Thursday, March 9, 2017

You Had One Job: X-Men Film Franchise


I am going to try to simultaneously explain why the X-Men movie franchise is garbage and try to make sense of its time line at the same time. This is difficult considering how many films that have been made, reboots, retelling, actor changes, and general not giving a fuck by the writers and directors. I recently watched the latest film, Logan, and just threw my arms in the air. There were things said in the movie that made no sense (Xavier did not find Wolverine cage fighting!) and just further convoluted this series. There will be a lot of focus on the Logan/Wolverine character because he linchpins this entire series. Let's see how far I get into this before my head explodes and my face melts off.

Let us travel way back to 3,500 B.C. Apocalypse is shown at the end of one of the future films standing with his Horsemen. Forget that happens because it never happens later. He is supposed to be the first mutant or whatever. Sure. In the later film (X-Men: Apocalypse) as soon as he is woken he is trapped by followers. Made no sense but that's what happened. So no Horsemen. Forget that. Shut up.


Now let's go all the way to the 1800's with Logan. We see him as a kid named James Howlett killing a guy that killed his stepfather by using tiny bone claws that come out of his hands. He an his step-brother Victor Creed go on the run. Creed is Sabretooth. Makes no fucking sense, but whatever. They go on to fight in the Civil War. Not the cool one with Captain America and Iron Man. The regular ass one. In the early 1900's they are still fighting, this time in World War 1.


In the 1940's Xavier meets a tiny Mystique for the first time. She ends up growing up with him with no explanation of how or why his mother agreed to this. Just accept it. Meanwhile Magneto is in a concentration camp because he and his family are Jewish. Kevin Bacon kills Magneto's mother to make him use his powers since he saw him use them earlier. Logan and Creed are fighting during World War 2 as well because...fight. Logan ends up as a POW in Japan and survives an atomic bomb blast. At this point he still does not have Adamantium claws yet. I don't think. He shouldn't. That technology wasn't available yet.


In the 1960's Xavier and Magneto meet for the first time. Magneto is hunting Kevin Bacon and Xavier is trying to impress women by using his powers and talking smooth shit. Magneto wants revenge. Oh, Emma Frost is working for Bacon as well. I mention that because this bullshit will come up again soon. Magneto deflects a bullet and hits Xavier putting him in a wheelchair. Beast is also here. Beast pops up many times in these films with no regard to what he has done in the past.


In the 1970's Wolverine and Creed are not as close and fighting in the Vietnam War. Creed tries to get his rape on, Wolverine stops him, they are sent to die by firing squad and are recruited by William Stryker. But...Days Of Future Past happens. Wolverine is sent back in time to this same period where he works with Xavier to stop Mystique from killing Bolivar Trask. Magneto chucks Wolverine into a river where Mystique disguised as Stryker gets him out. Forget that happens because it makes no sense and is never referenced again. In the late 70's Creed fake kills Wolverine's woman. Stryker (real one not Mystique) convinces him to coat his bones in Adamantium. Deadpool is also here but so is Will I Am so fuck this movie. Stryker shoots Wolverine with a Adamantium bullet making him forget everything.


Also in this movie (X-Men Origins: Wolverine) a bunch of mutant kids are saved. Emma Frost being one of them. Yeah, the same one that was a grown ass woman in the 60's is now a child. Cyclops is also there but forget that because when he meets Wolverine later there is no mention of it. Same for Xavier who looks like old Xavier who sees Wolverine.

Its the 1980's now and Apocalypse wakes up to watch some TV. He recruits some Horsemen in the form of Storm, Magneto, Psylocke, and Angel. They are stopped by a group of mutant kids that have never worked together as well as Quicksilver and Nightcrawler. I'll get back to Nightcrawler and Angel later. They free Wolverine from the Weapon X program. A few years later in The Last Stand Xavier and Magneto are buddies and Xavier can walk. No real explanation but he can.


They skip the 90's I guess and not we are into the next millennium. Wolverine meets Rogue in a bar and ends up fighting Sabretooth. No mention of them being step-brothers but they hate each other a lot. Sabretooth is also very different looking and less cool. Magneto and Mystique are best buds and Xavier never not once mentions the fact that a naked blue child showed up in his kitchen as a child and that they loved one another very much. Beast is also here but not in Beast form because he is on TV looking like a regular ass dude. Nightcrawler is seen as this brand new mutant that they try to capture and no one mentions the fact that he was with them as a kid. How many goddamn blue skinned teleporting kids did they know?!


Xavier is also confused that Magneto can block his powers but in First Class that helmet that he wears already exists. Its existed for over 40 goddamn years! Guess he forgot. He also forgot that magneto helped build Cerebro...but not quite because another movie said that the CIA did.

A few movies later Jean Grey turns into Phoenix after killing Cyclops during the beginning credits. Wolverine kills her but not after she also kills Xavier. But don't worry. He put his mind into some other dudes body. He later looks like himself because plot. There is also a mutant cure which Beast is fascinated by even though he made something just like it in the 60's. Mystique is hit with it and Magneto is like “Bye, bitch!” and abandons her. Magneto and his crew with Juggernaut (who is supposed to be Xavier's brother of some sort but is not in this series whatsoever) head to Angel's dad's lab to wreck shit. Angel is not connected at all to any other version of him. Like, at all. And don't bring up Moira MacTaggert. She and Xavier were together but then not and then he gave her that Superman style Bill Cosby Special kiss to make her forget shit. Then he gave her her memory back but in later films they have never met. Argh!


After 2010 Wolverine is a miserable asshole who can not handle Jean Grey being dead. He wants to die but can't because he keeps on healing and shit. The dude he saved during that atomic explosion wants to live longer so he offers to take Wolverine's powers away and let him die. The old guy becomes Silver Samurai, his daughter is Lady Deathstrike but not quite even though she in full Lady Deathstrike mode in a previous film fighting Wolverine, and all is well with Wolverine. Magneto who magically has his powers back after having them removed after Mystique did and Xavier (who is alive now?!) tell Wolverine that Sentinels are coming. Okay. Sentinels. These are the biggest dick tease of this entire series. That and the Danger Room.

Eight years later in 2013 the future is fucked. Wolverine is sent back in time into his own body and has metal claws which he shouldn't at this point. He and Xavier try to stop Mystique from killing Trask who was played by a big Black man in one movie and is now a White dwarf. They succeed and the future is nice. Cyclops is alive, Beast looks like Beast, mutant kind seems to be doing perfectly fine now. Yay! Right?


Nope.

Because six years later the future is all fucked up again and no new mutants have been born in years which makes zero sense considering how many kids are running around doing spooky shit. This movie don't fit with anything that has happened in previous films because things are done and said that don't even match up with the bullshit that these movies themselves have laid out for us. The Sentinel shit didn't happen and wipe out humanity because they stopped it in the past. Wolverine has clones that were gathered from a movie time line that was supposedly fixed/changed for the better. So X-23 shouldn't even exist. None of this should exist.


Once you introduce the aspect of time travel to repair a problem you have already lost because the only way to fix it is to time travel some more. That is how you end up with so many shitty ass Terminator movies and Back To The Future 3. If you say something is an alternate time line I just hear you saying you are copping out and trying to make something new while holding on to the fear of making something brand new and letting go of old shit. They could have rebooted this film so many times over. This series has been going for damn near twenty years now. I'm done with this shitty franchise. Either do a hard reboot and stop sucking Wolverine's dick as if he is the coolest character ever made or focus on the thousands of other characters Marvel owns.

Click here for previous You Had One Job.

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