat? He's the blow up and it's like, no, dude, higher this guy.
But you know what, I'm glad David hob wasn't in this movie because it probably would have been very hard for him to get costs in Stranger Things and have the career that he did have.
Also, will I am in this movie?
Will this is another thing? This was the period when we were like, kid, will I be a belief? We weren't sure.
Also were not sure about it.
I also just like the sweet guy from Lord of the Rings who's in this whose power is to like turn on light bulb.
They were really trying some stuff in.
They were sure, Yes, Mary is in this?
Yeah?
Was it Pip or Mary? Mary trying to Yes, He's like a con eventually ends up as a Carney. Other notes, Silver Fox, Yes, one of Logan's true loves throughout his comics arc, has a crazy comics continuity as crazy as these movies, some of which is reflected in the film, so she was a Native American woman who loved Logan in the early twentieth centuries. In the comics, she is in the classical sense fridged by yes, and it's just an absolute from the book definition of a fridging by Sabretooth.
Beginning Sabertooth's longtime feud with Wolverine. She later shows up as a CIA assassin who then flips sides and joins Hydra and then resurfaces as part of the Weapon X program, but she doesn't remember Logan, And I think there's no canon explanation for any of this, But I think the thing that's suggested is that the second Silver Fox who shows up as a member of WEAPONX and doesn't remember Logan is like an impostor who has been brainwashing to
thinking that she's Silver Fox. But like, how would they know about Silver Fox? Specific doesn't make it doesn't make sense.
That's a great point about Logan's cannon, because so much of the Wolverine canon is just like this person hated Wolverine and wanted to torture him mentally, like that.
Happens throughout his life.
Also, fantastic catch here by one of our super Producers, which is Lynn Collins, who played silver Fox was also in John Carpentah, I mean John Cottza, not John Carpenter. I would love to see that movie. But John coppinher Oh my god, John Carter, the movie that Taylor Kitch's career was ended on. But I will say in the film critic community, I'm not a John Carpenter. I'm not I am a Junk Carpenter Superstan. I am not a johnk Ktastan.
But i will say some people they like that movie now, they're saying give it every watch.
So I'm just it's it's okay. They were trying something, you know, yeah, trying something.
But yes, this film is obviously technically Deadpool's origin. It was very hated at the time, the whole idea of the muck with the mouth.
I think, for right now, let's pretend it is, and we will we'll talk about it, and we will try and figure it, will try and unwrap all of that eathetically. Now let's just quickly update where we are canonically. So, uh, Charles Xavier and Magneto have at this point like put together a couple versions of X Men teams and then broke up already Wolverine has is out there in the world, and.
He rejected them.
Charles Charles end Magneto both know about him, but he rejected them. Went on to fight at Vietnam because he again, he fought in every single American war apparently, and now is wandering around in the eighties without his memory because he gets shot in the head with an Adamantian bullet. He will later, you know, wander apparently up north called again to the northern border where he is doing cage matches,
and this brings us to X Men. Apocalypse twenty sixteen's absolute fucking stinker, and I gotta say this movie is the worst and it's also one of the worst collorbook movies that's ever happened. Apocalypse played by the wonderful Oscar Isaacs.
That seems like an absolutely like Wow, you killed it costing can't wait to see that, you can't wait.
He is prone to insane speechifying. He's also wearing like the ugliest makeup ever. I will now do recap of this. So we're back in ancient Egypt where super mutant Apocalypse is about to have his mind transferred into a younger, hotter body. This guy can do everything. He's got incredible powers. He can build the pyramids, he can't grow himself huge, he's got super strength. He can like make people dissolve. The only thing he can't do stop aging. The guy's
getting old old, so he needs a young body. And the only thing is every time he tries to switch into that young body, he's very vulnerable. So the people of Egypt take the opportunity to betray him and en sabaur Aka Apocalypse ends up trapped under the pancaked nine to eleven rubble of his great Pyramid, where he remains for five thousand years. Fast forward to nineteen eighty three. New mutants are emerging across the world. Havoc enrolls his
other cyclops at Xavier's school, Mystique recruits Nightcrawler. Also Angel is around. Angel's Apocalypse comes back because like a cult awakens him and also Moimrick Taggart is there and he reawakens.
Why is she there? The buckets look killing.
