X-Men First Class
Jun. 27th, 2011 02:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackGood
* Actual characters whose personality matters and interacters with other characters' personalities
* Set at a time when Xavier and Magneto are able to let rip and it's awesome, rather than having to come up with contrived explanations why they're practically omnipotent, but wait till the end of the film to do anything.
* A plot that mostly more-or-less makes sense.
* Portrays earlier versions of the characters that are interestingly different, but not inconsistent with their normally-understood later selves.
It's rare that once a series has started to go downhill, the second prequel is the one that's picks up again, but this one bucks the trend: it's definitely better than the boring wolverine prequel, and at least as good as XIII, and in some but not all ways better than X-Men 1 and 2.
Bechdel-Wallace Rating
Fail. Every film I see fails. Just assume every film I see fails until I see otherwise. Plus all the female chartacters are gratuitously sexualised.
And I mean -- gratuitous sexualisation of all genders can be very fun, but if one ALWAYS sexualises EVERYONE one is contributing to the badness of a society where people can't be respected for anything else. For that matter, I notice my standards have inexorably risen quite a bit from where they used to be. There's still a lot of things that don't bother me, but there's also a lot that's much better than it used to be, but that now I've seen how sexist it still is, I can't unsee it, even if I wanted to.
For isntance, there's a major theme in Mystique/Raven wanting to be accepted for who she is, which is often presented in romantic terms, but I think you can easily see it as her wanting to be accepted as a person first, and as a romantic person second. And the film very sensibly gives only a breifest mention of the flirtation between Xavier and the CIA woman, but a lot of time to the relationship between Magneto, Xavier and Mystique, and between Mystique and Hank.
I think whether you see it as a good arc, or disastrous devaluing of Mystique, depends how you think the film is portraying Magneto. If you throw him into the "well-characterised but definitely villain" bucket, you view Mystique as a dupe who had her feelings played on, which is incredibly negative. (I mean, that's a realistic story, but putting it here would just throw out one of the female characters with strong opinions and strong dedication for another "women ruled by emotions" stereofuckingtype.) But if you view Magento as being right (up till the point where he threatens to murder lots of people, anyway), then you tend to view the Magneto/Mystique arc as a genuine tragedy: Charles is good in most ways, but he fucked up by letting his prejudice against Mystique show, and she quite rightly told him to fuck off, and was driven to Magneto by her principles, not by superficial feelings.
So, a lot of good stuff. But it's practically impossible to get a message about "don't sexualise naked blue women" into a major blockbuster film without -- you know -- sexualising it in passing.
I was very very ready to accept the female characters on their own merits. They're all reasonably interesting characters, about as well characterised as men in similar positions. But it's hard to escape notice that they are, respectively in rough order of importance:
(a) naked
(b) scantily clad, and often turning transparent
(c) flirting with the main character
(d) a stripper, whose mutant power involves being faery and scantily clad
(e) a CIA agent in her lingerie
(f) a girl who flirts with the main character in a bar
(g) a parade of las vegas call girls
Any of those would be perfectly fine. Even pleasantly titillating. But I literally can't think of any female character whose primary function was not sexualised. (There were probably a couple in the background I forgot.)
Slash potential
Very very good. Xavier and Magneto go around giving each other significant glances, passionate speeches, and be in bed together having a vicar's tea party.
The Ending
The ending was quite moving. But I think they shot their wad way too early. They should have saved the whole "Magneto/Charles split" and "Charles getting injured" for a follow-up. Now they've painted themselves right back into the same corner they were in to start with, with each film trying to portray Magneto as (a) driven by principles but gone horribly wrong (b) a credible threat (c) reduced to the status quo at the end of the film without being emasculated. That's why the previous films hit a brick wall! They could well have had much the same ending but without Magneto walking into the sunset, and the whole next film could be about some philosophical gulf which drives Charles and Magneto apart by the end. But now it looks like it will be another by-the-numbers magneto as inconsitently-principled villain film.
