Dark Phoenix (2019)
Simon Kinberg takes over the directorial duties this time out, covering ground he’s covered before in his (and Zak Penn’s) screenplay to X-Men: The Last Stand, which took from one of the most popular story arcs in the comic book’s history. That film has its share of detractors, including Kinberg himself, who has alluded to it as a missed opportunity on telling that story and produced not at all in the way that should have been. Kinberg, who did his part in scripting three of the X-Men films prior to this one, knows these characters about as well as just about any screenwriter could, and now he has even more control over how to bring the vision he has on paper to life.
The plot, initially set in 1992 after a prologue with a tragic event in Jean Grey’s childhood back in 1975, continues with the First Class set of mutants and involves a presidentially sanctioned trip into space in order to rescue a space shuttle. Jean Grey commits an act of heroism in trying to keep the space shuttle together as the crew is rounded up to safety, absorbing a massive wave of nearby energy nearby that should have easily taken her life. She ends up surviving the ordeal, much to everyone’s relief. But something is a bit off with Jean, finding herself with enhanced senses, and growing even more powerful than she had ever been before. Exhilarating at first, but now she’s becoming increasingly unstable, scared she’s beginning to lose control to her new nature, with an internal fight going on that is an even bigger match than the external one that involves her in a battle with fellow mutants who are trying to contain what is rapidly becoming the most powerful, perhaps even unstoppable, mutant of all.
Meanwhile, in what will turn out to be the film’s worst element, it is revealed that a super-powerful alien race, led by an entity that has taken the human body of Jessica Chastain’s mostly anonymous character, may be behind Jean’s metamorphosis. They seek to make a connection with her to manipulate her into becoming the indomitable god-like force they have envisioned her to become, in their effort to wreak havoc on an unsuspecting Earth. Jean finds herself becoming overwhelmed by the enemy within, and her unpredictability in her loyalties is now making her an enemy to all.
Unfortunately, even with a second effort to make the “Dark Phoenix Saga” right, Kinberg ends up taking the tale in all the wrong directions. Truth be told, while Kinberg is a veteran of this series, only one of the three prior films he had a hand in (X-Men: Days of Future Past) is considered one of the good ones, with The Last Stand and Apocalypse regarded as close to the bottom in terms of overall quality. Why he would be given the keys to drive a vehicle outright, and without any prior feature film directorial experience at all, is perhaps the biggest question mark on the decision making for Dark Phoenix. Perhaps we can just chalk it up to him being one of the producers, but it does take a bit of chutzpah to give oneself such a costly first effort. Even shining the best of lights on Dark Phoenix will reveal it to be an uneven endeavor, especially in terms of tone. If The Last Stand had horrific undertones to it but maintained a definite grasp as an X-Men film; Dark Phoenix often times feels like the X-Men were just injected into a horror film plot in some alternate universe.
Speaking of alternate universe, the new breed of X-Men films has had its share of continuity issues with the original trilogy all along, but Dark Phoenix doesn’t even bother to pretend like it plans to be in the same universe anymore. In addition to the same storyline for Jean Grey happening at two different times in two completely different ways between the series (the first one retconned out by the events of Days of Future Past), there’s even the apparent death within Dark Phoenix of a character that is very much alive in the original series that is set in the future. The Professor X-led mutants of 1992 are also seen as heroes to the world, including the president of the United States, rather than the scourge of the planet by traditional homo sapiens which once made Charles Xavier start the school, for their protection, as well as humanity.
Such a cavalier disregard for a series that was firmly established by Days of Future Past as intending to be younger representations of the same characters is now completely jettisoned without much regard for the fan base that has supported the prequel ideas through thick and thin. To add insult to injury, the often maligned disco-loving (originally) mutant known as Dazzler makes a small appearance here, belting out a brand of pop music that is over twenty-five years ahead of its time in the 1992 setting, which is, by any measure, a whole heap of embarrassing to behold.
Sophie Turner gives a strong performance as the internally struggling Jean Grey, even if the writing itself doesn’t explore the role with the kind of depth that she’s painting over with her ability to deliver convincing portrayals of a pained, conflicted, and emotionally undernourished young woman with a traumatic past. Kinberg does make an attempt to develop her character, but the only background we’re given is a fatal accident in which Jean lost her mother due to her own act of recklessness. Fassbender and McAvoy are solid in roles that have become old hat to them by now, though Jennifer Lawrence seems to only be reluctantly coming back for this effort, having said she was done playing Mystique the last time out, but willing to if Kinberg was the director, showing almost none of the acting desire necessary to give her part the presence it once held in the past. She reassessed the situation and came back for one more go around so that fans wouldn’t wonder why she disappeared for no explanation. If there is an actor that is completely wasted in the casting department, it is Jessica Chastain, who is given a role that could have been played by just about anyone with a modicum of screen presence, and possibly could have been better with less if that actor could at least come across as halfway menacing, which Chastain does not.
