X-Men First Class (2011)

 

With X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) in the works, Fox planned to make another movie following the origins of Magento. This film would soon find itself in development hell and would eventually be cancelled. Ideas from that cancelled film would find its way into X-Men: First Class. This movie came about when producer Simon Kinberg read the comic book series, X-Men: First Class and suggested to 20th Century Fox, that they should adapt this series as the next X-Men film. 

The storyline takes place in 1962 and as the title suggests it revolves around the formation of the first group of X-Men. The bulk of the story involves the relationship between Charles Xavier and Erik Lensherr (later to become Magento) as they form this group of mutants. However, when a dark figure from Erik's past comes around, he is consumed with vengeance creating a strong rift between him and Charles. 

After X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) and X-Men Origins: Wolverine, showed the franchise starting to falter, this movie shows it again reaching the heights of the first two films. There is a lot to love about this movie. All the characters both old and new are great, with each of them feeling fleshed out and real to us (an impressive feat for a film with this many characters). Each gets their own arc here and each arc is given the proper time to develop. Though there are action scenes here, it is these characters and their arcs which are at the forefront. The 1960's setting is also perfectly utilized. This is not one of those movies where a time period is employed as a setting but only superficially so. Instead, the time period is integrated into every part of this story, which is just as much about Cold War America as it is about superheroes. With Cold War America as its setting, this movie helps explore the themes of prejudice and the replacement theory in a very intelligent and smart way. 

This film does have a few flaws though. The special effects are often times not that great and can't hold a candle to those in other superhero movies from the same time period (Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) and Thor (2011) came out the same year). This can get a little distracting at times, especially during the action scenes. Meanwhile some of the action scenes seem underwhelming and not have the weight or scale that they should have. 

This movie also benefits from a very strong cast. James McAvoy is wonderful as a young Charles Xavier (a role he would reprise in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), X-Men Apocalypse (2016) and Dark Pheonix (2019). Michael Fassbender is equally wonderful as Magento. a role that he seemed to completely understand. Kevin Bacon does a very good job as the film's villain, providing a character that may have a point but still comes off as completely evil. Jennifer Lawrence's career was just on the cusp of taking off with this film. The year before she had starred in Debra Granik's Winter's Bone for which she had won an award for best actress at the Stockholm International Film Festival and the Independent Spirit Awards. The year after this movie she would receive the role she is best known for as Katniss in The Hunger Games (2012) as well as Silver Linings Playbook (2012) for which she would win an Oscar for Best Actress at only 22 years old. She is wonderful in this X-Men role, showing how great of an actress she is even this early in her career. She would reprise her role as Mystique here in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), X-Men Apocalypse (2016) and Dark Pheonix (2019). Zoë Kravitz is great as Angel makes one wish this character would also be brought back for more X-Men movies. However superhero fans will know her for playing Catwoman in The Lego Batman Movie (2017) and The Batman (2022). Nicolas Hoult is quite good as Beast, though no one can top Kelsey Grammer in the role. He would later reprise the role in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), X-Men Apocalypse (2016) and Dark Pheonix (2019). Hugh Jackman's cameo as Wolverine is laugh out loud funny and the best use of an F-bomb in a PG-13 film. 

Though the producers originally did not want Matthew Vaughn as the director, because he had briefly started working on X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) before backing out of that film, after seeing Vaughn's satirical superhero film Kick Ass (2010), Kinberg approached Vaughn to direct First Class. Discovering that this film was both a prequel and a soft reboot of the franchise, Vaughn became interested in this movie because of the greater freedom it offered him.  

Upon its release this movie earned $55.1 million on its first three days. While this was less than the last movie had earned on its opening days, it was slightly more than the first film. Critics gave this film mostly positive reviews. While the critics admitted that the movie had flaws, they praised the casting and intelligent social commentary.