Why was X-Men Apocalypse A Disappointment?

Some call him Apocalypse, he's some kind of god... who got beaten down by a bunch of kids who are not even at the top of their game.

Fair warning: This entry involves spoilers!

So Apocalypse was supposed to be "bigger and even better than Days of the Future Past". We were promised BIG! What we got was...... mediocre.

I'll be honest as usual; as time gone by and we saw new trailers I started to lose my enthusiasm long before the movie came to the theaters. The trailers were just... not good. And it's never a good sign for the trailers to disappoint you.

What kept my hopes up was the success of Days of the Future Past (I saw it in the theater 5 times and I swear I lost count of how many times I've seen it after it was on digital release.) and of course the already amazing cast being supported with new amazing cast members.

So let's begin with the cast then... (Did I say cast too many times? Cast, cast, cast, cast)

One of the most popular actors in the past few years, the great Oscar Isaac, was the mighty Apocalypse. The problem was that neither Oscar Isaac was great nor Apocalypse was mighty.

I don't find the blame in Isaac in this one don't get me wrong. There was just not much for him to do. The character was written so badly into the screenplay that under all that makeup it could be an Oscar Isaac look alike and we wouldn't notice for as long as I'm concerned.

There is a great destruction but no motive.

Then there's the 4 horsemen. I get why Magneto and Angel would like to join Apocalypse to a certain level. Storm... okay he makes you more powerful and stuff but you are striving for good. You are looking up to Mystique for being a hero (don't even get me started on that). Why would you be a part of this immense destruction?

And Psylocke... I was so excited for this character to finally enter the X-Men universe, expecting so much from her; and I was sure that Olivia Munn was going to do justice to her being a big fan of the character. But again I was disappointed.

In the movie Psylocke was no more than a layerless, brainless, power hungry mutant that not only has a motive in life, except for jealousy towards every single soul she sees but really has no opinion of her own at all.

Thank God, at least Fassbender did justice to one of my favorite characters, and even though towards the end of the movie it is oddly vague what he is doing just floating around with a bunch of metal and doing some kind of a magnetic yoga (?), Magneto was one of the only well written characters in the story.

We also met some of the new students of Xavier's school for gifted youngsters.

I've never liked Cyclops and I never will so I'll just leave that there.

But I actually like the character Jean Grey (not in the movies but in the comics and cartoons etc.) but it had been destroyed for me by Famke Janssen and I was hoping for Sophie Turner to make it better for me in this one; only she didn't.

I really like her in Game of Thrones and I believed that she was a good actor until now. But the horrible accent and those empty eyes proved me wrong. I hate to say this but Turner was not a good Jean Grey.

I really liked Nightcrawler though. Kodi Smit-Mcphee's Nightcrawler really was one of the highlights for me in this movie. I wish they didn't delete so many good scenes of him in the final cut but at least he was in the final cut right Rogue?

Speaking of being left out of the movie... Did you see Jubilee? Because she was nothing more than an extra in the film.

I was just so excited that Jubilee was finally finding her place in the movies but... I don't remember did she even have a line? Did we even hear her speak? If you haven't read the comics or seen the cartoon tell me, do you know what Jubilee's powers are?

Did you also notice that at least 1/10 of the movie was scenes from First Class. At this point we have to admit that Brian Singer was too lazy to place clever dialogues to explain/remind us of the past events and just preferred to embed tiny flashbacks all over the movie. I don't know about you but I don't respect that.

Of course it's not fair to say that it was all bad.

Quicksilver again did his thing and signed for another unforgettable moment in the movie (probably one of the two best scenes in the entire movie with the Wolverine cameo).

If you've read my Quicksilver vs. Quicksilver entry, you know that I have a special place for Peters' Quicksilver in my heart. But still I can't help but admitting that at one point the school rescue scene (or whatever you would like to call it) seemed a little bit forced to me.

The kitchen scene of Days of the Future Past had a well deserved great success and I'm pretty sure a lot of people still watch just that scene particularly on an on again just like I still do. And even though the school scene was a great comic relief and it was really good, I can't help feeling like it was just a copy past of the kitchen scene in a different setting.

At the end of the day, I have no choice but to say that X-Men Apocalypse, even though it was a fun movie to watch, was not really what I expected.

It probably could be perceived better if we saw Apocalypse first and Days of the Future Past later; because I admit it was a though act to follow. But whether you enjoyed or were annoyed by it we have to agree in one point: it had the potential to much a much better movie. Let's hope the final Wolverine movie will erase our memories of this tragedy.

Anyway, at least we always have Deadpool :)

Thank you for reading my humble opinion.

Arrested Development, Revival and Re-Revival

Do you remember Arrested Development? Do you remember it in a good way? If the answer to the second question is yes, then you obviously haven't seen the 4th season right?

(I'll give it my best not to give any spoilers so take pity on me!)

I don't know what it is but I could never, like the slightest bit, could like Jason Bateman. I can't really explain it, I just don't like the guy. That was the sole reason why I resisted watching Arrested Development for all these years despite hearing great things about it.

Anyway, being a huge Harmonian, I caved it when I heard Dan Harmon talking about it so I downloaded the entire show.

Now, there are a few things that I hate in a TV show. First of all the cliche premise. Second of all Jason Bateman... The story of a family that lost everything and a Jason Bateman that had no choice but to keep them together... That is kind of a nightmare to me.

