Review of Dark Phoenix (2019) by Andil77 — 06 Jun 2019

The acting is great, this probably has the best Scott/Jean dynamic in all of the X-Men films, and there are some interesting ideas in the film. In the hands of the right writer, this might have been a good film.

If parts of it hadn't needed to be rewritten and reshot, this might have been a good film. However, what we ended up with is a bunch of scenes that do tell a story, but not a very deep one. And, hey, sometimes films don't have to be deep to be enjoyable.

However, this movie is also trying to tackle some of the moral complexities of the Dark Phoenix Saga. Namely, should Jean, who has been possessed by this force, be held accountable for the events that take place.

And there's no real debate about this in the movie. Some think she can be saved. Others want to kill her, until they suddenly don't. And the intent is that they're convinced to save her because of Charles' speech, and it would make sense if Charles had mentioned that Jean was possessed or that she accidentally killed Raven, except he doesn't do any of that.

They listen to him because it's the Third Act and the writers need everyone to band together to fight the evil aliens that exist in this film. The X-Men are supposed to be the ones who want to protect all life, except in the Second Act where they have no problems with people becoming collateral damage.

What Nightcrawler does in the Third Act completely flies in the face of the Nightcrawler character. And Jean's big hero moment basically involves mass genocide, which is ironic because in the Dark Phoenix Saga Jean was on trial for her life because she committed genocide.

By the end of the film, I was numb. I honestly feel that this movie would've killed the franchise, had it not been for the fact that the franchise died when Disney bought Fox. This is such a disappointing end.