He comes back and it's so funny watching him wander the streets of Eliot's Cairo just being a fucking super weirdo. He watches TV for twenty minutes and then decides, you know what, this world is fucking soft, Like I'm tea, this is dumb.
I watched twenty minutes of TV and I'm like, this is just the worst.
He recruits his new four horsemen, including Storm and Magneto, whose family were all murdered in Poland.
Again and actually like again, I will say in one of the best sequences from this movie is when you get to see Magnio what Magneo has.
Been up to, and he tried to live a simple life and they just wouldn't. Let Rosie, let me ask you about this, Let me ask a about this. Where's this depth of warm feelings and love for your other family, including your son Quicksilver Cat and the woman who you had a relationship for a time and is his mother, that you can't raise those.
Kids he had to go to Poland. Stoutney family. We're always trying.
Storm and Magneto eventually switch sides because fucking Apocalypse is crazy and prone to saying shit like this play the clip.
Always the same. Now all this no more stones, no more spears, no more slings, no more sauces.
Sisting, no more super power.
So that's a Partlympse. He's doing that he's doing that kind of shit alway.
He's doing it all the fucking time. Also, Tower of Babel is like a biblical story, and he was buried like three thousand years before the Bible, Like what the how?
Also, as whatever, I.
Guess that was in the twenty minutes of TV he watched he got that information.
The music is so outrageous in this sequence too, like and everyone else plays it so serious, like all these people around the world like they're in like the hunt for Red October or something.
They're like, who's turning the keys? It's like, I'll tell you who.
It's apocalypse with his mind. I guess that seems like he could be doing other things with that power. Also, I feel like he didn't think this through. I feel like just putting nukes in space is a bad idea, gonna end badly for everyone. Also, this movie does include one of my all time Hollywood favorite tropes, which is when they give an origin story for something that never needed an origin story. This is maybe only beaten by the second bar Ro movie that Kenneth Browna made, where
they give an origin for his mustache. But in this movie, they legitimately give an origin story to Charles Xavier going bold.
I mean, that's I'm getting to this. Let me get to this. So Magneto and Storm flip sides because they're just like, I can't stand listening to this guy so boring. He just keeps talking and talking and talking. So Gene levels up her powers to Phoenix kind of sure region, Charles fights Apocalypse on the astral plane, and the big guys went.
But sadly done.
Sadly Apocalypse has baldified Charles over his fucking careful now never ever be the same.
It tasfles out and you are just like, wow, this it's.
All gone, dude. Every follicle is gone, gone, gone, gone with it, or the last vestiges of like Austin Powers esque Riz no.
Hardhead and he's gone all these young students, but it's never happened in FAM.
Now there's a justice students.
That's Mando is offered an opportunity to teach you the school. He declines, and that is x amount Apocalypse that takes us up through the early eighties. One thing I want to mention that you mentioned origin stories. This movie is really really bad. The Apocalypse stuff is like funny bad because I think this movie is also like Apocalypse is so deadly Shakespearean like serious, like he's serious all the
time and it makes him really funny. But also very clearly this movie was influenced by the MC which was riding oh high high it could possibly at the time, and so they added like a lot of humor that just falls extremely flat all throughout the movie. And then there's problematic aspects like, for instance, the way that Apocalypse recruits Magneto is he takes him to Auschwitz and it's like, hey, remember this, Yeah.
He's he's like, remember when your parents were murdered? Why don't you just get really angry now? And just like remember the wholes that's fucked up.
And also as well, like you're talking about, you're reintroducing like a character like Storm, who's like such an iconic legend.
And she's like a pace. They don't know what to do with her. They don't do a good job.
Also, you have Angel who's like fighting in these crazy like fight clubs in Berlin. It's like he's at Bergen, which I will say hilarious as an English person because that kid was most well known for being in like a British soap opera called Coronation Street or EastEnders. I think he's in EastEnders. So it's like seeing someone from like Days of Our Lives turn up in an X Men movie. So I will say something really funny about this that I now see was a It was like a noell A death.
Now more stone steps.
He's just like, that's not this is a nuclear bomb. It's a different thing. But yeah.
Like also, they came to the comic book shop that I worked in at the time and they were like, oh.
Do you want tickets to go and see this movie?
And it was just to the premiere, so you know that they were really struggling when they were like, you guys can just come and like try.
