X-Men: Days of Future Past

[Uncanny Web-Slinger]

Hmm. . .Puck maybe?.

It's rumoured he'll play Bolivar Trask.

Singer is as responsible for the wave of serious comic movies in the 2000s+ as anyone else due to his work in X-Men. I give him much more credit for influencing comic films than Whedon honestly, but putting that aside, I think one filmmaker has as much right as another to take some liberties. For me, it's a question of how much is too much. I think Singer et al. did go too far with First Class, but they didn't have much of a choice considering he wanted to do a '60s period piece and the previous films had original members of the team active as of the '2000s or whatever.

 

[karamazov80]

All filmakers have the right to do whatever they want with these movies. They are movies. Not comic books. They have no connection whatsoever other then in name only.

All this nerdy **** doesn't mean anything if the film is actually good.

I don't agree with this. If that's the case, then why base them on comics at all? I think there has to be a balance. But I do think filmmakers have to take some liberties in order to tell new stories. I don't want to see DOFP the story revisited faithfully on the screen. I've already seen that story done, and done better than any film could make it! But the essence of characters, and the essence of compelling comic stories can make for compelling new stories in the medium of film. The more you can reference these essences, the more fulfilling I think films can be, because those of us who are fans of comics (the real core audience for these movies) want to be reminded of this, and want to "geek out" over it. I do want the founding X-Men to be Angel, Beast, Iceman, Cyclops, and Jean. I also don't want to see Hulk as a recurring Avenger. But, these are some of the concessions we have to accept, and at least Singer and Whedon have both managed to capture some of the important essence that makes these teams different and memorable to comic fans.

 

[Deckard]

Forget source material just look at the friggin cast. It's everyone from X3 + everyone from First Class. That's just too many damn characters. Marvels doing the same thing, Avengers was already character heavy. Every single character is coming back for 2 plus an entire space team of talking racoon people plus maybe black panther, quicksilver etc etc. Why? That's an awful lotta fan service for a studio that should "throw out the source material". What I've seen is that the movies that do use the graphic novels and other source material as closely as possible seem to have the better more compelling stories.

Every tweet from Marc Webb has gotten me excited about SM2. Every single tweet so far from Singer has made me doubt this movie more and more. Wolverine with Beast in the X-Mansion in the 70s, possible inclusion of Trask even though hes already a 50 year old black guy in X3, leather costumes on pregnant mediocre actresses.

 

[karamazov80]

A huge ensemble can definitely work. Look at some of the old war films like Midway. Or on a smaller scale something like the Dirty Dozen. You limit the ability to do specific character development, but I think there is definitely a place for a film that fits in lots of moving parts to tell a different kind of story.

 

[Darth Zangetsu]

All filmakers have the right to do whatever they want with these movies. They are movies. Not comic books. They have no connection whatsoever other then in name only.

All this nerdy **** doesn't mean anything if the film is actually good.

Yes and No. I do agree that a filmaker should do everything possible in order to make the best film possible, but there has to be a point where it's not acceptable. An example of good change is Bruce Timm and Paul Dini's change to Mr Freeze in Batman the Animated Series. They made his story less cheesey, and gave the character way more depth than ever before. In fact their version of his orgin was adopted as the official origin, until DC rebooted again. An example of this done wrong for me is the new World War Z film. I love that book. But the film has taken such huge licenses with the source material, that the only thing similar is the title. If they had shown that same trailer and it was called Zombie Apocalypse(or whatever) I would have looked at it and said ok, I'll keep an eye on it as i like zombies. But by Calling it World War Z, and saying its a film adaptation of the book, yet remove the books theme entirely is wrong. At that point you are using the good will the novel generated to sell something that is completely different.

Just my 2c.

 

[Uncanny Web-Slinger]

A huge ensemble can definitely work. Look at some of the old war films like Midway. Or on a smaller scale something like the Dirty Dozen. You limit the ability to do specific character development, but I think there is definitely a place for a film that fits in lots of moving parts to tell a different kind of story.

X2 managed the 11+ characters well. Some got too little and others too much but it handled the characters development better than anyother team movie.

But it had:

Bobby & Rogues blossoming relationship.
Bobby leaving behind his biological family for his genetic family
Wolverine's Weapon X past
Nightcrawler & Storms religous relationship
Stryker and Xaviers story concerning Jason.
Magneto & Mystique's attempt to wipe out all of Humanity
Pyro's journey from hero to villian
Jeans loss of control over her powers and sacrifice

It moved between these subplots excellently. I have faith Singer will weave this movies characters well.

 

[karamazov80]

What I've seen is that the movies that do use the graphic novels and other source material as closely as possible seem to have the better more compelling stories.

Which ones would you say stuck more closely to the sources? Like I posted before, I think just about every comic film has taken some significant liberties apart from Watchmen. First Class was one of the best comic films of the past few years IMO and it took more liberties than nearly all the rest. Nolan's filmas are an even better example, since apart from Batman himself they only kept some very superficial similarities to the comics, but they were considered huge critical successes. Of all the new Marvel U films, Captain America probably stuck most closely to the source, but it was considered mediocre by many (I personally think it is pretty good though).

 

[Josette]

My anticipation for this movie takes a hit every time I read a news article.

I was excited as hell for a First Class sequel, but that's apparently not what we're getting. We're getting what seems to be Bryan Singer's apology - "I'm sorry about X3 and here's my fix it to the X-Men universe!".

Too many characters. Not enough focus on the First Class team for me.

Singer should've made X4 - and let Vaughn make XFC2. Both could've been great. This just seems like a convoluted, overly crowded mess.

