In the months building up to X3: The Last Stand, it seemed to have the makings of the greatest comic movie ever, topping the first two X-Men installments.  It had great writing and directing, the entire cast returning, as well as additions of great actors such as Vinnie Jones and Kelsey Grammer.  Previews showed sweeping battles that seemed reminiscent of scenes of a futuristic war-torn Earth in the Terminator movies.  Then it was released, and will probably be remembered as one of the most disappointing comic movies of all time. 

What went wrong? There are several things that the movie got wrong.  Starting with the basics, it was far too simplistic and a jarringly irregular pace. The movie wanted to have the fast-pace, but with all that this “final installment” had to cover, to have such a fast pace left gaping plot holes and just seemed to be a jumble of action scenes, with little or no reason and logic involved.  The creators tried to simulate character development and emotion and interrupted this system of action sequences with forced emotion scenes to give it depth.  In X2, we actually felt bad for characters like Nightcrawler or Rogue (in the first movie).  The “character” scenes were so forced, it would be impossible for the viewer to empathize with the characters.  In actuality, these scenes were terribly cliché and obviously fake, the stuff of bad soap operas.  The producers couldn’t decide if they wanted to do a simple kid’s movie or a movie that would grip adults.  Likewise, the movie was far too simple.  The first two movies had build-up of the scenario of having mutants, introducing characters and the situations, with good plot twists and simply came off as intelligent writing.  With Last Stand the plot breaks down to this: There is a cure for mutants. Magneto doesn’t like it and will fight the government over it.  The X-Men are going to save the humans because it’s the right thing to do.  That’s it! This may be engaging for Saturday morning cartoons, but the plot falls short of what the first two movies were like.

What is more appalling is how the writers handled the characters.  When you undertake something like the X-Men, you have to bear in mind that some of the viewers have been fans of these characters for over forty years.  Bryan Singer did an amazing job of converting the comic book characters into being Hollywood-worthy.  The creators of X3 had a relatively simple task.  They just had to continue the style and characterization that Bryan had set precedents for.  In X3, Cyclops has gone from being this fairly assertive leader into this blubbering baby (granted, he would being grieved, but not to the extent that he was losing control).  And with his death, they completely disrespected the character and his history.  He didn’t get a heroic death, or much of one at all.  He just… wasn’t on screen anymore.  No explanation for why she did it.  The viewer was left expecting him to jump out at any time, but he never did.

  Rogue was terribly botched, doing things (accepting the cure) without so much as a big debate scene going on.  It was like she was put under the table as far as importance.  Wolverine lost his rogue nature and became a sort of Mr. Rodgers of the group.  Professor X lost his cool, calm demeanor and became this mean, cunning man who was as irrational as Magneto.  Magneto lost all since of his original intelligence and became simply “kill humans”.  With Phoenix, there was no proper explanation of her behavior or origins (completely rewriting comic history too).  And, unlike in the real Dark Phoenix saga, there was no final redemption of Jean Grey before she died, with her comic death being a sacrifice.  It’s like the writer’s didn’t know what to do with her after the Phoenix hint at the end of X2 – one more clue that Marvel should have waited for Bryan Singer to come back after Superman, to complete his vision.

It is now clear that the first two X-Men movies were all Bryan Singer’s vision and their greatness is attributed to him.  When he moved on to Superman, Marvel made the move to hire Brett Ratner (Rush Hour).  Fans were skeptical, but the trailers seemed to keep fairly close to the franchise’s style.  However upon the film’s release, our greatest fears were realized.  Ratner had no sense of style and completely lost all sense of what the X-Men movies are about and how to keep it within the franchise. 

In the effort of retaining continuity, the director and writers made X3 in a similar way that The Godfather Part III was made, by taking scenes and exact concepts that made the first two parts so successful and meshing it together into a repetitive, yet convoluted film.  It is as if the creators of X3 ate the first two movies’ scripts, and regurgitated the monstrosity that X3 became.  For example, you’ve got a government organization involved in some sort of conspiracy against mutants as the main villain, like in X2.  The big battle is Magneto, with his band of rogue mutants, like in the original film.  There is an emotional death of Jean Grey, just like in the second movie.  You even have the final battle on an island just like in the first X-Men movie. 

X3 unfortunately makes the X-Men series Marvel’s version of what happened to the Batman franchise in the mid-90s.  With Batman, Tim Burton’s first two movies were great successes, then the producers brought in Joel Schumacher who completely changed the vision of the following sequels.  He did so to the extreme that Batman and Robin was a campy kid movie that retained almost none of the qualities that made the franchise so great.  The emotions, the pace, the intricate plots, the character development, and great dialogue of the first two movies were lost in X3, much as in the Batman franchise. 

It’d be a shame to end the franchise on this note, however in a time of Rambo, Rocky, and Indiana Jones’ sequels, we know it probably isn’t over.