This out, just like see how it is.
I will say, in the cinema there was a couple of cool like crazy is interesting, but yeah, terrible movie,
absolutely ridiculous. And the fact that Apocalypse is like biggest impact here is that he like makes Charles go bold is like so fucking funny Charles he bought and also as well, I just want to say this is especially painful because Age of Apocalypse is like seen as one of the best eras in Marvel Comics and Marvel X men, so to adapt it so badly, you just know it's all going badly from here, Making a superhero movie is expensive, and so it's making a podcast, So please listen to these ads.
Okay, we're back. That brings us up to twenty nineteen's Dark Phoenix.
Really, I'm saying this movie going down might be worse than Age of Apocalypse.
Honestly, I think it's slightly better, but it's still I mean, plot wise, there's definitely higher points in this higher I think it's not a worst plot, but is a slightly better mind.
I enjoy it because of the representation of Charles Hill. I feel like is finally the.
Year is nineteen ninety two.
Away, Can I just say everyone on Earth has wanted a nineteen ninety two x ME movie because that is when the cartoon was set. Everyone wants this to be a neon fun They're going to the move. No, this is the most bland ass looking movie that you could ever imagine. They did the most boring version of the nineties. It's actually offensive.
So it's nineteen ninety two. The psychic barriers Charles placed on Gena keep her mutant powers from going absolutely fucking crazy pants Phoenix level have failed.
Shouldn't have done that, by the way, that's a classic Charles's mistake, kit don't be yes.
She is asked to like save a space shuttle, and she does it, but this awakens the powers and also merges them with some sort of cosmic energies, and things are going bad. Jane kills Mystique uh oh, freeing Jennifer Lawrence from her prison of the playing Mystique then flees to the mutant refuge run by Magneto.
Interesting aliens, but they're not Jason.
Obviously on that. So aliens drawn by this burst of cosmic energy come to Earth. They tell Jane that she has absorbed the Phoenix Force, which they want so they can conquer Earth. Gene eventually kills all the aliens, but is consumed herself by the Phoenix Force and she dies. Hank takes over the school, which is renamed after Jane, while Charles and Magneto play chess in Paris Your Thought, Dark Phoenix.
I my my most resounding memory of this movie, right is one.
I think they put Dazzler in it, and Dazzla's that and she's like in it for like two seconds.
Modern Dazzla she's not disco.
Second, Charles is like arrogant, kind of half evil Charles in this where he like just.
Well he's been bald and he's been balding and and he's.
Like leaving the kids alone to just like go and go and get like an award for being such a great guy.
I thought that was pretty interesting.
But my most read a sounding memory is I saw this in Century City AMC in the Westfield, which is where many of these pre screenings happened. And no joke, the last forty five minutes of the movie, we were locked in to the screen and there was alarms going off and flashing by, and we were all like, oh my god, what is going on? And were they wouldn't
last lea if we're watching the movie. At first we thought it was part of the movie, then we realized it wasn't, and eventually it was just like someone had leaned.
On the fire alarm door. But we were all like, oh my god, we're gonna die, like what's happening.
So that's really And then the next day they emailed us and they were like, guys, we're so sorry, Like you can come if you want, you can come to the premiere at the TCL Chinese there and everyone went.
Nah, I nobody wanted to go to the premiere of that movie. So that's my resounding bad times, bad times at.
The Bad Child's Bad movie that I just think, like the.
Fact I'm sorry to I don't like to personally point out somebody's failings, but like the fact that they got the same person who made X three and fucked up the Phoenix Saga in that to come back and once again write a Phoenix Saga movie that he also flopped. Simon Kimberg, Please don't do that again. Just do a different story.
