X-Men Days of Future Past Review

Attention to Character Development & Storytelling

One of the issues that I was admittedly expecting to run into with Days of Future Past was its balancing of characters considering the massive scope involved. Well, after now watching the movie, I am more than happy to report that Days of Future Past does a magnificent job on the structuring and writing of the various individual stories being explored. Let's begin by discussing the core characters of the film being Wolverine, Professor X, Magneto, and Mystique. These four characters are essentially the spotlighted mutants in this particular X-Men story as the entire time travel element of the film fully revolves around their decisions in the past, present, and future. Now I wouldn't be surprised if many of the die hard comic book fans quickly bash on the idea of Wolverine being the one that travels back in time instead of the traditional Kitty Pride. But when taking to account this cinematic universe's version of the story, I would argue that Logan works perfectly fine in the grand scheme of things.

The context here being the idea that Wolverine can survive the painful mind bending toll of time travel making him the perfect candidate for the mission. As we see him being transported to the past where he interacts with the 70's version of various characters that we know and love from the series (utilizing the First Class cast), this was where things got pretty exciting due to the built up anticipation for what was about to take place. The feeling I'd describe during witnessing Logan's time in the past can be compared to the slow climbing of a roller coaster ride gradually reaching upwards to its highest peak setting itself up for the big drop. What's really fun about these earlier scenes is seeing how Logan himself has to get use to the world around him and the sensitivity of the situation itself. We're given occasionally hilarious but also dramatic moments such as Logan trying to convince a young Xavier of his future fate. You can see that he clearly isn't the type of person meant for this type of venture (as admitted by himself), so the struggle refreshingly becomes more than a simple "what obstacle does Wolverine have to slash his way through?".

A great example of that "different kind of fight" comes with one of my favorite scenes of the movie where Logan sees someone who would eventually majorly affect him in the future resulting in him utterly losing his mind. What makes this moment truly impactful and powerful is the way in which we as the audience witness the mental trauma of the past transitioning to a more physical reaction within his future body as his claws are shown to be unleashed as a defense mechanism. This causes a lot of tension as well as adds on an extra layer to Logan's psyche regarding the consequences of revisiting he past. Again, this isn't something that he's used to handling (this isn't a bunch of drunk guys messing with him at a bar or Sabertooth leaping at him) as he's forced to fight using his mind more so than his body. Moments and ideas like these are what I found this to be some of the more fascinating aspects of his journey in this franchise and why I'm perfectly fine with them choosing him instead of Shadow Cat.

Talking about Xavier now, with Wolverine encountering a much younger Professor X, we get another great character story explored as we see our once wise and powerful leader shown at his lowest point in life. As I stated before with Logan, "humanizing" is a key element of this story allowing the us to be able to relate to these larger than life characters more than ever before through moments of emotionally grounding them with issues of depression or identity crisis. Seeing Logan struggling to convince Xavier to snap out of his self loathing mindset and become the Professor that he knows was such a dramatically intriguing segment that I really appreciated the writing for covering some strong mature themes. We also have Magneto's story (one of my favorite comic book movie villains) which shows the master of metal manipulation in one of his most destructive moments of the series. What's so compelling about this character is the attention given to his beliefs and morality revolving around genocidal methods being the only path to bringing peace for mutant kind.

It's that powerful unyielding commitment where you get a sense of genuine love and care for keeping his species alive in a world that wants to cast them out that makes him such a fascinating antagonist. Once you've understood his motivation, it can easily be seen why many would both side and be against his agenda resulting in an interesting debate of his villainy categorization. This is brilliantly shown in one of the more emotionally powerful scenes in the film between Erik and Charles. After Magneto gets broken out of his prison, both him and Xavier gets into a huge fight with each other about their ideologies and what they've done for the mutant species. This rivalry is one of the most famous ongoing battles in comic book history and we finally get to see it in its purest and rawest form in one particular chess scene onboard a plane between the two here. 

Both sides of the fight can be justified in some way, but it was Erik's emotional reaction to their discussion that really dominates the moment as his anger causes the plane to almost crashing via his mutant abilities. What I especially love about this scene is the visual storytelling of the chessboard between the two. A symbol of a battle between two opposing forces despite the fact that these two were the greatest of friends in the past  (as shown in First Class) and essentially want the same thing. I think as far as character moments go, this may be one of the greatest scenes in the history of comic book movies. It's the perfect example of strong performances, writing, and direction all coming together to masterfully convey a singular theme.

As for Mystique, honestly, I have never really been fully invested in the character throughout the series...until now. Her motivation for murder and how it affects the tragic future for mutants was a very interesting story to follow along and added a sense of weight to her character that I think it's worth celebrating for the franchise. Mystique in other X-Men properties has had some amazing stories and conflicts with other mutants beyond just being a seductive shapeshifting tool for Magneto. I think this movie honors that in a phenomenally deeply layered fashion. Every scene involving this character was equally amazing and tension driven as we get to see this solo assassination mission slowly play out for her. And although I knew that it was Logan's mission to stop her with the help of Charles and Erik, I also felt empathy for her character, and to some degree, wanted her to actually get the victory that she desired.