 

[Deckard]

On the upside after Singer ****s this up they can have Brett Ratner come back and re-retcon X3 back into existance for X-4, and then maybe Vaughn can come back and make a good one again set in beween 3 and 4. In between those we need a 3rd attrocious Wolverine movie though.

 

[Uncanny Web-Slinger]

Fox and Singer are 3/4 on their X-Men movies imo. and 3/4 of them have Singer in some form of imput

 

[CelticPredator]

Yes and No. I do agree that a filmaker should do everything possible in order to make the best film possible, but there has to be a point where it's not acceptable. An example of good change is Bruce Timm and Paul Dini's change to Mr Freeze in Batman the Animated Series. They made his story less cheesey, and gave the character way more depth than ever before. In fact their version of his orgin was adopted as the official origin, until DC rebooted again. An example of this done wrong for me is the new World War Z film. I love that book. But the film has taken such huge licenses with the source material, that the only thing similar is the title. If they had shown that same trailer and it was called Zombie Apocalypse(or whatever) I would have looked at it and said ok, I'll keep an eye on it as i like zombies. But by Calling it World War Z, and saying its a film adaptation of the book, yet remove the books theme entirely is wrong. At that point you are using the good will the novel generated to sell something that is completely different.

Just my 2c.

Yes. But...

I'm talking about the little things. They don't matter. If the film is better having character love X vs. loving character love Y...then is it really that big of a deal? Does it really hurt the overall film? Or is it just nerdy nitpicking?

 

[Biojex]

Yes. But...

I'm talking about the little things. They don't matter. If the film is better having character love X vs. loving character love Y...then is it really that big of a deal? Does it really hurt the overall film? Or is it just nerdy nitpicking?

Even the nerdy nitpickers will accept something if it's done well.

 

[Deckard]

X1 was/is ok, was alot better when it came out, but as the pool of Superhero films fill up it sinks further and further, mainly do to effects already being dated.

X2 is pretty darn good, a few minor gripes but overall really solid.

Wolverine was working on a 7/10 for me upto the wife is still alive reveal/mutant deadpool/sabertoohteamup,memory loss and then it's just an unsalvagable trainwreck I'll never bother with again.

X3 is X3, we don't even need to go here.

First Class was easily the best imo in terms of focusing on the characters and their relationships with one another. Fassbender was really compelling to watch with Bacon and McAvoy.

Hoping The Wolverine will be great.

As Jossette said, everytime I see someone added to this it gets further away from an First Class sequel and becomes clear Singer is meddling bigtime with the script. By the way he's bringing back old characters one at a time, its pretty telling to me that they weren't a part of the original plan and I don't like the idea that he's making this all up as he goes based on who he can convince to come back.

Yes. But...

I'm talking about the little things. They don't matter. If the film is better having character love X vs. loving character love Y...then is it really that big of a deal? Does it really hurt the overall film? Or is it just nerdy nitpicking?

IM1 and 3 both draw from the Extremis storyline, both diverged but IM3 moreso and it's getting alot more heat in general than IM1 did imo. And again for me the Mandarin wasn't the biggest problem, it was the sense of removing Tony from danger like they did with Indy and the over excess of comedy. So yes it's mainly nerdy nitpicking but sometimes they get stuff right too. Regardless of how cool you found Trevor he still would have been infinitely cooler with actual magic rings.

 

[CelticPredator]

I didn't care about The Mandarin either way. I enjoyed the film for being a character flick and it's noirish style, and different tone from the previous films.

it being really funny, helped a lot.

I'm just tired of "Oh Tony Stark would never do this! Because in issue whatever of whatever he did this!"

That stuff just doesn't apply to the films. They're regular adaptations. Not direct page to screen adaptations.

 

[Deckard]

Yes but I think alot of that also came from what we've seen of this character in 4 previous movies already. Theres a certain level of acceptable complaints about character similar to the way Alfred feels like a way differant person in TDKR. Alot of this is because Favs been replaced at least though, unlike Nolan just ceasing to care.

 

[intothevoid]

Yes but I think alot of that also came from what we've seen of this character in 4 previous movies already. Theres a certain level of acceptable complaints about character similar to the way Alfred feels like a way differant person in TDKR. Alot of this is because Favs been replaced at least though, unlike Nolan just ceasing to care.

Hmm Nolan ceased to care so he spent 2 yrs of his life on something that was boring to him instead of doing 129301890 other projects that people wanted him to do instead.

Yeaaaaahhh ok

 

[CelticPredator]

Michael Bay hasn't cared about making a Transformers movie since the first...and he's devoted 8 years of his life to making them.

 

[tomandshell]

Money motivates some people just as much as (or more than) passion and personal interest. Is my trash collector doing it because he cares, or for a paycheck? Michael Bay will handle trash every day for the rest of his life if it pays well.

 

[Deckard]

Well I'm not about to get drawn into a debate with Nolan's number one fan here since I already know theres no reasoning with Nolan fans, but yes, I believe and have believed since production his heart was not in this one. He didn't want to play with his Batman toys anymore after Heath died and I believe he did it avoid backlash from walking away. Dressing up like Joker to kill babies, having RT have to close comments for the first time ever, these aren't rational people. After seeing the movie 3 times now, I not only have no desire to ever watch it again, I can safely say that it is not the technicaly proficient director at work I've come to know since long before BB came out.

 

[intothevoid]

It's pretty sad when people start judging someone's artistic integrity when he's made an entire career and reputation out of doing films on subjects that are dear to him.

Nolan may sell out one day - but that day hasn't come yet.

You may or may not like TDKR, but don't stoop to such depths to justify your dislike for it