I don't blame mister Kinberg, who you know had did wonderful work on earlier days of future past. Yeah, this feels to me like again, this is too many chefs in the kitchen trying to chop it up and make things, turn things into their own cinematic universe that could stand on its own true And this is really the film
that you know, it's nineteen ninety two. Our next film is two thousands X Men, which takes place basically in current day, late nineties, early two thousands, and this is the movie that kind of irrevocably fucks up the canon and it remains to be seen whether this the prequel movies exist in a different timeline as earlier released later fictional chronology X Men film, So that brings us to
two thousand's X Men. The school is not named after Gene, and Gene is not dead, and an apparently perhaps separate timeline will try to make sense of this. Afterwards, Charles runs his school, which has active X Men team of Cyclops Storm and not dead Gene means a lot. Logan is cage fighting up north somewhere. He doesn't who he is because he gets shot in the head by the Adamantian bullet by William Striker. He meets Rogue, a runaway mutant whose power is she can absorb other mutant's powers
regular humans like life, Force and Memories. Magneto's brotherhood of Evil Mutants are looking for her because Magneto has a plan which is the same plan as a Sebastian Shaw's plan back in the same which just make everybody a mutant. He has a machine that will make everybody a mutant. He can power the machine, but it will kill him
if he does it. So his plan is to have Rogue in a kind of like Gollum in Return of the King kind of thing, have Rogue steal his powers and then have Rogue power the machine and she dies nice. But ultimately the X Men with Wolverine defeat him at the Statue of Liberty and put him in a plastic prison. This was a great movie and I loved it when I saw it in the theater all those years ago. I was so excited for this film. And so let me ask you your thoughts. One about this movie and
two is this a different timeline? Did Charles eraice everybody's memory? Did you not really die? Is as a clone?
What is going on? Okay, so this movie obviously like legendary movie.
I feel like establishes not only like ah comic book kindon as it is nowadays with these movies, but also just like loads of the tropes love.
This movie was very important movie to me as I was growing up.
Like fai Ye, this is where he gets his start on these movies. I think that I have no idea what they were thinking by killing Jean in that movie, because it makes me know in Dark Phoenix it makes no sense. I know, it's like eight years later, I don't know what's supposed to have happened. Now, I did consider this.
At the end of Days of Future Passed, Logan walks through the door. He wakes up.
He's at Charles Xavier's and he walks through the door, and Scott is there, and Jeane is there, and Charles is there, and they're like, welcome back. Guess what, these characters that you love never died, which happens in the canon of these later on.
Maybe this time line is fit.
Maybe this timeline is actually that timeline and we're at the beginning again or something interesting.
That's a good thought, yeah, because.
I'm like, that would make sense. And Logan, you know, the logan we see here. Maybe he doesn't remember, but really that I think is the only get out that we have.
Like, I like that, Okay, so that I'm gonna go with that because I think that actually does kind of work.
It's sort of like a trapped cycle.
It's the Yeah, it's kind of like a trap cycle, which brings us to two thousand and threes X two.
Widely seen as the best of the X Men movies, I will.
Widely seen as the best. I think it probably is loganside I would pre logan. I think that's right.
So it is.
You know, Early two thousand's Nightcrawler attacks the White House, which is the strong support for William Striker's anti mute.
Fantastic opening sequence still just stats.
Wonderful William Strikers Reavers Early Reavers, I guess who are? I guess? A government sealed Team six Anti Mutant Strike Force attack the mansion and kidnap a bunch of students. He is building another Cerebro up at his base at Alcoholi Lake, and he plans to use the powers of his mutant lobottomized son, Mastermind Horble, to make Charles, using Mastermind's ability to create illusions and implant false memories to make Charles kill every mutant in the world by basically
flipping it. He he logs into Cerebro and he thinks all the mutants are like evil or human. I forget what it exactly, go into Cerebra and kill now Mystique in what is a wonderful set? Such a set all the breaking Magneto out of prison set pieces are great.
Mystique breaks Magneto out of prison. Everyone goes to Striker's Canadian base, which is also the longtime home of Weapon X, the project that gave Logan is Adamantium, and he's there and he's starting to like fragmented memories are starting to come to the survey's kind of remembering that the X Men defeat Striker and his lackeys, but Jeane dies, drowns in the lake in like a rushing torrent of the broken dam of alt the like La was holding back.
She drowns in this rushing water, helping them escape. But does she die No, because power at the end, the power of the Phoenix is kakoonder. And you know this because at the end there's a shot where you're flying over the surface of Alcohol Lake and you see like the flames in the shape of the Phoenix on the surface of the lake. I love this movie. I think the action was wonderful. I think it was great. Like there's that wonderful attack on the mansion. You get to
see Wolverine really in action for the first time. You get to see him fight against Lady Death Strike, which I was so psyched h for Lady Death Strike to show up. You get this wonderful fleshing out of Charles and Magneto's backstory. You meet Mastermind and learn that part of William Striker's original grudge against mutants of the fact that his son is a mutant and that Charles really couldn't help him because he was too just too powerful, and and Charles was too young to like, too young,
and yeah, it was an inexperienced Charles. This is I guess when would we guess this happened in the eighties days of Future Past or something.
