Editorial: Second Viewing And My Dilemma Of X-Men: Apocalypse

I had the opportunity to catch a second viewing of X-Men: Apocalypse yesterday because I enjoyed the first viewing so much.

But going through it the second time around, there were just a few more things that didn't quite gel together for me. While the first time viewing gave me so much joy, this second time didn't elevated the experience - unlike Captain America: Civil War.

And so this is where I'm having this internal debate.

As a movie on its own, I didn't find a lot of fault in the storytelling, nor the action sequences, nor the character development. Apocalypse as the antagonist was a well written character that was both powerful and flawed at the same time because he was born a human and then became the most powerful mutant through absorbing powers of other mutants.

In his wake, his thirst for power and immortality blinded him and caused his downfall because if he had taken a different and slower approach to take over the world, no X-Man could have taken him down.

But this was still a comic book movie with decades-worth of source material. Apocalypse as a character has been altered greatly for the movie and, to the hardcore fans, may look pathetic.

My biggest problem through the second viewing was the fight choreography. Granted that half of the X-Men were kids on their first mission, I so missed those fight sequences so wonderfully choreographed in X-Men: Days Of Future Past. And this being the close to the trilogy, nay, the six stories of X-Men; it should have had a bigger fight piece at the end.

But we're only treated to characters throwing blasts of energy at Apocalypse. Even Psylocke, one of the best martial artist in the comic books, didn't get a cooler fight scene. Even Nightcrawler and Angel's tousle wasn't enough of a spectacle. There's no memorable fight scene at all in this movie.

Still, I very much appreciated Singer's introduction to characters like Storm, Nightcrawler, Cyclops and Jean Grey. Fans shouldn't be disappointed in these. I also appreciated how that second last shot of Jean Grey was an uncanny shadow of Famke Janssen's Jean. Quicksilver once again had one of the best scenes of the movie but it was nothing compared to the previous movie. Nevertheless, I couldn't stop smiling in his sequence.

Again, I would stress the performances of Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy were the best parts of the movie. But this time the emotional impact was much weaker than DOFP.

I would have liked to see an ending where Magneto was still distraught over his loss of wife and kid, and Mystique left with him instead of staying in the X-Mansion. That would make a great setup for what's to come: Magneto forming the Brotherhood and continue to defy Xavier.

So now I'm kind of torn between my scoring for this movie. As a movie on its own and removing my fanboyism, I could let it maintain as 8.5/10. But this is still a comic book movie with source material, and in that respect, I would drop my score down to 7.5/10.