Films > DVD Reviews

X-Men: Apocalypse

23/09/16

Last month, I finally got round to watching Captain America: Civil War. I’d been putting it off because I, like any moderately intelligent adult, can no longer stomach superhero films, and I no longer give the tiniest particle of airborne faecal matter what happens in the increasingly ludicrous Marvel universe (with the exception of Deadpool and Jessica Jones, of course). Nevertheless, watch it I did, and I can happily report that sitting through CA:CW is like being in a room full of costumed dogs that yap at each other while their owners throw happy-meal toys at you.

The reason I mention this is that I had been equally reluctant to wade my way through X-Men: Apocalypse, which I was required to do this month. I’ve long held the opinion that the X-Men films are the cooler, older brother of the Avengers films. They’re generally emotionally deeper, more character driven, better acted, rely less on interminable and ultimately pointless fist-fights, and feel less like toy adverts.

Happily for me, this is certainly the case for X-Men: Apocalypse, which sees our plucky weirdos saving the world again, this time from Oscar Isaacs in blackface (black everything, actually) as Apocalypse, the first mutant, who’s been stuck under a pyramid for a couple of thousand years. X-Men: Apocalypse is not exactly a great film - it’s bloated and the dialogue is very silly in places - but it succeeds where CA:CW doesn’t by virtue of its cast,  and the fact that its epic effect sequences augment the film rather than constitute it.

Oh, and it doesn’t have fucking Spiderman in it.