Yeah, which, by the way, in the context of these movies, Charles had a lot of experience. But I think the idea is in the context of the x the original X Men trilogy, he's a younger guy.
He doesn't necessarily know what's going on.
Also, just want to say, the one thing that really makes these movies stand out right is like Patrick Stewart, Charles Xavier, Ian mckella, Magneto, Great Marsden, Scott Summers, like that is a huge Jackman Wolverine. Obviously, these are like top tier Hollywood castings that we still have.
Like I think James Marsden.
Scott Summers is like on a level almost with like a Robert Downey junior Tony Stark, Like who saw that in him that he could be the perfect Scott?
He's so good and by the time you get to X three, which is, you know, a much maligned movie, but.
He's still his story and that still moves me, like there is still interesting things that are done in this movie.
So my apologies to Simon.
Can I guess actually, but yeah, I just I just think that the costing in these movies is like halle Berry.
A Storm, She's amazing.
Do you want to see a darker skin Storm more representative of who Storm is? Yes, But halle Berry did a fantastic job with what she's given in this Alan Cumming Night Crawler.
Nobody saw that.
Oh now, that.
Genius costing.
Yes, and the cold open his attack on the White House, so that is up there as an action set piece with you know, with the Quicksilver scene and anything else in the MCU like, it's just wonderful. It's great. That brings us to two thousand and six is terrible X Men The Last Stand, which is happening again concurrently somewhere in the mid two thousands, Worthington Labs of the family business.
This owned by the Worthington family. The scion of that family is of course Warren Worthington, slash Angel, who's im mute. Worthington Labs is developing a cure to mutation. They basically have a cure.
I also feel like kind of work.
I feel like, if your son is angel, that's like the least problem, Like why would you be bothered to cure him? He just is like a beautiful, handsome guy who has angel wings.
I feel like that's not really like this guy would have a mutation for sure.
Yeah, I mean, like I could see right now if Warren Worthington was just like flying around in the real world, every TikTok would be like people crushing on Warren Worthington. There would be strong arms and fly me like away, please, Warren Worthington, take me, take me away from here anyway. Scott goes to visit Alkali Lake where Gene died, just because he's missing her and he just wants to He's been called there's something that's calling him there. He goes there and he dies.
Off screen, Yeah he does. He does get to like release his powers and he's like, yes, it's that's it's good. Good acting by James Marston.
That killed apparently by Jean who is now fully the dark Field, and that means she already was wants.
Now she is the dark Phoenix again, and that means she has to address like she's at a remfare throughout the rest of the movie, and it is unbelievable. Makes her so frumpy. And I'm like, if you can make Fams and frumpy, there is a problem here, and this problem is in this movie.
Charles admits that he's been using his powers to suppress his Jean's full abilities, but now she's broken at the Garrison.
Stop doing this.
He just keeps doing it. He's admitting that he's doing it. Magneto is like, Gene, you finally seeing the light, babe, come to my side. He recruits her to his huge band of I don't want to call him evil mutants, but me, you believe in the in the Magneto agenda, yea, and she kills Charles, She dissolves, It turns him to dust.
Oh my god, old house, just like crazy. She's she's really she's on one.
But you know what that was where Charles, the place where Charles first invaded her mind.
Yes, where we also get more I believe we also get a Chris Claremont cameo in that moment where we see her like the local families around looking on as Charles goes to house in a very bad daging sequence.
So Magneto's band of mutant freedom fighters attack Worthington Leaf because they want to stop the cure, which I agree with. I think that's great. But the way they want to do it is by killing this specific kid whose mutant genome is the source of the cure.
And they're like a little bald headed kid, and so.
In the X Men are like, no, but we don't kill the kid.
Come on.
So the X Men go to stop them, and they stopped them.
A huge outrage. Oh my god. Every time I think about it, it's like a pain in my heart. I feel like they would never do that.