* Actual characters whose personality matters and interacters with other characters' personalities
* Set at a time when Xavier and Magneto are able to let rip and it's awesome, rather than having to come up with contrived explanations why they're practically omnipotent, but wait till the end of the film to do anything.
* A plot that mostly more-or-less makes sense.
* Portrays earlier versions of the characters that are interestingly different, but not inconsistent with their normally-understood later selves.
It's rare that once a series has started to go downhill, the second prequel is the one that's picks up again, but this one bucks the trend: it's definitely better than the boring wolverine prequel, and at least as good as XIII, and in some but not all ways better than X-Men 1 and 2.
Bechdel-Wallace Rating
Fail. Every film I see fails. Just assume every film I see fails until I see otherwise. Plus all the female chartacters are gratuitously sexualised.
And I mean -- gratuitous sexualisation of all genders can be very fun, but if one ALWAYS sexualises EVERYONE one is contributing to the badness of a society where people can't be respected for anything else. For that matter, I notice my standards have inexorably risen quite a bit from where they used to be. There's still a lot of things that don't bother me, but there's also a lot that's much better than it used to be, but that now I've seen how sexist it still is, I can't unsee it, even if I wanted to.
For isntance, there's a major theme in Mystique/Raven wanting to be accepted for who she is, which is often presented in romantic terms, but I think you can easily see it as her wanting to be accepted as a person first, and as a romantic person second. And the film very sensibly gives only a breifest mention of the flirtation between Xavier and the CIA woman, but a lot of time to the relationship between Magneto, Xavier and Mystique, and between Mystique and Hank.
I think whether you see it as a good arc, or disastrous devaluing of Mystique, depends how you think the film is portraying Magneto. If you throw him into the "well-characterised but definitely villain" bucket, you view Mystique as a dupe who had her feelings played on, which is incredibly negative. (I mean, that's a realistic story, but putting it here would just throw out one of the female characters with strong opinions and strong dedication for another "women ruled by emotions" stereofuckingtype.) But if you view Magento as being right (up till the point where he threatens to murder lots of people, anyway), then you tend to view the Magneto/Mystique arc as a genuine tragedy: Charles is good in most ways, but he fucked up by letting his prejudice against Mystique show, and she quite rightly told him to fuck off, and was driven to Magneto by her principles, not by superficial feelings.
So, a lot of good stuff. But it's practically impossible to get a message about "don't sexualise naked blue women" into a major blockbuster film without -- you know -- sexualising it in passing.
I was very very ready to accept the female characters on their own merits. They're all reasonably interesting characters, about as well characterised as men in similar positions. But it's hard to escape notice that they are, respectively in rough order of importance:
(a) naked
(b) scantily clad, and often turning transparent
(c) flirting with the main character
(d) a stripper, whose mutant power involves being faery and scantily clad
(e) a CIA agent in her lingerie
(f) a girl who flirts with the main character in a bar
(g) a parade of las vegas call girls
Any of those would be perfectly fine. Even pleasantly titillating. But I literally can't think of any female character whose primary function was not sexualised. (There were probably a couple in the background I forgot.)
Slash potential
Very very good. Xavier and Magneto go around giving each other significant glances, passionate speeches, and be in bed together having a vicar's tea party.
The Ending
The ending was quite moving. But I think they shot their wad way too early. They should have saved the whole "Magneto/Charles split" and "Charles getting injured" for a follow-up. Now they've painted themselves right back into the same corner they were in to start with, with each film trying to portray Magneto as (a) driven by principles but gone horribly wrong (b) a credible threat (c) reduced to the status quo at the end of the film without being emasculated. That's why the previous films hit a brick wall! They could well have had much the same ending but without Magneto walking into the sunset, and the whole next film could be about some philosophical gulf which drives Charles and Magneto apart by the end. But now it looks like it will be another by-the-numbers magneto as inconsitently-principled villain film.