[Image Source: Wikipedia]
Perhaps
Dark Phoenix was a creative casualty of corporate wrangling via the finalized Disney/Fox combination that brought the previously Fox-licensed X-Men characters fully back into the Mouse House’s Marvel Cinematic Universe. Perhaps the
X-Men movies should have called it a day (no pun intended) with the far superior
Days of Future Past. (Don’t get me started on the candy coated cluster that was its follow-up
Apocalypse.) Perhaps longtime
writer/new-time director Simon Kinberg should have just stuck with the writing (though that isn’t very good either in
Dark Phoenix and not up to par with his previous work). Or perhaps we all are just (finally) suffering from movie superhero fatigue.
All I know is that Dark Phoenix is a soapy bore, not unwatchable by any means, but not a hellvua lot of of fun either.
I began this week taking in erstwhile Wolverine Hugh Jackman’s sunny, zippy one-man The Man. The Music. The Show. at Detroit’s Little Caesars Arena, and I ended the week with this X-Men: Last Stand retread that made me long for Hugh to show up and sing a few more Peter Allen-penned show-tunes while swiveling his bedazzled 50-year-old-hips. Hugh was a wise man to finally walk away from this sputtering franchise and spend the summer doing what he does (and loves) best. Thank you, X-Men, for giving Hugh his start in this country … and, 20 years later, for setting him free.
Dark Phoenix attempts to right the wrongs of Last Stand, an over-baked muddle from 13 years ago that first told the tale of mutant Jean Grey’s descent into madness via a cosmic-based parasitic “Phoenix force.” I know to non-geeks it sounds absurd, but the original “Phoenix/Dark Phoenix” story-line by Chris Claremont and John Byrne from the late 70s is a beloved one, revolutionary in its day for its exploration of gender issues, agency/autonomy, and how absolute power can corrupt absolutely.
[Image Source: Wikipedia]
Don’t get me wrong.
Dark Phoenix tries. Really, really hard. And that’s part of its problem. Too self-serious by half, yet slapdash in its execution, the film takes a solid cast – Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy, Nicholas Hoult, Jennifer Lawrence, Jessica Chastain, Evan Peters, Alexandra Shipp, and Sophie Turner (as the titular antihero) – portraying classic Marvel characters, all lovingly re-established in a fresh, postmodern way with
X-Men: First Class, and squanders the whole shebang with heaps of illogical character motivation and turgid dialogue. As Fassbender’s Magneto cautions his bromantic rival James McAvoy’s Charles Xavier: “You’re always sorry. And there’s always a speech. But we no longer care.” True dat.
It’s a shame. It truly is. The series could have gone out on a high-note, pulling all the topsy turvy threads of time travel, lost souls, and marginalized identity into one super nova of an ending … if they’d just have followed the blueprint of the original damn comics. Seriously, look at how many Oscar winners/nominees are in the cast; yet, at times, I thought I was watching Guiding Light: The Mutant Years.
[Image Source: Wikipedia]
C’est la vie. The plot, as it is, details how young Jean Grey was orphaned (or was she?) by telepathic powers run amok. Charles Xavier rescues her (or does he?) and raises her as his own, always wary of the limitless powers at her disposal. One epic space shuttle tragedy later, a now-adult Jean Grey finds herself imbued with the nuclear power of a thousand solar systems, but she really just wants to mope around, glare a bit, and throw her enemies into the sides of buildings. Chastain as some alien despot with the albino aesthetic of Edgar Winter seeks Jean’s newfound power for herself. And, blah, blah, blah … more moping, more glaring, more throwing.
Jennifer Lawrence’s Mystique notes to Xavier, “By the way … we women are always saving the men around here. You might want to change the name of this group to X-WOMEN.” Now, THAT’s a movie I think I would have preferred to see. And, as poorly written as that line is, it says something about Lawrence’s uncanny abilities that it lands like the best zinger you’ve ever heard from a Noel Coward comedy. Otherwise, Lawrence is clearly just collecting a paycheck here, waiting for her contract obligations to final run out.
Photos taken by my parents Monday night in Detroit
Back to Hugh. If Dark Phoenix truly is the death knell of the X-Men movie universe, perhaps the rest of the cast should follow suit and launch their own respective concert tours. As noted here earlier, his show is an absolute delight … and also a bit surreal, given that it is the culmination of Jackman’s wildly varied career, plus a melange of influences and experiences close to his heart. It is, in essence, a two-hour midlife crisis, Vegas-style, but a kicky, charming, loving, unmissable one. [Photo album here.]
What I also learned this week is that there are two kinds of people: those who know that Hugh Jackman sings … and those that don’t. As to the former, all I had to do was mention I saw him in concert, and they rattled forth rapturous perspectives on which songster Hugh they loved the most: Les Miserables, Greatest Showman, Oklahoma, The Boy from Oz … all of which were featured in Monday night’s show. As to the latter, I was met with a quizzical gaze and a “what did he do for two hours?!”
Ah, what didn’t he do? Tap dancing to AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck”? Check. Channeling his best Gene Kelly for a Singin’ in the Rain homage? Check. Working through what felt like some Freudian confessionals about family, romance, and fatherhood? Check. Offering a salute to the atrocities experienced by the aboriginal peoples of his Australian homeland, complete with didgeridoo? Check.
There were some missteps Monday night. A blown mic … or three. Some faulty projection screens. Heartfelt but at times overly fawning tributes to Detroit (we ate it up … but at times it got a bit thick). A strangely sequenced second act that seemed to jettison the chronological overview of the first act for a random grab-bag of themes and ideas. I also admit that I wouldn’t have minded a bit more attention paid to his Tony-winning role in The Boy From Oz. The medley of Allen’s more obvious (for American ears) pop tunes was understandable as was the Rip Taylor-style vamping in the audience; yet, I longed for more of Peter Allen, the brilliant singer/songwriter and a bit less of the theme park character flash on display. That said, these are all minor quibbles in an otherwise extraordinary evening.
My hunch is that our singing, dancing, jazz-hand flinging former-“Wolverine” will be riding this arena-gig until the wheels fall off. The Hugh Jackman on display Monday night was simply too exquisitely blissed out not to, and, as a result, I’m sure he will be playing every arena, concert venue, and state fairgrounds into which he can get his twinkly visage booked. Given what I just experienced this afternoon watching Dark Phoenix, that’s one damn smart career move!
[Image Source: Wikipedia]
______________________
Reel Roy Reviews is now TWO books! You can purchase your copies by clicking here (print and digital). In addition to online ordering at Amazon or from the publisher Open Books, the first book is currently is being carried by Bookbound, Common Language Bookstore, and Crazy Wisdom Bookstore and Tea Room in Ann Arbor, Michigan and by Green Brain Comics in Dearborn, Michigan. My mom Susie Duncan Sexton’s Secrets of an Old Typewriter series is also available on Amazon and at Bookbound and Common Language.
-2.png?upscale=true&width=1116&upscale=true&name=Email%20Headers%202023%20(9)-2.png)
![Description: Film poster; Source: Wikipedia [linked]; Portion used: Film poster only; Low resolution? Sufficient resolution for illustration, but considerably lower resolution than original. Other information: Intellectual property by film studio. Non-free media use rationales: Non-free media use rationale - Article/review; Purpose of use: Used for purposes of critical commentary and illustration in an educational article about the film. The poster is used as the primary means of visual identification of this article topic. Replaceable? Protected by copyright, therefore a free use alternative won't exist.](https://reelroyreviews.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/x-men-days-of-future-past.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:X-Men_Days_of_Future_Past_poster.jpg)
Reel Roy Reviews 