X-Men: First Class (2011) Review

Next on my list of X-Men films to watch was the prequel and soft reboot of the franchise X-Men: First Class and here is my review for it. The premise of the film is set in the 1960's and sees a young Charles Xavier and Erik Lensherr have to unite to stop a mutant group from starting World War 3.

Main Character

For years and three films up to this point we had come use to seeing Sir Patrick Stewart and Sir Ian McKellen in the roles of Professor X and Magneto so it was definitely a change to see James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender take on the roles and they are brilliant here. McAvoy does a great job in showing Xavier as a charismatic guy which you would imagine he would be to get this group of people together. It is also great to see Fassbender as this man set out for revenge and playing a really intense version of the character. But their chemistry together is fantastic and I love seeing the dynamic between the two and how both of their ideologies conflict but they are clearly friends which maybe the original films didn't have a chance to do as much. 

Supporting Characters

Jennifer Lawrence has received some criticism of her portrayal as Mystique but I thought she did a good job here. She is meant to be portrayed as a young woman and fills that well and her personal story arc is important about acceptance and it adds emotional depth to her character which obviously had not been seen before in the original trilogy. Nicholas Hoult plays Hank and I mean no spoilers but Beast as well, I mean it is on the poster so I don't think it is a spoiler and he is good too. His arc with Mystique's is interesting and I mean I could have done without the romance between the two but I like how there different ideologies clash and you kind of see both points of view just like our lead characters. Kevin Bacon plays the villain Sebastian Shaw and he was a great choice here, his story with Magneto is really interesting and you can just see how much fun is having in the role. The rest of the cast do a great job to, including Rose Byrne who plays Moira McTaggert and Lucas Till who plays Havok. 

Story 

The story is done really well here, by focusing on the relationship between Xavier and Magneto it looks at the interesting ideologies of the two men that would really shape the X-Men franchise and their dynamic is what makes this film really interesting. This film also does the best job of any X-Men film of making the majority of characters interesting, X-Men films have found it hard to balance the amount of characters but this film does a pretty great job of doing that. Also the last act of this movie is fantastic and is one of the best you will see in any comic book film ever. 

Script

The script here is fantastic, the dialogue all feels really natural and balances humour and drama really well. Like the other X-Men Films it looks at larger social factors and this film does a great job of that as well. Also the writing for the characters is fantastic and really makes you care about them and the situations that they get themselves into. 

Style

There are some great action scenes here, it highlights the different power sets really well to create an exhilarating experience. There is a character called Azazel here and imagine a more violent Nightcrawler and he steals every action scene that he is in and adds so much to this film. This film is also paced really well, it might be over 2 hours but it moves so quickly and entertains from start to end. But I have one criticism here and that some of the effects and costumes look a bit cheap, I mean my main one is the design of Beast here, it looks terrible and really cheap and thank god it gets better in future films. Also I am glad that this film went more comic accurate with the yellow costumes but again for me they just looked a little cheap here and not as good as they could have been. 

Overall

Overall, this is a fantastic X-Men film. It really does a good job showing younger versions of the established characters and introducing new characters which I appreciated and I would highly recommend this film even if you aren't the biggest comic book movie fan. 

Rating - 9/10