There's two things that happened in this movie that is very pain to me. One is when Mystique accident again Rebecca Remain It is really like the letters. She is so good as Mistique. I feel like it was very hard for them to ever recast that role and like Jennifer Lawrence did her best, but Rebecca is so good as Mystique. Two moments in this movie that always make me so furious every time I watch it, And yes
I do rewatch this movie too much. But like the moment when Mistique gets cured accidentally because they have these guns that they're shooting the cure out and then and then magnet I was like, sorry, babe, you're not a mutant anymore.
I'm just leaving you behind. He could never do that.
He would never do would you would never do You would be like, we will avenge you, and we will avenge this crime against you. These humans will pay.
But you would not be like, you're not a mutant anymore. But no, never, that would never happen. Rejected hate that idea. Also, when Logan kills Jane, this is the most sad boy weird, misogynistic bullshit, Like it's so horrible.
And she's like, do it, log and I really want you to kill me. And he's like, okay, I gona do it. I gonna kill you. He would never do it. He loves that.
He would never do it, this this disrespect. As soon as you boy up, I was like, fury came back inside my heart, like he would he would never do that.
That terrible movie brings us to yet another ad break. We'll be back after these messages from our sponsor. Yeah, we're back Okay, here's where we are, right. So it's the two thousands. There are X Men teams, Wolverine is a part of it. Jean Gray is dead, the Charles Xavier is dead, and Magneto is potentially depowered because we show him not you kind of saw him as stuff. But his power has taken a hit after being shot with the cure.
And he's running the school. The one good thing the movie did set up but we never get.
A storm is running the school. But now Logan has been so traumatized by having to kill Jean and also what a bad movie. The last stand was that he's back to living in the northern woods. That's where he goes when he doesn't know what else to do. He's living literally a hermit's existence in the woods. His only roommate is a bear yeah that he every morning says hi to is he heads into town to drink beer.
He is then lured by this super rich industrialist named yashidah whose life he saved from the nuclear attack on Anagasaki back in World War two when he was fighting in every single war to Japan. This guy Yoshida basically is like, Hey, I just want to thank you for giving me the gift of my life by saving me from the nuclear bomb, and I want to give you
a gift in return, which is your run. More to you're living this is basically immortal life, and you've faced you had to kill Jane, and all this stuff has happened, and you're so sad, and wouldn't it be better if you could just die and it would release you from all these terrible memories. By the way, let me just say, mister Shida, you got it wrong, because he doesn't remember any of the shit from before nineteen eighty. Yeah, like
he barely remembers it, to be fair. So Logan eventually goes on the run with Yashida's daughter Marico, with.
Her Logan character in the comment a huge.
Important Logan character. He goes on the run from you know, various ninjas and Yashida mercenaries and who knows who else. He finds out that he has this robotic parasite that's in his chest next to his heart, and that's kind of like deadening his healing factor. So he cuts open his own chest and he reaches in he pulls it out with his beards. Okay, he's so sick. He then fights the Silver Samurai, who turns out to be Yeshidah in an animantium suit like an Iron Man suit with
this big sword. Yashidah cuts off Logan's adamantium clause and I'm begin sucking the healing factor out of him and he becomes young. But then Logan kills him with the bone Claus and as he collapses near death, he has a vision of Gene, who just tells him, Logan, forget about how bad the last stand was. You're free, now,
just go be free. I forgive you for killing me, and you know, don't worry because an even worst movie, X Men Apocalypse is gonna come out in like two three years, and it's gonna be so so fucking bad. Logan flies back to North America. Yes, Charles and Magnino meant him at the airport to warn him about a new human anti mutant weapon that they're putting together, and I don't know that we ever really figure out what
that is. Your thoughts about twenty thirteen's The Wolverine heavily influenced by Frank Miller's The Wolverine limited series.
I love Hiroyuki Sonata.
I love to see him show up obviously now Emmy nominee Hiroyuki Sonata my bay from my favorite movie Message from Space, which is a nineteen seventy.
Eight Star Wars knockoff. I love him. It was nice to see him here.
This movie is very important for one reason. James Mangol made this movie. James Mangold made this movie, was obviously hindered by studio Shenanigans, and then would would get to get a second chance and make Logan And I think that is the main reason this movie is important.
It's not as bad as I think people remember. I think it gets comed It's not that bad.
It gets confused a lot with X origins, which is more of like a comedic failure. This is definitely leans into a lot of like the action is really exciting, the silver Samurai's cool. But honestly, if you're drawing from a Frank Miller comic about Japan, you're probably gonna make a movie that's pretty outdated, and this movie does feel like pretty outdated.
