X-Men: Days Of Future Past (2014)
Well that about wraps up everything. "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" didn't happen since a young Stryker turns up here in completely the wrong place. And even "The Wolverine" didn't happen since Wolverine still has his metal claws in the future. In case anyone is wondering, Xavier switched minds with his identical twin. It's vaguely shown in the after-credits sequence for "X-Men 3: The Last Stand", so that clears that up. The only thing that doesn't seem to have been tied up properly is that in the original trilogy Xavier claims he met Erik when he was 17. Oh well, they can't tidy up EVERYTHING.
Considering how well everything is tidied up, this is a pretty remarkable script. Some credit clearly needs to be given to Jane Goldman who has worked as a writer on most of Matthew Vaughn's movies and was involved in initial work on the story for Days of Future Past before Simon Kinberg took on the heavy lifting. Kinberg has clearly grown as a writer since working on "X-Men 3: The Last Stand". And it should be noted that his projects, while not generally perfect, are very often good fun. (And on the poorly received "This Means War" Kinberg was one of two writers, with the horrendous McG of "Terminator Salvation" fame holding creative control.)
Still, in the opening to "Days of Future Past" I felt we were still a little bit stuck in "The Last Stand" style of storytelling. There's some voiceover narration to bridge the gap to our apocalyptic future, then a confusing but spectacular action sequence, and finally some out-and-out exposition to explain the action sequence and to set up the main plot of the movie. It's all a little awkward. But thankfully the rest of the film more than makes up for the convoluted set-up scenes.
Where the movie really gets started is with Wolverine in the past trying to take on a mission to which he is clearly unsuited. (His healing powers make him the only one who can make the trip.) Wolverine wasn't exactly absent from "First Class", but he only had a cameo role there and never properly had a chance to meet the First Class crew. My favourite scenes in "Days of Future Past" involve Xavier giving Wolverine lip. They do not get on at all and it is wonderful.
Still, while Xavier and Magneto will always be the major characters in the X-Men movies, the real star here is Mystique. She's a proper badass this time around. Still, her motivations aren't as fleshed out as I'd like them to be. In fact character motivations in general seem a little bit odd towards the end of the film. It's not that the characters are acting oddly in the final act, but more that the specific mindsets of the characters are either unclear or less nuanced than they were towards the end of the last X-Men film.
Another character motivation which seems unclear for pretty much the entire movie was that of Peter Dinklage's character Trask, the mastermind behind the sentinels. I mean sure, I suppose there's no problem with him just being concerned with national security, rather like the senator in the first X-Men movie, but with Peter Dinklage in the role I'd always presumed his presumed his role would be a little more complex than that.
And in the end, that's the biggest problem with "X-Men: Days Of Future Past": It's not complex enough. Considering the awkward time travel plot connecting two different branches of the franchise and resolving fan issues with "X-Men: The Last Stand" and the enormous success this movie has in making that simple, this might seem like an odd criticism. But while the plot is made miraculously simple, the characters feel less fully fleshed out than "First Class" had caused us to expect. It shows just how far superhero movies have come that "over-simplistic character motivations" actually sounds like a reasonable criticism of a comic-book movie. What's more, if the filmmakers take this criticism seriously, then the X-Men franchise could be once again leading the pack just like it was back in the early 2000s.
"Days Of Future Past" might not be as character focussed as "First Class", but it involves a similarly high level of quality. At the very least, it is enormous fun and a real treat for fans of the franchise. (Unless your favourite bit was the standalone Wolverine movies, in which case you may feel a little cheated.)
A+