HOW FOX FUXED UP "X-MEN: FIRST CLASS" (OR, WHY DOFP MUST BE...)

HOW FOX FUXED UP "X-MEN: FIRST CLASS" (OR, WHY DOFP MUST BE...)

What went wrong with the story in "Xmen: First Class", and how Fox studios may be trying to fix their mistakes with "Days of Future Past."

Editorial Opinion
By Oxbow - Mar 12, 2013 11:03 PM EST
Filed Under: X-Men

What was the best part of "Xmen: First Class?" Undoubtedly there were some great action scenes but most people would say the complex relationship that had developed between Charles Xavier and Eric Lensherr by the end of the movie was really gripping. Their individual stories were interesting by themselves; when they faced off with (and then against) each other though, it was electric scripting and also acting from McAvoy and Fassbender! This is a relationship that has had decades to develop through the comics, and to see something of how it began was really interesting, purely from a psychological level.




Sadly, the rest of the movie could not match the tension between Xavier and Magneto. The relationships were not there, and so the personalities never had a chance to shine. This is not surprising to First Class fans from before the movie, however. The relationship between Jean Grey, Cyclops, Beast, Iceman and Angel is no less complex and entertaining than that between the the Xmen's leader and their greatest nemesis.




First, you need great characters. Then, you add history between great characters, and you get great relationships! When Fox threw those relationships out the window and decided to change who was in the first class of X-men, that left them with some cool characters but not a lot of story between them at all.

I can almost imagine Fox execs looking at pictures of various X-men on a projector, deciding who to put on the team. They might say they like the fairy, because they think that she will drawn in more girls. They like Havok; he has a cool power, right? He's Cyclops' little brother you say? [frick]it, they like him and he makes shit blow up! We need a black character to kill off too...how 'bout this "Darwin" fellow? Throw in a guy that can fly for good measure, and why not Beast too... he's crazy looking!

Now you have a team with lots of personality...and absolutely no character. Let's treat them like teenagers and have them learn to work together And unfortunately...the rest is history:



So, now we have an X-men with no Cyclops to lead the team but Havok is there...There's no Jean Grey and none of the fun interplay between Jean and Scott, Jean and Angel, Iceman and Beast, and all the other relationships that make you really love not just the characters, but the team as a whole! Now, its 2013 and they have to steal pages from one of the most revolutionary and beloved X-men storylines to make 13 years of bad decisions fit together. "Days of Future Past" is a great story and it would be a disservice to the genre and the fans for Fox to use it as filler story to get them to a Fox movie Universe.

Remember "Iron man 2?" That was used as a filler movie to get to The Avengers, and it was roundly mocked for the obvious ploy. Why ruin DOFP (and any good-will left over with people who love American comics) by mixing and matching and turning a DOFP into another piece of big-budget spam?

I know that the movie is not anywhere near finished, but Fox should, FINALLY, take a look at what they did wrong in the past movies and try to LEARN FROM THEIR MISTAKES! There has to be a win-win, a way to please the original fans and draw in new fans who don't know how great the material can be!

Avengers proved that, in spades.






Ox out.
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Oxbow
Oxbow - 3/13/2013, 12:05 AM
That's my point: 1st class was passable. but why hang on, when you could have made something amazing--we could have had a CBM that actually works way before avengers. Instead of something that was as great in parts as it was cringe-worthy in others
CorndogBurglar
CorndogBurglar - 3/13/2013, 3:34 AM
I thought First Class was a piece of garbage.

While i thought Magneto was done exceptionally well, the rest of the movie was crap.

Keep in mind that when they were making this movie, they had no plans for DOFP to come in and fix everything. Knowing that, it is beyond me how ANYONE can like a prequel movie that completely ignores most of its own series continuity.

Ox, you mentioned them sitting in a room, picking and choosing characters to use. Well I can see them doing the same thing with the continuity. Keeping things like the concentration camp scene, but then throwing out other things for no real reason.

It just blows me away that this film is so liked when it destroys the continuity like it did. And its funny, because isnt the whole point of a prequel to PIECE TOGETHER CONTINUITY? Not destroy it?

EdgyOutsider
EdgyOutsider - 3/13/2013, 3:43 AM
Outside of X3 and X-Men Origins, I love the X-Men movies. First Class is the best in my opinion (although, McAvoy at times bugged me for some reason). I personally can't wait for, The Wolverine and X-Men: Days of Future Past. Actually, the first X-Men movie was the first superhero movie I had ever seen. From there, I've been hooked.
Tainted87
Tainted87 - 3/13/2013, 6:10 AM

Jean and Cyclops are NOT IN Days of Future Past. Jean is dead (it takes place two issues after the Dark Phoenix Saga) and Scott has left the team to grieve.