However, as I got to watching the show, I... yeah I loved it. I'm not gonna lie I even liked Bateman. It is a perfectly structured comedy that really makes you laugh. I'm not talking about a grin or a smile, I'm talking LMFAO kind of laugh. I really did laugh my ass off.

Then came the 4th season...

I usually trust Netflix when it's about making shows. I haven't seen a Netflix series that I didn't like... until this week.

Every episode was about an individual character that we came to love. What we learnt however is that what made us love those characters was the unity of their existence. And because they hardly could get more than two characters in one scene together, Buster's immaturity and Gob's stupidness and Tobias' weirdness just didn't have the same effect on us.

At the end the whole of 15 episodes was just a pile of old jokes reheated and served tasting dry.

Scheduling problems, I get it. It's not easy to gather that many big names in front of one camera at the same time especially after almost 10 years. But if you can't do it, don't do it. Just don't half ass it!

What is special about this show is the relationships and yes all the events somehow get tied to each other at one point and the intricate storylines, I like; but it just lacked that thing that I can't really name.

It must be the confused feedback that the show got after its revival season that even though it's not canceled there hasn't been a new season for the past 3 years. Movie sequels come faster than this right?

Anyhow, according to the "mega producer" of the show Brian Grazer, season 5 was "definitely" coming in 2016, starting production in January and airing summer. You know... this summer... like... now....

Then a few days ago Mitch Hurwitz, the creator of the show, made this statement:

"It'll happen. It'll definitely happen. Not before the election, but it's definitely going to happen." (I'm not kidding, this is a direct quote)

And after this statement we are sure that... it's soooo not going to happen. Maybe another 10 years late. Who knows.

As I said, I really did my best not give any spoilers because if you haven't seen the show, I would really really recommend you to see it. It's a great laugh. But I would also like to warn you. Take caution in watching the final season. Sometimes it's better for things to die young so that you'll remember them well.

Thank you for reading my humble opinion.

Captain America: Civil War

But both of your mothers are named Martha!..

Sorry, wrong movie =/

We have been waiting for this for a long time haven't we? To be honest I was dreadful first after I heard that they were going to make Civil War into a movie because Age of Ultron...

Civil War is an amazing comic with an amazing story and as it is so easy to turn it into an amazing movie it is also very, very easy to fuck it up. Thank got in the hands of more than competent hands of the Russo Brothers, it is safe so say that Captain America: Civil War is my favourite MCU movie so far.

Now, Captain America is far from being my favourite Avenger and I was extra worried of Civil War becoming a Captain America movie rather than making it like an Avengers movie or something. Just felt too specific and I wasn't sure what they were going to do with it. However, not only giving equal and enough focus to every and each character, they even made Cap into a somewhat lovable persona in my eyes.

Don't get me wrong I'm team Iron Man forever! (In the movie; in the comics team Cap was more appealing to me. They've got the Punisher for God's sake!) But knowing the origin of the story, it's easy to say that they did justice to both sides ideology and point of view.

Without giving out too many spoilers I want to talk about a few things that I am so excited about in the story. First of all is of course our brand new Spider-Man.

Oh had I have my doubts!

I did get extremely excited, almost at the edge of having a heart attack, just like millions when Spiderman made his debut in the second trailer? third? There were just so many of them, I lost count. But it was really great. Yet, right after his big debut a huge worry started to haunt us: Trailers are made to make the movies look good. So what if that "Hi everyone!" was the only exciting moment we will get from our itty-bitty Spider-Man?

Thankfully, Tom Holland made an amazing Spider-Man (did you see what I did there?). I understand there is some controversy on Holland being too young comparing to the rest of the cast. But Spider-Man is supposed to be young. He is supposed to be in college age. He is supposed to be significantly younger than rest of the mighty Avengers. So SHUT UP! Ehmm. Sorry.

Another brand new addition to the team was the Black Panther. Chadwick Boseman gained my approval as the king of Wakanda. Wasn't he the most badass cat you've ever seen?

Nonetheless I have to say that I'm still a little upset him being separated from his lovely wife. (For those of you don't know the origin of T'Challa a.k.a. the Black Panther, he is married to the X-Men's very own white haired queen, Storm). Let's hope for the better days with no copyright restrictions, separating the people in love.

Speaking of love... If you've seen the movie you may have noticed a little thingy going on between Scarlet Witch and Vision. In the comics they are married; they were married... It's complicated. But at least both of their rights belong to the same company right? So that's good.

To tell the truth, despite hating the guts out of Captain America: The First Avenger, I really, really liked the Winter Soldier and I would like to give the credit to the Russo Brothers. Of course they did win my heart years ago with Community, and seeing with both of these Cap movies that it is not a coincidence.

I can say with my mind in peace, that this is the best Marvel Cinematic Universe movie I have seen so far.

Anthony and Joe Russo, I raise my glass and tip my hat to you sirs. We expect great things from you with the upcoming Avengers movies.

(By the way did you know that the next Avengers movies are going to have a change of name and be something different than Infinity Wars? Now you do!)

Let me know which team are you on in the comments? Team Cap or Team Ironman? Also if there is anything you want me to wright about, I'm always open to suggestions.

Thank you for reading my humble opinion.