Is like a thin yah Marricar.
I don't know what drives a different.
Version of this movie where, especially if it's made nowadays, especially if it's made post Shogun, Like really nowadays. I hope we get to see a version of Marico where she stands on her own two feet, where she is a powerful character, where we get more, we get to learn why she means so much to Logan.
I would love that. Yeah, it's it's like very mid, very very mid.
Okay, that brings us to twenty seventeen's Logan, and we jump way ahead. We jump over a couple decades ahead in the fictional chronology. It's now the year twenty twenty nine, and mutants are getting real scarce. There's no new mutants as far as anybody knows. I don't know how they're keeping track of this, but no, no mutants have really appeared in the last twenty five years or so. Logan is living out in Texas with Caliban and he's working as a limo driver. They're both taking care of Charles,
who's early stages of dementia. He is really really not doing well and in fact, like a year or two years previously, it lost control of his powers, killed like six hundred people, including several.
Actions, Yeah, including basically like his whole like found family. Right.
So he's living now, you know, out here in this outpost in the in the Texas bad Lands and they keep him like in this room that you know, dead and yeah, because he's.
Essentially had like he's essentially having like seizures that where he loses control of his mutant powers, which is very interesting because this is obviously this movie was actually nominated for an oscar as Best Adapted Screenplay because they said it was adapted from Old Man Logan as Me and.
Old Man Logan the limited ser wonderful limited series that features and an aged Logan in an alternate timeline trying to free the United States from the grip of the long victorious super villains led by the Rent.
Yeah, and it's Mark Miller who will bring up again here very you know, prominent in these X Men comic adaptations and art by Steve mcnivven.
Like just legendary, wonderful, the wonderful, wonderful.
Steve mcnivvin so like, but interestingly, there are a lot of changes from that material, which is kind.
Of and I think for the best, definitely for the Best is a really I think.
This is just such an incredible movie.
I actually went to this movie with my mom and she loved it, and after which she was like wanting to have all these deep convos about it, and I was.
Like, I mean, there's a lot of like Meditecht this movie, but let's let's continue to recount quickly. So Logan's healing factor after the events of everything we just talked about in all of these movies, not to mention him getting his healing factor sucked out of him and having a parasite in his heart. Yeah, in Wolverine, his healing factor is like on one bar, like it's like, yeah, it's
fifteen effectiveness. But he does have his claws back, which I guess here's my head canon for how this happened. Magneto put him back on.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. At some point magnet I was like, I'll just do you a little favor.
Yeah, I'll put it. Okay, So he's got his claws back. No good answer for how this happened. However, Logan gets roped into helping a young girl, Laura, who's on the run from something reavers working for the evil Transigen Pharmaceutical Corporation or pursuing them. Turns out Transigen, like many many other entities, including the US government, has been using mutants and experiments trying to basically steal their powers to use as drugs, which is likely part of the reason that
MutS are very scarce. Logan finds and frees some of the young mutant kids from transigen and eventually Logan defeats a clone of himself named X twenty four Laura turns out his X twenty three X twenty four kills Charles. Laura says I love you, Logan, You're my dad, and Logan says like, I love you too, and I'm dying, but don't cry for me and don't become what I was, which was like a mindless killer with fragmented memories. And now Hugh Jackman, with Logan dead, is free to play
any other role he wants. He will never be asked to play with again until twenty four Dead Full and Wolverine. Okay, your thoughts about Logan, which is a fit.
I love this movie. It deserves to be OSCAR nominated.
I will say one thing I do not love about this movie that does need to be pointed out. Starts with Logan killing a bunch of Latino guys.
There is also a classic.
There, Aristelia's hubcaps to be found.
Yeah yeah, yeah, definitely.
To get Then and then also there is a classic Charles Xavier sequence here where they go and they stay with a kindly family who in this movie are black, and then that family gets completely murdered by X twenty four. I feel like it is not there are thoughtful choices that you can make. I think a lot about John Wick, right, the first John Wick movie. The reason it stands out and that we still have that franchise going strong now is because they just chose to make the gangster's white.
