Escape to the Movies: X-Men: First Class
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Welcome to the internet!Optimystic said:
Also; because getting things right is something the universe ought to strive for.
I really liked it 
The first two movies were good, but in comparison this feels a lot more like an X-Men movie. It has more of the tone and the themes that I associate with the franchise, and it's such a relief to let the X-Men movie be about something other than Wolverine for once. I would have preferred the actual first class X-men team, but whatever, it's nice to see some more underrepresented mutants on screen too, and this way they can line it up with the other movies so I'll buy it ^^
They've set it up for quite a sequel, I hope it continues as good as it has started, if they do, there's really no need for Marvel to take the franchise back
The first two movies were good, but in comparison this feels a lot more like an X-Men movie. It has more of the tone and the themes that I associate with the franchise, and it's such a relief to let the X-Men movie be about something other than Wolverine for once. I would have preferred the actual first class X-men team, but whatever, it's nice to see some more underrepresented mutants on screen too, and this way they can line it up with the other movies so I'll buy it ^^
They've set it up for quite a sequel, I hope it continues as good as it has started, if they do, there's really no need for Marvel to take the franchise back
With you as the universe's arbiter, I take it?Smokescreen said:
They did get it right (both the trailer and the movie) - your disagreement on either point isn't actually relevant to me.
I was expecting disappointment like many others but the film actually shined for me. I wouldn't rate it alongside Dark Knight but it was a damn good comic book movie. They made the characters actually interesting instead of just making us feast on Hugh Jackmans best Clint Eastwood impression for 2 hours
Not really relevent as animators have always done fairly well with comics and super hero fight scenes. We've seen what now must be dozens of shows based around printed comic characters from both DC and Marvel.honestdiscussioner said:
The issue here is dealing with live action and the writers/directors that deal with live action.
As far as that trailer goes, it's very pretty, but I'm not a fan. Generally speaking I'm getting tired of the giant sith-wank off that is the Old Republic promotional material. It seems like every time we see the good guys they are getting beaten down or running away, and even in "Hope" which this is a prequel to, we don't even know if Shan actually took a Sith out for once since we didn't have a body. Basically the devs are making no bones about which side they favor, and the game seems like it's going to be heavilt afflicted by "Alliance Syndrome". Quite sad actually since while I'll try it, I've even said flat out on their forums that while I'll probably play both sides, I plan to main the good guys, and if I yet again feel like that makes me a second class citizen I'm just not going to keep re-upping my subscription even if the game otherwise walks on water for us. I would have hoped EA would have looked at how the promotions for WAR sort of predicted what was going to happen with the game and exercised some authority here, but that doesn't appear to be the case. We'll see what happens but going by the cinematics, art, and other things, I'm getting a pretty bad vibe overall. I don't expect the good guys to dominate, I expect in a competitive, factional MMORPG for there to be parity. I get tired of the whole "Alliance/Order kiddies suck" thing while we watch Horde/Destruction/Whomever pretty much dominate all the leaderboards for both PVP and PVE accomplishments. With millions of players on both sides it's generally indicative of inherant game balance issues, oftentimes it's not a matter of one thing, but dozens or even hundreds of little, subtle things, that add up. Penny Arcade once called rolling alliance "one of the biggest gips in gaming" and really they weren't kidding.
At any rate this is entirely off subject, and in the end I'm pretty POed with EA/Bioware for releasing another cinematic trailer, rather than giving us a release date. My above comments aside, I do intend to give them a chance, it's just that I expect this to be yet another case where the bad guys wind up being favored by the Devs and wind up dominating the game, rather than seeing a balanced enviroment that goes back and forth.
