X-Men: First Class

Yeah, posting schedule has been detoured, again. I blame the boyfriend and his nefarious ideas re: seeing movies on the weekend. Will nobody stop this madman?

So, my thoughts on X-Men: First Class:

* Retro-tastic! Always a plus, for me: I would go into some sort of Padme-style lack-of-will-to-live decline if I found myself back before birth control and lattes, but historical eras are always fun for me to read or watch. Especially when there are mutant powers or magic or something to make up for realistic historical squalor. I was not around in the actual sixties, but from my perspective, the movie did a pretty good job of establishing the time.

* Swinging Young Xavier is hilarious, also very cute. Not really sure why he had an English accent at six, what with being born in Westchester, but whatever. Not really complaining.

* Ugh, Mystique, stop being Clingy Jealous Girl. Cockblocking is not the way to anyone's heart; there *is* no way to Xavier's heart in the way you want; stop mooning and pouting. She does, thank God–and Magneto–but the first few scenes with Adult Mystique…GAH.

* Mystique's issues in general were…interesting. In the comics, and the modern-day movies, it's pretty clear that she's pissed that society will hassle her if she appears in her true form, and that this is understandable; in FC, at least at first, it seems to be more about boys not liking said true form. Which is very appropriately teenage, but…

a) If I could look however I wanted, for however long I wanted, I so would not care how "hideous" my natural form was. Honestly, the natural state of the "normal" human body is or can be twenty different varieties of either "ew, get it away" or "don't look at me like this", and while I assume Mystique's no more immune to head colds or food poisoning than the rest of us, shapechanging seems *way* easier than hair dye, facial scrubs, shaving, regular trips to the gym, etc.*

b) Mystique's true form is Jennifer Lawrence only…OH MY GOD SHE'S BLUE. And maybe kinda scaly. THE HORROR. Yeah, Xavier's not interested**, and Beast's got issues–dude, you have fleshy monkey feet, she's Blue Jennifer Lawrence, maybe not conflating the two so much?–but informal polling indicates that nine out of ten guys would hit that.

* Could have lived without the invocation of Black Dude Dies First, movie. Also having the only defector to Shaw's forces of Evil be the stripper. Really? And it's pretty *blatant* defection to evil, I gotta say: guy's just killed about a hundred people for no good reason.

* Shaw's attack on the facility was a nicely hardcore moment: no offscreen civilizations getting destroyed, no people disappearing…nope, a lot of guys getting dropped to their horrible screaming doom. And/or shivved. It seems strange that you have to establish that a film goes there when said film began with Nazis, but hey, it's effective.

* Speaking of Nazis: yeah, I'm kind of on Team Magneto here, or at least on Team Sometimes You Have to Put a Coin Through a Dude's Head. Shaw:

a) was a Nazi. If not an official Nazi, a guy who joined up with the Nazis so he could experiment on ten-year-olds, which is…not actually any better.

b) post-being-a-Nazi, tried to start World War III, and killed a lot of people in the process.

c) could absorb and redirect energy. Put this guy in a normal jail cell and he'll run into the walls until he can blow the place up.

Yeah, killing him might not bring Magneto inner peace, but it brought the rest of the world the assurance that we were one step further away from being nuked. I'm cool with that. Couldn't have been much fun for Xavier, what with experiencing the braincoinage second-hand, but sometimes you've got to break eggs to make an omelet. Er, kill a guy. Whatever.

* People who find dental stuff squicktacular: there's one scene in this that is just Not Okay. Geez. Inventive use of Magneto's power, yes. Comfortable to watch? OH MY GOD NO.

* Emma Frost could only be more Bond Girl if her name had been something like Frosti Piques. And if she'd gotten it on with Xavier or Magneto, I guess, but hey: PG-13.

* Yay training montage! *Snerk* at Hank's montage scenes. Beast is awesome and all, but the Jekyll & Hyde allusions are perhaps a little much considering that the guy has…monkey feet. When I think "hidden animal darkness waiting to be unleashed", I do not think "prehensile toes".

And I don't actually ever think "hidden animal darkness waiting to be released", because then I'd have to paint my nails black, listen to *way* more Depeche Mode, and write a lot of bad poetry during third-period study hall.

* The Russian/American parallels were all kinds of awesome, and the "it has been an honor" scenes rocked. That said, *wow* does humanity sort of justify Magneto's decision at the end.

*Disclaimer: these things aren't, and shouldn't be, mandatory for everyone out there. But they are for me, and I expect them or the male equivalent from anyone I'm involved with.

**And the movie leaves it pretty ambiguous why: maybe it's Mystique's blue scaliness, maybe it's a Westermark sort of thing, maybe he likes playing the field and doesn't want to bonk a girl he's close to. It's not clear, and I approve of that.