Okay, honestly, I really enjoyed this film. For one, James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender are still brilliant at their respective roles, Professor Xavier and Magneto. Xavier comes off as far more human than I think I’ve ever seen him, especially in a brilliant scene between him and Rose Byrne’s character, Moira, in which he does a terrible job of hiding the fact that he fancies her. It gives the character a much more realistic appearance when he’s given a flaw as ordinary as being nervous around girls. Meanwhile, Magneto, or Erik Lehnsherr, is easily the best written character in the entire film. He struggles throughout the film with the way humans treat him in some really harrowing ways, meaning even when he does do all of the evil stuff he does, you really sympathise with him.
The other characters aren't as good, unfortunately, with the exception of Quicksilver of course, who is just as amazing as he was in DOFP and I still want to see more from him. Jennifer Lawrence is sort of okay as Mystique, whose character is really quite boring in this film and all the other mutants aren’t that great either. Admittedly Cyclops’s origin story is dealt with very well, but his character stays fairly underdeveloped from that point on and young Jean Grey was horrendously miscast, as she felt nothing like Famke Janssen's character in the original trilogy. Apocalypse, the big blue villain guy, is very well performed by Oscar Isaac, but he’s not a very three dimensional character and his minions (or the four horseman of the apocalypse) range from boring, but cool looking (Angel), to slightly more interesting, but less cool looking (Storm) to really boring and really stupid looking (Psylocke). The only genuinely good horseman is the aforementioned Magneto, who seems to be the only one with real motives.
There is more stuff I like, however. The film has this brilliant ‘80s movie aesthetic, as it is set in 1983 and has quite a few 80s references in it, from Quicksilver’s Pac-Man arcade machine to a surprisingly meta joke about Return of the Jedi and how the third film is always the worst (*cough* X-Men: The Last Stand *cough*). There’s another brilliant slow motion sequence with Quicksilver set entirely to Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and in fact generally there are a lot of really creative visuals, including one of the best X-Men opening title sequences ever that travels forward in time from ancient Egypt to ‘80s America, and the final showdown between Apocalypse and Professor X that takes place entirely inside their minds is fantastic. The final climactic fight at the end isn't all good, however. The first fifteen minutes or so is very repetitive and dull, with lots of way too similar looking shots repeating over and over and the action itself is very weightless and special effects heavy.
As a result of all this conflicting stuff, the film feels very messy. There’s so many characters that the film doesn’t have enough time to focus on the ones you really care about, like Magneto and instead focuses for way too long on ones you don’t, like Mystique. X-Men: Apocalypse would also often switch dramatically in tone, from incredibly sad to silly and comical to gritty and disturbing and then to unrealistic and flashy. The thing is though, it kind of works in the film’s favour. Avengers: Age of Ultron had a similar problem with the characters and, whilst it did do a better job at juggling them, the tone didn't jump about like mad, which is probably technically a good thing, but honestly I found the drastic changes in mood far more entertaining and I never felt myself getting bored, as I never really knew what was going to happen next, unlike Age of Ultron, which could often be a bit too predictable.
So, does it top its predecessor? No. Is it as good as Civil War? No, but it is far more entertaining than Batman V Superman and whilst it is easily director Bryan Singer’s weakest entry into the X-Men franchise, it’s still an entertaining film in its own rights, even if it is dragged down by way too many boring characters and a sluggish final showdown. In the end though, X-Men: Apocalypse takes a seat comfortably in the middle of the epic 2016 battle of the superheroes.
7.2/10
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