This is a repost of a review I originally wrote back in 2006.
In yet another case of a movie not quite living up to the hype, X-Men: The Last Stand (aka X-Men 3) mostly delivers on the visuals but underperforms on the story.
In X-Men 3, a “cure” has been found for the “mutant gene” dividing the mutants into two camps. One camp, lead by Magneto (Ian McKellen), wants the cure destroyed and the mutants left as-is. The other, lead by Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), wants to take a “live and let live” approach, allowing the mutants themselves decide their own fates.
Whereas the fight scenes between the mutants are awe inspiring, the story is paper thin with major holes and dialogue that’s shoddy/cliché. Characters motivations/actions seem to be driven by moving the plot forward rather than how those characters would normally act.
One would suspect that when a movie costs a reported $200 million to make at least some of that money would be spent on developing an excellent script, but apparently not.
Most frustrating of all, many of the major twists and turns in the movie seem to be driven more by contract negotiations with the actors than by servicing the plot.
Back in 2002 I called X-Men 2: X-Men United one of the best movies of the year and lamented that I couldn’t wait for X-Men 3. Unfortunately, X-Men 3 wasn’t worth the wait. (7/10)