It felt well deserved and justified considering everything that her target has done to the mutant species solidifying yet another multilayered antagonist in the movie  It's actually a pretty amazing thing to experience in a story where the villains have goals that are quite similar to the heroes but are simply executed differently causing the inevitable clash to occur. Speaking of which, those final moments where the Mystique is pressured to make a decision that would change the entire world and future of her race was very dramatic and powerful. The more that I think about it, the more I'm willing to say that Days of Future Past is quite possibly the most dramatically impactful comic book movie to date. Just putting that out there.

Now as for the several side characters, something that I always eagerly anticipate with any X-Men film due to the source material's vast ensemble, there is quite the list here filled with surprises and familiar faces. I won't list every single one of them here, but I will say that each character was handled exceptionally well for the strictly supportive roles linking to the more action heavy segments. For example, I absolutely loved the future timeline scenes where heroes like Iceman, Kitty, Colossus, Storm, and a cast of never before seen characters are shown struggling to survive the invasion of the Sentinels. Upon those never before seen characters include Bishop, War Path, Sunspot, and my new all time favorite mutant in terms of special abilities, Blink. We see this group of rebels struggling to survive the Sentinels and their unpredictable ways of adapting to each mutant's individual power set. It was quite the visual spectacle at times seeing how these intimidating looking machines would take on each mutant while showing our heroes strategically attempt to defeat them.

This looped over situation constantly altered by Kitty via her time traveling capabilities was effectively epic and equally bleak surrounding the X-Men's hopeless fight against this terrifyingly powerful enemy. The more that I think about these segments in this movie, the more I'm starting to realize that, of all the comic book superhero titles that we've had over the years, the Sentinels just might be the most scariest villains yet. The absolutely brutal way that our heroes end up dying at their hands is pretty unsettling to say the least. As for the characters in the past, we're greeted with another collection of familiar and unfamiliar faces. Out of this bunch including Beast, Havoc, Toad, Ink, Spyke, and of course the biggest selling point of the movie character-wise, Quicksilver. He's not heavily shown throughout, but when he is utilized, I can only describe his scenes as "cinema gold" especially for any comic book fan desiring to see super speed beautifully used in a live action setting.

Amazing Action & Character Spotlights

X-Men: Days of Future Past has a lot to offer in its strong character writing and drama, but make no mistake, the action does not take a backseat in the entertainment value department. Every mutant in the movie is given at least one awesome moment to shine with his/her particular ability or subplot. Some of these scenes are even painful to watch like Magneto bending metal rebars into Wolverine and tossing him away. That moment by the way being a fantastic way to recreate one of the most iconic Magneto-Wolverine confrontations in the comics (albeit not as visually graphic). Not only are the production values as top notch as fans should expect during these spotlighted action segments, whether it be the mutant superpowers being presented or the spectacle of the Sentinels showing up, but the overall visual direction is beautifully executed.

One of the movie's most memorable character spotlight points (one might argue the most iconic) is without a doubt the Quicksilver rescue scene. As a group of police officers begin to open fire on our heroes for a major crime that they've committed involving Magneto's imprisonment, Quicksilver takes down the entire squad of officers by speeding through the room and creating chaotic scenarios between them. Keep in mind that we're also seeing this entire sequence though his heightened perspective as time is extremely slowed down which was an extraordinary spectacle to experience in the theaters. Every second is highly entertaining presenting his sense of humor personally affecting the officers in some hilarious fashion resulting in a perfect blend of comedy and action.

Another moment that I latched onto was anytime we were treated with a scene involving Blink using her ability to create portals for teleportation. The brilliance in her using it to support the other mutants by offering them a tactical advantage on the Sentinels was such a fun visual to see. Her final moments utilizing the portals to cause the Sentinels to attack each other alongside the Quicksilver scene mentioned above truly made me feel like a little kid again watching the X-Men animated series on television. For that feeling alone, I highly commend Days of Future Past for strongly bringing back that nostalgia factor in watching these super powered characters showcase their extraordinary capabilities. It's a great reminder that, despite the amount of comic book superhero movies that we've been getting nowadays, the excitement of watching each new title is still intact.

As Entertaining As It Is Interesting

For the majority of Days of Future Past, every scene that involved a strong character or dramatic moment also had an amazingly fun sequence to enjoy. Moments that were filled with heavy emotional content were accompanied by an equally entertaining action scene or a hilarious remark by one of the characters. This is something that a lot of comic book movies have struggled with along the years regarding the difficult tight rope act of tonal balance and quality consistency. However, X-Men Days of Future Past steps in and highly succeeds on all aspects regarding what a magnificent comic-book film or even just a fantastic science-fiction blockbuster can be when handled with the utmost care. 

Rating: 10/10