You seem to have lost connection with the movies. I mean how else can one really say that Iron Man 2 was filler, AND hate on the X-Men movies, simply because they want to prove a point?

Could X-Men be better? Sure. But they're still fun movies with a clear message. Enjoy it, and stop crying.
Frogman
Frogman - 3/13/2013, 6:25 AM
It just sounds like you're still pissed off that it wasn't an identical line-up to the one in the comics.
manymade1
manymade1 - 3/13/2013, 7:50 AM
What Lizard said. First Class was awesome, and DOFP has the potential to be even better.
Oxbow
Oxbow - 3/13/2013, 7:51 AM
I bet i enjoyed IM2 more than most people on this site. Having said that, I still think it was trying to do too many things, and so ended up watered down. A movie needs to serve its own plot, not be there to forward the plot of an upcoming movie or fix the mistakes of a past movie.

I didn't need a 100% accurate 1st class movie. Like corndogburglar, I would have settled for a prequel that fixed continuity instead of muddying it further. Since when did Xavier and mystique grow up together, either in the comics or the movies??? Why even throw in that piece and confuse the time line further...unless you have no respect for even your own [frick]in movies!

Fox doing a DOFP movie is basically them saying "ya, we know. we [frick]ed up 1st class..."If they paid more attention to chronology and team dynamics in the First Class movie, then there would be no need for a DOFP movie to come and effectively reboot the reboot. <--this is the point of the article in a nutshell.
LEEE777
LEEE777 - 3/13/2013, 10:34 AM
Yeah X-MEN FIST CLASS sucked as a cbm, was a good action film but a horrible cbm, FOX don't even follow their own movie continuity, let alone loosely follow the comics...

Till this day I haven't enjoyed an X-men movie since X-MEN 3!

THE WOLVERINE, it'll be hard to [frick] that one up but who knows? lol

Yeah use the time travel to wipe out all past movies and have the real original X-Men back, yeah love it but wont happen :(

I'll say one thing tho, FASS as MAGS was awesome, just a pity we never got that solo Magneto movie I personally was looking forward too!

Can someone say.... MARVEL STUDIOS


Thumbs up, good read!
LEEE777
LEEE777 - 3/13/2013, 10:35 AM
^ Btw I been before X-MEN 3 lol

Damn, miss the edit button...
Wallymelon
Wallymelon - 3/13/2013, 11:55 AM
how can you say first class was barely passable, its the only x men film worth watching next to x2. x1 was cool cuz it started this wave of CBMs but seriously that movie is full of crap. x2 still holds up. and first class even tho it had some mishaps it literally reinvigorated the franchise, it had good acting, and a good story. the action was there and it was interesting to see this take on the franchise. all you fanboys want is the exact shit you read on the pages, why do you want that? why do you feel that thats artistic? to just lift other people visions and execute them on your own and to be profitable off it? how is that respectful? how mmuch integrity can you have? how artistic is it?

every year artists, and comic book writers change and half of the readers say shit about it, because they love this character. thats why you read it thats why you see the movies, because you love the character. and theyre going to constantly make movies out of these characters because you are all demanding it. regardless if you liked the movie, comic, or cartoon. youre going to demand its better or youre goping to demand more of it. either way your idiocracy is won over by the studios.

so all you fanboys need to shut the hell up and just enjoy the bullshit that is coming our way because at least its interesting to see all these random takes on characters you like. it keeps it fun and entertaining.
Oxbow
Oxbow - 3/13/2013, 12:14 PM
I appreciate your attitude @SotoJuiceMan, and all who can enjoy FC while not denying its faults. I talk about those faults not to whine but as a larger point: I would rather not get a bastardized DOFP movie just so Fox can fix the mistakes made with the other X-movies; To do that would only be adding insult to injury!

Don't copy the original story Word for Word! just Respect the story, respect the characters, stay true to their core natures, and everybody will be happy with the results ^_^
marvel72
marvel72 - 3/13/2013, 1:58 PM
good film crap x-men movie,i really can't enjoy a movie with so many continuity faults,the film doesn't make sense when you connect the dots with the other movies.

x-men first class pros & cons

pros

-fassbender's performance
-mcavoy's performance
-opening with young erik
-the siege of the c.i.a building
-erik puts coin through shaw's head
-the soundtrack
-good movie

cons

-movie continuity
-one of the worst selection of mutants ever!
-didn't care for any of the characters apart from charles & erik
-charles & erik this was movie borderline brokeback mutants,if you know what i mean with their love for each other.
-calling the movie x-men first class & not using the important original x-men
-good movie crap x-men movie

they should of used the original five against magneto & his brotherhood of evil,they can come up with whatever original story they like but they must at least keep the original characters from the comics.
Nomadic1
Nomadic1 - 3/13/2013, 2:37 PM
@Marvel72 you missed, IMO, the biggest con/mistake.