It's just him killing a bunch of Russian guys, right. Nobody wants to see Peppermint. We saw what happened when they made Peppermint. I just think that there's some choices, hey, that could have been more thoughtful. But now I've got that out the way. I will say this is a very moving movie to me, Like I do love and I love I love seeing the baby mutants. I love That's what I wanted to see in a like New Mutants movie, you know, I want to see that.
I love Charles, I love the idea of.
This utopia for mutants. I also thought it was very interesting that they kind of revealed that there's this GMO kind of they've been putting something into the food, into the processed food in America that stops the mutation.
I thought that was really interesting.
Yeah, I just I think generally this is like a this is a solid like nine out of ten, and my one point is removed for those like not good choices.
I want to add to your point, which I agree with for all the reasons you mentioned, and I want to I'll criticize as the decision, specifically the kind of staying with the civilian farm family. My note in addition to your note is that this happened in X Men origins. Will read in that storyline, he is on the run.
He ends up with this nice couple farmer family, who then he brings all this trouble down on them because he is which by the way, the farmer is the guy gives him a motorcycle and his classical so that's where he gets that stuff. And now we're doing that again, and so that's in part my annoyance is this is a recycle.
Also, like they do, they have an interesting moment where Logan's like, we should leave and he can kind of feel that it's not a good idea, And you get this moment from Charles by Charles is like, no, let's stay there. Great, And I'm like, classic fucking Charles. He doesn't care. He's always bringing problems on people. But generally, I mean daph Nickina's Laura Kinney. You're talking about one of the best child performances we've ever seen.
Like, she's so fantastic.
I love the little choices they made styleistically where she steals the little sunglasses from the gas station, so you've got her killing machine, but she's wearing these cute child sunglasses. The Australian actor who plays the main reva is so good.
And so scary. Boyd boyd, Yeah, he's so good. I think.
I just think this is really a wonderful movie and it is so good and it did deserve that Oscar nomination, and I do think I agree. So there's a famous quote that apparently Kevin Feigi told you Jackman, like, don't come back because Logan's just so good, Like why would you come back?
And obviously that a couple of changes, like a couple of notes.
One thing I really love about this film, and I think it's not talked about enough, is like obviously like a grittier Retelling, but Mangold finds a way to make the found family theme even more poignant and heartbreaking with this surprising team up of Logan and Caliban, who we less saw in X Men Apocalypse and is forced to work as a tracker having to track down his friends watching them care for Charles is so heartbreaking and also Mangled found a way despite this like more grounded again,
almost like Batman begins kind of style retelling that seems to esthetically reject the comics. He also found a way to underline the importance of the comics and believing in this kind of heroic thing with the addition of the X Men comics being part of the story and having clues for our heroes. I thought that that was woven together in a really really effective way that I just found really really resonant, and it was, Yeah, that's one of.
My favorite It was great.
I actually wrote an article about that when the movie came out, because I was just like, it understands something about comics as a mythology and kind of the employe of storytelling and like the power of what it can do. And I was just yeah, I was just totally blown away by that aspect of it. And I just think it is in general, is like a real high point for these kind of movies.
We like to end each episode with a selection of fast moving segments. Today we are going to power rank all of the X Men movies. Let's you are top five X Men movies, Rosie, you go.
First, Okay, Logan is number one for me. Days of Future Past is number two.
Wow.
Then I'm going for the first X Men.
Movie because I really do love that one. Then I'm going for X two, and then First Class. That's my personal top five.
Here's my top five Logan. Of course, I'm gonna go with X two, and this is partially just because of how stoked I was when that movie came out. My feelings, my general feelings. Then X Men, Days of Future Past, then X Men First Class, and then the first X Men two thousands X Men film.
Yeah.
Oh, and here we go again. It's the cycle starts again, Rosie. With the release of Deadpool at Wolverine, we've already made our predictions to that, which is, we think that Deadpool is going to just basically cauterize the X Men universe with its insane, twisted cannon that we don't know what's real and what's not and will bring them fully into the Marvel universe, selecting whatever best bits it wants. That's it for this episode, Thanks for listening by.
X ray.
Vision is hosted by Jason Kncepcion and Rosie Knight and is a production of iHeart Podcasts. Our executive producers are Joelle Smith and Aaron Kaufman. Our supervising producer is a Boo Zafar. Our producers are Carmen Laurent and Mia Taylor. Our theme song is by Brian Basquez.
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