Well my entire point is that the animators know how to do it well, and also to say that Ryan vs. Dorkman were able to pull of some really great coordination. If they took their notes properly there is no reason they should be able to pull it off. I think we can both agree that they haven't so far, but it should be doable.Therumancer said:
As far as the whole Sith thing, I think it only makes sense. Sith are always the aggressors, except for maybe the original trilogy. Whether that will translate over to the game itself, I don't know. I haven't played any MMO's, I do hope it is fair. If I do play the Old Republic, it will be as a Jedi. However the point is that whatever the story background is, THAT is how you shoot a sci-fi action sequence. Even taking the Jedi out of it, the part with the space cowboy next to the trooper was fairly awesome.
Thanks for the great review Bob. You did a neat trick making me interested without giving too much away. I just felt...well kind of sad when I heard there was another movie. I didn't plan to see it in the theater or had any spark of hope for it to be interesting. But you and I see more or less eye to eye on movies so Ill shell out the cash and give it a whirl.
I was just rewatching Xmen origins (and Laughing my arse off because its a unfinished version, so i can see all the special effects and wires), i noticed that Emma Frost looks about 15 in it, so im figuring that First Class is ignoring all of the previous movies and starting up its own continuity
A very good movie. I saw it a few days ago, and I'm going to see it at the cinema again. I can't remember the last time I did that - probably The Dark Knight.
Concerning TDK, my opinion is obviously in the minority. While I loved TDK, I don't think it was the #1 superhero movie of all time. That title, IMO, belongs to Batman Begins.
I actually got a chill when Banshee was onscreen. He's always been my favorite in the X-Men, and seeing him onscreen -at last - was a real treat.
Concerning TDK, my opinion is obviously in the minority. While I loved TDK, I don't think it was the #1 superhero movie of all time. That title, IMO, belongs to Batman Begins.
I actually got a chill when Banshee was onscreen. He's always been my favorite in the X-Men, and seeing him onscreen -at last - was a real treat.
It's better than the Dark knight...but I have a very low opinion of the Dark knight. Such a overrated meh film...hey look as the whole world jobs to the Joker...Criminals, Batman, the police , the national guard..you name it they act like idiots. I mean the national guard somehow misses 50+ barrels of explosives being loaded on two boats? Not just a single explosive in the engine room or the bottom that would sink the ship. Really, tons of barrels just magically got loaded on the ship and no one bothered to check it for safety before they started moving? Sorry fail. Everything just has too much plot conveince. Anyone care debate I can go on as I have lists of stupid things that happen in this supposedly "intelligent" film.
honestdiscussioner said:
Well, the Space Cowboy (Smuggler) bit actually bugged me a bit. Since we're talking about direction and so on, and comparing this to "X-men", the simple fact that they guy was in custody makes it a "WTF" moment when it turns out he has not one, but TWO ginormous pistols on him which defy concealment. A point just as bad as the whole "Brass Bed" thing in X-men, so really if you wanted to make a case for this animation/writing team doing a good job... really they didn't. See all that "awesome" has to hold up to examination, which is exactly the point, especially when your trying to engage in serious storytelling. In this case the animators wanted to have fight scene with the smuggler doing something cool, so they just did it, ignoring the context of the rest of the entire cinematic. The very fact that people will look at something like that and think it's cool is part of the problem, and also why people making things like movies insult our intelligence, especially when they get progressively lazier about it.
As far as the Jedi-Sith thing goes, remember this is a prequel. The Jedi are not quite what they were in the movies. In the movies the order was being lead to it's own destruction due to it being time for a new period of balance, heading towards an era of evil. In ORO we're supposed to be dealing with a period of balance already in place, heading towards a multi-thousand year reign of good which ends with the movie timelines. The Sith are not just supposed to lose this one, but be so entirely wiped out that nobody even knows what a Sith was anymore come the movie timeline. Not onlt that but it involves the Genocide of the various sith empire species like the so called "Sith Pureblood". The Jedi order being a far differant animal than the movies. They don't just run off The Sith, they chase them down and kill them all off to the littlest baby.
