in the shell

Did anyone see Xmen III yet? I was expecting to be disapointed, but it was really good, and dealt with interesting concepts.

The thing I found the most interesting about it is the way it handles the complexities of the concept of "Freedom".

As the previews show, there is a new mutant "curing" drug.

This, and its fallout, provokes comparisons to everything from Homosexuality, to the genocides of WWII as well as others.

I thought the reactions of the various characters were very "human". (man I hate that word and its exclucivity)

Plus this provokes discussion of concepts of Human, or not, the "normal" v.s.the dangerous "other" a wish to conform within a larger society despite intrinsic difficulties, and wheather that is "wrong" or "right" and further more if it is even possible.

This ties into Oshi's exploratian of person hood in innocence also, I think.

Of course it all deals with concepts of self identification, and what happens to the psyche when ones self identification is forcibly removed. I.E. in this case thier mutatian, or in this world the athelete who loses thier ability to compete, or a scholar with alzhimers...

Whatcha think???

I didn't like it, very much. Compared to the earlier parts, it was simply bad. Too many ideas put in one movie. Mutant cure, Brotherhood getting restless, Phoenix awakened...And all those new characters with barely any screen time.

It would have gone better, IMO, if they had concencrated solely on the Phoenix-storyarc and made it truly epical. As I understand, the Dark Phoenix arc of the comics was one of the most memorable struggles in the Marvel universe - or so I've come to understand with very limited knowledge of the comics.

And I really can't imagine that even Magneto could convince hundreds of mutants into a suicidal attack against the state - riots I can imagine, but an organized assault into a facility protected by military forces is just insane. To compare to homosexuals, do you think that gays would attack in bloodthirsty frenzy if a "gay-cure" would be developed? Doesn't sound like a very minority-friendly viewpoint to me. I don't think that was the director's intention, but the whole thing just reeks of xenophobia.

I have to wonder how Dr. Hank McCoy managed to become the UN ambassador, by the way, after beating up and possibly killing dozens of voters - even ones in suicidal frenzy. Is that a way for a goverment offical to act? And he was a pretty good character, too, apart from that scene...

Yeah, I didn't like it very much. As an action flick it was passable, but otherwise it really wasn't worth paying for.

I'm upset that solid snake didn't write it this time, and also I've heard it's the weakest of the three movies. According to the Sci Fi channel website review, they said it was less complex and more black and white feeling than the other two, which is sad for me since my draw to the first two movies was the complexity of the characters.

That said though, I'm extremely excited to see that Solid Snake is working on Watchmen, and that it looks amazing.

SPOILER ALERT:

I was a little annoyed about Proffessor X. In the comics he was always the morally straight one, but in this movie they've made him to ambiguos for my taste. Like the fact that he transfers his mind to save himself or what he did to Jean.

I hope to see X Men 3 sometime this Memorial weekend.

Lightice wrote:I didn't like it, very much. Compared to the earlier parts, it was simply bad. Too many ideas put in one movie. Mutant cure, Brotherhood getting restless, Phoenix awakened...And all those new characters with barely any screen time.

It would have gone better, IMO, if they had concencrated solely on the Phoenix-storyarc and made it truly epical. As I understand, the Dark Phoenix arc of the comics was one of the most memorable struggles in the Marvel universe - or so I've come to understand with very limited knowledge of the comics.

And I really can't imagine that even Magneto could convince hundreds of mutants into a suicidal attack against the state - riots I can imagine, but an organized assault into a facility protected by military forces is just insane. To compare to homosexuals, do you think that gays would attack in bloodthirsty frenzy if a "gay-cure" would be developed? Doesn't sound like a very minority-friendly viewpoint to me. I don't think that was the director's intention, but the whole thing just reeks of xenophobia.

I have to wonder how Dr. Hank McCoy managed to become the UN ambassador, by the way, after beating up and possibly killing dozens of voters - even ones in suicidal frenzy. Is that a way for a goverment offical to act? And he was a pretty good character, too, apart from that scene...

Yeah, I didn't like it very much. As an action flick it was passable, but otherwise it really wasn't worth paying for.

The plotlines did seem kinda rushed. I was shocked that they would kill off both Cyclops and the Professor and then turn mystique human, thereby taking her out of the picture, so early in the movie. Cyclops in particular had practically nothing to do in this movie, I feel sorry for Marsden. And they should have elaborated on the background and motivations of that new group of mutants Magneto convinced to join them, especially Callisto (the female hispanic leader). I don't think we even heard her name, I only know it from imdb.

I'm pretty sure Magneto managed to convince the mutants that the government wanted to force the cure on them with the gun and darts he captured, and that lead to the attack on the alcatraz facility. Wanting to get the cure is one thing, but for it to be forced on you by getting shot by a dart destroys your self-identity by taking away the trait that sets you apart and makes you who you are, and can be construed by people with extremist views like Magneto and probably many of his followers as akin to murder and mass genocide. This becomes more plausible if you consider that most if not all mutants, especially the hardliners like the Brotherhood, went through extreme persecution for what they were (Mystique says her parents tried to kill her), and thereby hold their powers or abnormalities to be a much more important part of their identity. Hence forced conformity equated with murder.

Except instead of killing them, you're forcing them to be just like you, thereby destroying them as a unique group with their own identity.

