This summer’s “X-Men: Days of Future Past” does an in-universe reboot of the “X-Men” saga via time travel, similar to the 2009 “Star Trek” movie, which jumped back to the early days of Kirk and company, and the TV series “Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles,” which time-jumped ahead of “Terminator 3.” As such, the seven existing “X-Men” films form what I’ll call Timeline One. (Timeline Two gets a sneak preview of sorts in “Future Past,” and it will presumably start in earnest with “X-Men: Apocalypse” in 2016.)
To mark the end of an era, I thought I’d take a look back at the first seven “X-Men” films in timeline chronological order rather than release-date chronological order. I’ll note continuity errors as they pop up in each film, but I’m holding out hope that the films fit together OK in a chronological re-watch. While giving my general thoughts on each movie, I’ll also note my favorite mutants. Our journey begins with the appropriately titled “X-Men: First Class” (2011):
THE STORY
In 1962, cribbing from the real-world Cuban Missile Crisis, Sebastian Shaw (an entertainingly laconic Kevin Bacon) – whose mutant power is to absorb energy, which he can then use to attack – aims to get the U.S. and Russia firing nuclear warheads at each other. It’s either so a bunch of humans wipe each other out, or so he can capture the energy to gain power, or both.
“X-Men: First Class” (2011)
Director: Matthew Vaughn
Writers: Ashley Miller, Zack Stentz, Jane Goldman
Stars: James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence
BEST GOOD GUY MUTANT
Beast. Nicholas Hoult (yeah, the kid from the “About a Boy” movie!) gives an outstanding performance as the awkward genius Hank, who creates an embryonic Cerebro among other gadgets, and crushes on Raven. But, projecting his own insecurities about his chimpanzee-like feet, he likes her more as the Jennifer-Lawrence-looking Raven than the Jennifer-Lawrence-painted-blue Raven, thus violating Dating Advice 101: If you’re a nerd with chimp feet, don’t reject a chick cuz she’s blue.
BEST BAD GUY MUTANT
Magneto. As played by Michael Fassbender (who looks like Ian McKellen much more than James McAvoy resembles Patrick Stewart), Erik’s quest for vengeance on the Nazis who killed his mom and ruined his life is compelling. I could’ve filed him under “Best Good Guy Mutant,” but I’ll keep him under “bad guys” based on the conventional wisdom. Still, in the debates between Charles and Erik, I agree with Erik 90 percent of the time in “First Class.”
Shaw deserves to die, and the U.S. and Russian soldiers “just following orders” is no excuse for attempted murder of (mostly) nonviolent mutants on that island. In the epilogue, Magneto already starts to take things too far – hinting at his schemes 40 years down the road in “X-Men” (2000) – by teaming up with Shaw’s former henchmen Azazel, Riptide, Emma Frost and Angel (the girl version, not to be confused with the male Archangel who pops up later in the saga).
WORST MUTANT
Emma Frost. January Jones is really boring in this role. I think she’s trying to play Emma as an ice queen, befitting her name, but she comes off as disconnected from everything that’s happening.
BEST NON-MUTANT
Moira MacTaggart. I had forgotten that Rose Byrne has a substantial role in this film as the CIA agent who befriends Charles and believes in equal rights for mutants. She’s an important character, as she gives us homo sapiens (as opposed to homo sapiens superior) in the crowd an audience surrogate. It’s a shame that Xavier wipes her mind at the end rather than trusting her to be an ally (especially since it means Byrne isn’t in “Days of Future Past”!).
MOST UNDERUSED MUTANT
Riptide. “First Class” does an admirable job of giving attention to everyone, but it’s funny how teleporter Azazel does so much more for Shaw’s cause than Riptide does (his power is to stir up water into mini-hurricanes, something he only gets to do once).
CONTINUITY NOTES AND ODDITIES
Hugh Jackman and Rebecca Romijn are the only two actors from “X-Men” films further down the timeline to appear here. Wolverine tells Charles and Erik to “go f— themselves.” Lawrence morphs into Romijn to show Erik what she’ll look like “in a few years” — actually a few decades because Mystique ages slowly, as Hank points out. Indeed, we see young Raven with a young Xavier in the opening segment, set in the 1940s, and she has aged about 10 years 20 years later.
When “First Class” ends, the embryonic Brotherhood of Mutants and Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters have been formed, and the battle lines seem to be drawn for a showdown in the near future. However, a decade later, in “Days of Future Past,” Future Wolverine arrives to find that such an inter-mutant war has stalled (thanks in part to the feds locking up Magneto for Mystique’s alleged crime of killing JFK – now there’s a helluva plotline to skim over!) and both teams have broken up (except that Hank still hangs out with Charles). Unless I missed something, there’s no mention in “Future Past” of what happened to rest of Magneto’s and Xavier’s gangs. But I guess some of them could return in “Apocalypse.”
When Charles uses Cerebro, he sees Storm and Cyclops at about age 10. As such, we can assume that Cerebro senses mutants not only through space, but also through time, as – judging by “X-Men” (2000) — those two probably would’ve been age 10 in the 1980s. Another possibility is that they were 10 years old in appearance in 1962 but they age slowly. This film establishes that Mystique ages slowly, and we know Wolverine hardly ages at all due to his healing factor.
There are many other continuity oddities that will crop up in future films, but I’ll save those for later in this flashback series.
WHERE IT RANKS
Pitted against the established continuity of the saga, there are plenty of holes to poke in “First Class.” However, if one can imagine that this was not only the first film chronologically but also the first film released, it’s hard to complain.
It moves briskly through great-looking locales around the world and has a bunch of great sequences, from an underwear-clad Moira infiltrating the HellFire Club, to Azazel taking out CIA guards by teleporting them into the sky and dropping them to their deaths, to Xavier helping Banshee, Havok, Beast and Magneto to hone their skills at his mansion.
“First Class” hits on its central theme expertly: Humans, as a general rule, don’t accept mutants. As such, Magneto essentially says “screw humans” (although he’s not yet militant like Shaw), whereas Xavier wants to work within human society or hide if necessary while waiting for humanity’s views evolve.
The question of whether mutants should be ashamed of themselves or not is played out via Mystique and Beast, who have it toughest of all because they physically look different. (Although let’s be honest: Mystique looks hot and Beast looks bad-ass.) Variations on this theme will continue throughout the saga, but it’s fresh in this first entry.