The New Mutants (2020)

 

The New Mutants marked the last of the X-Men movies for Fox Studios. This film offered a compete change of pace for these movies. Not only does it focus on brand new characters, but it also brings this movie franchise into the horror genre. 

In this film five teenage mutants are being held a secret institution, where they are undergoing treatments to cure them of their powers. As these treatments go on, they find themselves face to face with their worst nightmares.  

Despite the poor reviews this film has received, I actually liked it a lot. On the onset combining a superhero film with a horror film is a rare unique idea for current Hollywood. This idea is often explored in a rather intriguing way. With the character of Rouge previous X-Men movies have taken a look at the idea of superpowers not always being a blessing. With this movie, the franchise delves even deeper into this theme. There is never a single moment here, where we would ever want to be a superhero. For most of these characters their powers are a curse rather than a blessing. This is a fascinating idea that too few superhero movies give any credence to and to see it explored in such an intelligent way was a pure delight. As for the characters themselves they may be undeveloped, but they are likable. Even if they aren't complex, we care about them enough to feel an emotional connection to this story. This is helped by the well-done performances from the leads playing these teenagers (Maisie Williams, Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlie Heaton, Blu Hunt, Henrique Zaga). The story is also very well constructed and the reveal of why all these spooky events are happening is very clever. This movie also does a great job building an atmosphere that has a truly eerie feel and a general sense of unease. 

The main problem with this movie is that the filmmakers were too timid to go all the way with the horror elements. There are moments when the film starts to get genuinely creepy but then it backs off from this as if the filmmakers are afraid to make a superhero movie actually scary. Because of this, there are scenes that start out as legitimately creepy but end up leaving the audience disappointed with their conclusions. 

This film was directed and co-written by Josh Boone, who had earlier directed (and co-written) the romantic movie, Stuck in Love (2012) and The Fault in Our Stars (2014). The New Mutants is a true departure for him as both a superhero movie and a horror film. However, his experience with romantic films shows itself in a surprisingly sweet and touching romance between two of the teenagers (a lesbian romance that barely calls attention to itself for being a lesbian romance). Boone's co-writer on this film was Knate Lee, who had worked as a writer, producer and camera man on the Jackass TV series and movies. Boone and Lee had worked together on the mini-series The Stand. The New Mutants is the only superhero film either of them worked on. 

This movie was originally going to be released on April 13, 2018. However, it was delayed until February 22, 2019, because of the release of Deadpool 2 (2018) and then to August 2, 2019, because of the release of Dark Pheniox (2019). After Disney acquired Fox, it was delayed again until April 3, 2020. It was then delayed to August 28, 2020, because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, its release was a theatrical release when many places where still in lockdown. Frankly the movie deserved better. 

Boone had planned sequels for this movie. He wanted to turn it into a full trilogy. However, Disney's acquisition of Fox and the plans to put the X-Men in the Marvel Cinematic Universe prevented this from happening.