The end is nigh! Well, at least for Fox’s X-Men film series. Although Dark Phoenix was touted as being the final film in the X-Men saga, there is still one to go with this week’s New Mutants actually bringing the series to a close. X-Men movies are no strangers to behind the scenes struggles, with New Mutants arguably boasting the most troubled production to date. But with Disney overseeing the recent reshoots, hopefully they can shape together something worth watching.
But how have the X-Men films to date been received by critics? To say it’s been mixed is an understatement. Whilst the series has earned a couple of Academy Award nominations (a Best Screenplay nomination, no less), there’s some absolute stinkers here as well.
So here is every X-Men film ranked by their Rotten Tomatoes score…
12 – DARK PHOENIX – 22%
When the reviews started coming out for Dark Phoenix, I’d read that it was worse than The Last Stand, Apocalypse and even Origins. Surely it can’t be that bad, right? Those were not good films, and the trailers for Dark Phoenix looked interesting, if not fantastic. But then I saw it, and it really was that bad. Not a single member of the cast looked remotely interested in being in this film, and not even an epic score by the excellent Hans Zimmer (who came out of superhero movie retirement for this) could save this film.
For a series that has churned out several boring entries, 20th Century Fox “finished” their X-Men run (although there’s still one left) on the most boring one of all. This was meant to “fix” the original portrayal of the Dark Phoenix storyline as shown in ‘The Last Stand’ and was somehow even worse. Baffling.
11 – X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE – 37%
This one had so much promise. The opening scene was terrific, Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool was a perfect match, it had Liev Schrieber as Sabretooth, featured Dominic Monaghan and Kevin Durand from TV’s LOST (which I was massively into at the time) and it was finally going to introduce Gambit! How could this go wrong?
They sewed the Merc With A Mouth’s mouth shut. Wolverine screams “noooooo” at the sky on numerous occasions (surely we’d learnt from Revenge Of The Sith at this point?) and for some reason we were assaulted by Will.I.Am’s mere presence. This film was meant to launch a whole series of ‘Origins’ films with the intention of a Magneto standalone set to follow, but this film single-handedly, and thankfully, made sure that would never happen
10 – APOCALYPSE – 47%
Why would you cast someone as talented as Oscar Isaac and then dress him up as Ivan Ooze from the Power Rangers movie? I think we all knew this film was in trouble from the very first photo reveal of Apocalypse.
Hot on the heels of ‘Days Of Future Past’ and directed by the same man who made said film, along with the first two X-Men movies, this should have been watchable at the very least, but it was yet another dull, uninteresting mess that I feel the series will ultimately, and unfortunately, be known for in the long run.
9 -THE LAST STAND – 58%
Whilst I was never a big fan of the Blade movies, at this point neither Spider-Man nor the X-Men, and thus Marvel, could do any wrong. But whilst I had come away from the cinema feeling like I had just watched a terrible movie before, I had never left the cinema feeling disappointed until I saw The Last Stand. It felt tonally different from its two predecessors and nowhere near as accomplished. That being said, it has its moments of fun (I fully dug the Danger Room scene with the Sentinels, it’s just a shame it wasn’t ‘real’) which is more than can be said for the likes of Apocalypse or Dark Phoenix.
8 – THE WOLVERINE – 71%
This isn’t a bad movie per se, it’s just a very ‘meh’ movie, that happily sits alongside Apocalypse, Dark Phoenix and (dare I say it) First Class as the series’ most spiritless entries. I got a huge amount of joy from this bus poster though…
7 – X-MEN – 81%
This film admittedly has not aged particularly well (I can’t believe it’s now 20 years old!) but for its time it was a breath of fresh air, following a decade of disaster and slasher flicks. It (somewhat unfaithfully) took some of cartoon’s biggest stars of the 90s and put them in a live setting for the first time and kicked off a superhero movie craze that is now, 20 years later, arguably at its highest point. If this film hadn’t succeeded, we would have never got the MCU.
6 – DEADPOOL 2 – 83%
5 – DEADPOOL – 84%
I loved Deadpool in the comics and he was always my go-to character in the X-Men Legends and Ultimate Alliance video games, so after the travesty that was X-Men Origins: Wolverine, my excitement was fever pitched. But perhaps my expectations were a little too high. I didn’t think much of the sequel at all, but I found the first one to be little more than your average superhero origin movie but with swearing and dick jokes. When my non-comic book loving friends raved about it because it was more of their sense of humour, I found myself rolling my eyes and disliking it even more.
I do like this version of Collosus though.
4 – X-MEN 2 – 85%
This is my personal favourite. I haven’t watched it in many, many years but I’m not sure I want to. I always held the first movie in high regards but when I watched it recently I found myself not liking it quite as much as I remember doing when it was originally released, so I think I’m happy to let this one live on in my memory.
3 – FIRST CLASS – 86%
I do not get the fuss about this one at all. I thought it was just ok on my first watch and a few years later, after seeing the amount of love it gained in the years gone by, I thought I’d give it a second go, but (as with half of the films on this list) I was so bored. It was definitely a step up in quality from X-Men Origins: Wolverine and The Last Stand, but I’d argue that at least those films try to have some fun along the way. First Class tries its hand at humour but aside from the fun Wolverine cameo, it all feels forced and just falls flat. I’m not a fan at all.
2- DAYS OF FUTURE PAST – 90%
Yep. Liked this one. I don’t think it’s as good as X-Men 2 (at least in my memory) but I liked the future stuff, Peter Dinklage as Trask and James McAvoy as a troubled Charles Xavier, especially his encounter with his future Patrick Stewart-shaped self. It never explains how the likes of Rogue or Magneto get their powers back or why Professor X is alive, but hey ho. It’s the X-Men films. As soon as you start worrying about simple things like, I don’t know… practical storytelling, you may as well entirely give up.
1 – LOGAN – 93%
This film tried something different with the franchise, and exceeded on basically every level. It should have been the film that finished the entire franchise as it wraps up everything in a mostly satisfying manner. It remains the only superhero movie in history to earn a Best Adapted Screenplay nomination at the Oscars, and was fully justified in doing so. I nearly skipped out on this film entirely after the dismal Apocalypse, but I’m glad I didn’t.
SUMMARY
Writing this article has made me feel like a right grumpy bastard. I’ve realised I really don’t like many of these films, despite desperately wanting to. It’ll be interesting to see what Marvel Studios and Disney choose to eventually do with the X-Men, but I am excited for the future and hope we finally get a more faithful, and entertaining, big screen version in the near future. It might be best if they put the franchise on the shelf for a little while longer so we can get rid of the bad taste left by Apocalypse and Dark Phoenix, but fingers crossed that when the X-Men finally return to our screens and enter the MCU, they’ll be a darn sight better than half of the films on this list.
What’s your favourite X-Men film? Or are you, like me, looking forward to a complete reboot set in the MCU? Let us know in the comments below, and thanks for reading!
NERDFACE 