I could say a lot of things about Star Wars, prophecies, etc... I've gone into it befoe, but it would be off topic. In the end that doesn't matter all that much as for the purposes of this game the two sides are supposed to be fairly even for a brief moment before the good guys dominate as dictated by The Force (and as we know from history). These cinematics in general show very little to present a balanced universe. What's more as time goes on, and we see all these awesome Sith and relatively generic Jedi and Republic guys who are always running away, the question arises as to who is going to want to play a Republic character? What's more I see very little even implying that Bioware "gets" this universe at times and realizes that The Sith are supposed to get pounded come the end of this, with Anakin's "killing the younglings" stunt being nothing compared to the absolutly biblical wrath that is going to fall on The Empire.
I'd really like to sit down with MovieBob and have a conversation about movies. He seems as smart and nerdy as me, yet he loves almost the complete opposite. I almost want to move to the east coast to facilitate this exchange. I think it would be great for his career (an opposite yet equal sounding board) and fun for me. Maybe if he has a heart attack my heli will be called to pick him up ... 1k miles away. I doubt it.
I liked the last stand and origins, I didn't think they were any better or worse than the first 2. Also comparing this new movie to the dark knight well I have to say the dark knight did not really do it for me I much prefer batman begins. Spiderman 3 was also not that great in my opinion, watchable but not something I would care to repeat.
I usually agree with bob in everything else.
I usually agree with bob in everything else.
Whoa, whoa...as good as The Dark Knight? I just might have to take up the X-men series (never been big on superhero movies)
I get what you are saying with the Space Cowboy. I too noticed that he shouldn't have had his guns. However I feel this is a bit off topic. I never lauded the trailer for its ability to tell a story or weave a narrative. I think superhero movies already do that well enough (at least some of them do). The question is action sequences, and I think my point still stands that the action in that was exciting and well directed. That doesn't excuse the story plot holes, but if you're looking for someone to make your super action scenes look good, I would think CGI animators at least could have something significant to contribute.Therumancer said:
As for the Old Republic being balanced, I don't know. You seem to be far more knowledgeable than me on that issue. The only thing that I'd like to point out is that the whole "Sith Purge" thing cannot happen until they decide to shut down the MMO, for if they do that there won't be a game to play. It makes sense to have the Sith start winning at first. It wouldn't be much fun otherwise if there wasn't something for the good guys to overcome. I would reserve judgment until we see the MMO come out, and I for one will be a Jedi if I can afford to play it.
Well, the issue is that both factions are playable in the game and are supposed to be evenly matched. I do not think we should be seeing the Sith being entirely purged, but at the same time I do not think we should be seeing the good faction constantly running away or being killed either. It's supposed to be a period of balance, where either faction is equally viable from a player perspective. The point about the purge is that there isn't even a real reason lore wise why we should be seeing nothing but a constant array of bad guy bad assery.honestdiscussioner said:
Otherwise, I do see your point about the action scenes which is what I was largely talking about, but again, as I said originally, there has never been an issue with doing this with cartoons. Being able to draw and animate something is a lot differant than getting real people to do it, with or without CGI characters being involved. Basically you need to get writers, directors, and choreographers together that know how to do this kind of thing. The problem is that your pulling out a bunch of writers and directors who are good when it comes down to other generes, when what we need is the equivilent of science fiction John Woo with a huge budget.
See, ironically, I think that while Michael Bay is wrong for a lot of the material he gets involved with, he would probably be right for the kind of fight scenes we should be seeing here, assuming he can restrain the usage of jerky cam and lens flare and actually show the action. Lots of stuff flying around, stuff being destroyed and explosions everywhere? Well yeah, that's exactly what we should be seeing here. Depending on the super hero even the whole American flag fixation works. I mean when you get past all the liberal "it's wrong to be American" crap, in the end guys like Superman fight for "Truth, Justice, and The AMERICAN way" (and I'm of the opinion that politically charged comic writers who have been trying to knock that recently should probably have been given their pink slips)... so yeah, an American flag blowing mournfully at a time of crisis, or being trashed, only to be replaced by the victorious hero(s) fits right in as well when dealing with certain heroes, even if it isn't quite the X-men's gig in paticular.