The effects work is nice, even if this film feels like it contains less big action set pieces than we’ve seen in other recent X-Men efforts. The best aspect of the entire film is the captivating score credited to Hans Zimmer, who was convinced to come back to scoring superhero films after wearing them off following Batman v. Superman. Kinberg wanted to recapture the more earthy feeling of the Dark Knight trilogy, enough to bring back its composer. Zimmer gives the compositions just the right mix of superhero rhythms mixed with the more somber tones usually afforded to horror films, of which Dark Phoenix can be classified to a certain degree. While the score is the stuff of big epics, the scope of Dark Phoenix comes across as surprisingly standard for a tea, superhero film. Part of this may be due to Jean Grey being the primary focus, rather than an external force, but it’s also a downplaying of the majesty from Kinberg, who claims to have been influenced by the more personal scale of Logan in downplaying the stylish qualities usually afforded a film in this franchise, that lacks the vision of large-scale, wide-open set pieces where something that feels cataclysmic happens. Dark Phoenix is, at times, claustrophobic in its approach (the climax of the film is a skirmish inside train cars) that, while refreshing in contrast to what we’ve come to know and expect, still lacks a certain sizzle we should be feeling when witnessing an adaptation of the story so riveting in the comics that they adapted it twice in the course of thirteen films.
Poor test screenings pushed forward the film’s release date by about a half-year but also has appeared to have resulted in a somewhat fragmented storyline, including a redone ending, originally shot to be taking place in space, now shifting to the aforementioned moving train. The ending, which incurred even more reshoots because it was tracking similarly to Captain Marvel, which would come out first because of the delays, is particularly dissatisfying after such a bombastic build-up, especially if you consider that this could be the last of this flavor of X-Men films before it inevitably gets rebooted by Marvel now that Disney has taken over 20th Century Fox and its film properties. Instead of the continued exploration on the neverending battle for acceptance by mutant-kind, or just a battle within Jean Grey to come to terms of whether she can maintain her desire to do good works with her powers while raging with feelings that are out of her control, we get mutants battling a bunch of ostensibly invincible aliens who seem to have walked in from another movie property in a battle to save Jean and/or themselves. The very end of the film is Kinberg’s nod to his love for the end of The Dark Knight Rises.
It’s hard to find much thematic resonance to leave the theaters with when given such a collection of perfunctory villains to have a major fight with, especially as the film wraps up shortly after the conflict without some way to tie the narrative together. Given the amount of screen time allotted to beings we’ve never heard of before and are unlikely to ever see again, one can only wonder how much better Dark Phoenix might have been if it instead concentrated on the emotional components of Jean Grey’s tragic arc, with a battle between Grey with god powers taking on every other mutant to the death while Professor Xavier tries to mind-control her out of it, or Magneto ends up finding a way to take her down permanently. That battle between rehabilitation and punishment for one’s sins has been an ongoing debate for humankind, so it certainly would have been a much more interesting theme to explore here, is Kinberg had wanted to continue the reflections on society, and those who don’t fit into it, that the X-Men has always represented.
All in all, there’s enough here to recommend for those fans who’ve stuck with the series this far, but it certainly isn’t the kind of film that will likely bring back those who’ve given up on the series since the departure of the original cast, and definitely isn’t going to gain new converts. It’s a diminishing return kind of film, and while not the worst we’ve seen (I think it’s a tick or two above the dreadful X-Men Apocalypse), it’s obvious that the Fox version of the X-Men might benefit from the kind of complete overhaul Marvel has been anxiously awaiting since they started on their current venture over a decade ago.
Qwipster’s rating: C+
MPAA Rated: PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action including some gunplay, disturbing images, and brief strong language
Running Time: 113 min.
Cast: Sophie Turner, James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jessica Chastain, Nicholas Hoult, Jennifer Lawrence, Tye Sheridan, Alexandra Shipp, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Evan Peters, Scott Shepherd, Ato Essandoh
Small role: Chris Claremont
Director: Simon Kinberg
Screenplay: Simon Kinberg