McCoy did what he had to to prevent the boy from getting killed and Magneto's war from going any further. And I' m sure the troops at the island appreciated the help, and were also voters. I wouldn't be surprised if he were publicly commended for helping stop a terrorist attack.

It was a little rushed, I would have liked more back story to Callisto and the Morelocks, who are pretty interesting in the comics.

I like all the new characters, but then again, Ive read the comics forever, and they often have many characters at once, so I may have been more preped for that.

I didnt think it was more "black and white" at all, if anything, I thought it was much more ambigous. It didnt have as much of people talking about thier feelings, but the situations and actors conveyed them well enough to me.

I liked that it dealt with the ambiguity of Prof.X and Magnito. The affection and respect between the two, as well as their reasoning behind there opposing view points. You can sympathize with Magneto's paranoia, and his emphasis on free will, and nurturing ones mutant talents to thier fullest extent, untill you see his manipulative nasty side. I particularly liked how Famke Jansen used mostly intonation, and looks to show that she knew exactly what Maggy was up to.

I also liked the bit about Xavier making moraly ambiguous decisions. In the comics they actually do deal with some of the moraly ambigous choices Prof. X had to deal with. I think it was good to bring it into the movies, to round him out a bit.

To me it keeps him more of a human character. Even the best people are faced with choices that dont really have a clear cut moral way out, and I think thats what they were doing.

For instance his own son is super powerful, as well as severely sociopathic. Im not 100% sure, but I beleive in the end it was him that had to kill his son, to protect the world/ universe/timecontiuity...

Lightice wrote: To compare to homosexuals, do you think that gays would attack in bloodthirsty frenzy if a "gay-cure" would be developed?

Yes Lightice, I do think that...NO of Course not! geez, gimme a little credit... Ian Mckellen has said in a number of interviews that the theme of "cureing" mutantcy reminded him of people who wish to "cure" his homosexuality, and how the similarity gave him impitius to play his role better. Like Storm was trying to explain, there is nothing to cure, they are fine as it is. Also the rounding up people to cure them of thier differences is as Magneto is parinoid of, often the the precurser to killing them off, since they are defenceless and within the control of a government.

However, back to ambiguity, it still remains the problem that you shouldnt force anyone to chose to be cured or not, because you havent had their experiances. Like Beast pointed out, its easy for supermodel girl to say there is nothing wrong, but there are a number of unpleasent socialy, or physically dangerous mutations that come up in Xmen world that may make a mutantcy surpressent a good choice. (an example from the comics is of a boy who let of kenetic charges when he began to mutate, and died from it soon after.) As you could see, it seems to wear off with time anyways.

I have to wonder how Dr. Hank McCoy managed to become the UN ambassador, by the way, after beating up and possibly killing dozens of voters

Same way any military person can go on to goverment roles. Also, the morlocks were streat toughs, basically a big super powered violent gang. Hence the attitude, and the tatoos. Not a lot of votes coming from the homeless/gangland sector.

Tonks_kittygoth wrote: I liked that it dealt with the ambiguity of Prof.X and Magnito. The affection and respect between the two, as well as their reasoning behind there opposing view points. You can sympathize with Magneto's paranoia, and his emphasis on free will, and nurturing ones mutant talents to thier fullest extent, untill you see his manipulative nasty side. I particularly liked how Famke Jansen used mostly intonation, and looks to show that she knew exactly what Maggy was up to.

I liked that, as well, but it could have been done better, IMO. It already was done better in the previous part.

Yes Lightice, I do think that...NO of Course not! geez, gimme a little credit...

My annoyance was pointed at the movie's creators, not you. The question was, as you most likely understand, purely rethorical.

However, back to ambiguity, it still remains the problem that you shouldnt force anyone to chose to be cured or not, because you havent had their experiances. Like Beast pointed out, its easy for supermodel girl to say there is nothing wrong, but there are a number of unpleasent socialy, or physically dangerous mutations that come up in Xmen world that may make a mutantcy surpressent a good choice.

There was nothing bad in the plot's idea. It was the execution, that was below the standards of the previous movies.

Same way any military person can go on to goverment roles. Also, the morlocks were streat toughs, basically a big super powered violent gang. Hence the attitude, and the tatoos. Not a lot of votes coming from the homeless/gangland sector.

Dr. McCoy didn't have military affiliations. He appeared out of nowhere to kill people, who his job was to represent. Yes, people in middle of a terrorist attack, but nevertheless, that is not an image you want to relay as an ambassador of peace. He basically portrayed the very stereotype of violent, unpredictable mutant in that battle. Would you want a guy, who just killed people with his bare hands as the UN ambassador of the United States?

The group wasn't called Morlocks, either, by the way. I'm guessing that's from the comic. Magneto called them the Brotherhood (a tad sexist, wasn't he? ) and it was implied, that they were fairly ordinary people who were being discriminated in one way or another because of being mutants. Remember that they were talking about setting up commitees and filing offical complaints to the goverment, before Magneto arrived. Not exactly street-gang sort of behaviour.

In any case, after Magneto had invited them for his little camping trip, they were suddenly an army prepared to fight against their homeland. That didn't seem very credible, to me. It would have been better, if the main attack had only included a dozen or so of dangerous criminals, while the rest of the Brotherhood riot around the town and cause trouble. That's something discriminated people are pretty easy to convince to do, but attacking straight against military forces requires a bit more than that.

According to boxofficemojo.com, X-Men 3 is in first place at the box office and it took in $107 million.