I think there are certain things you don't change. Some things in the comics mythos that should not be touched. Example, Batmans parents should not be killed by The Joker in front of city hall.

How they explained Charles being in a wheelchair in later movies is by far the biggest sin of this movie.
marvel72
marvel72 - 3/13/2013, 3:07 PM
@ Nomadic1

i don't mind slight changes i.e watchmen(the ending)iron man(different war)but massive ones piss me off.being a long time x-men fan makes it worse for me,can't speak for everyone else.

making havok the older brother or even dad of cyclops sucks & hank mccoy/beast personality the way he is in some of those scenes mystique are nothing like the beast i know & love.

another thing that bugs me is in x-men origins wolverine scott summers at school with his ruby quartz glasses to stop his optic blast from destroying everything,how did he know that ruby quartz was the substance needed to hold back his blast,i know they explained it years later in the comics,i believe mr.sinister gave them to him in the orphanage when he blew the roof off.

@ SotoJuiceMan

the mutant selection process for x-men first class felt like they drew them out of a hat.it wouldn't of been as bad if they did only feature scott & jean,the avengers didn't have a complete first team line up but it had most of them.
ScottMontgomery
ScottMontgomery - 3/13/2013, 6:45 PM
Why does Iron Man 2 get all this hate I've never understood it! And I do agree that none of the X-Men movies have reached there true potential
marvel72
marvel72 - 3/13/2013, 9:01 PM
problem with iron man 2 is it looked better than iron man when we first watched the trailer,so when we finally got to see the movie it was a huge letdown when compared to iron man,don't get me wrong i still think its good just not as good as iron man.

iron man 3 is at the moment looking better than iron man.
Oxbow
Oxbow - 3/13/2013, 9:30 PM
IM=10
IM2=6.5
IM3=looking good

I can describe the plot of iron man in one sentence: genius arms-dealer Tony Stark decides to use his fortune to help those being hurt by his weaponry and so becomes iron man. It's interesting and classic and epic all at the same time.

Iron man 2 was more confusing and a little schizophrenic... not as easily described in a sentence, or even a paragraph. It was good but trying to do too much, and not doing much of it well as a result.
TheLibrarian
TheLibrarian - 3/17/2013, 5:27 AM
I sat and watched the all the X-men films back to back yesterday (not including Origins cos, y'know, it's shite).


The thing that annoys me about First Class is that despited being a good film, and it is, it has caused almost all of the continuity errors in the series. It would have worked better as a complete reboot but to try and protray it as a prequel and completely disregard the continuity of the previous films was sheer stupidity.

Another thing that struck me watching all the films again is that Last Stand is nowhere near as bad as people say it is. Obviously it's not of the same qualty of the first two but it's still a really enjoyable movie.

In fact I'd put First Class and Last Stand on a par. Both good movies but with some really irritating issues.
AC1
AC1 - 3/17/2013, 8:11 AM
First Class was the best X-Men film so far, especially from a story stand point, but I agree that aside from Professor X and Magneto (and perhaps Beast and Mystique) most of the other characters were severely underwritten. I think it's mainly the title of the film that makes that so obvious though: it's called First Class, but most of the First Class are pretty boring background characters. The real story, and the best parts of not only that movie but all the X-Men movies, was exploring the friendship between Charles Xavier and Magneto, and how that friendship met its end.
AC1
AC1 - 3/17/2013, 8:18 AM
And the continuity thing I kind of blame on FOX's plan for a FOX/Marvel universe. When First Class was originally released, Matthew Vaughn said it was ignoring X3 and XOW (y'know, because those movies were shit) so the continuity flowed pretty well, aside from a few contradictory throwaway lines in X-Men (such as Prof X saying Cyclops was his first student, or that Magneto helped build Cerebro).

Now that FOX is planning their own universe, they've appointed Mark Miller as this 'FOX/Marvel guru' or whatever, and they're trying to force all these movies to fit together like a mismatched jigsaw puzzle. They're shoehorning DOFP in so that they can use some lazy time-travel subplot to fix the mess that they've made by trying to take shortcuts, and that's probably also why they brought back Bryan Singer to direct a sequel to First Class with returning cast members from both franchises; they're throwing elements of both continuities together and hoping for the best.
AC1
AC1 - 3/17/2013, 8:18 AM
So if anything, this continuity mess is The Avengers' fault ;)
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