X2: X-Men United (2003)

Wolverine: Got any beer?
Bobby: This is a school.
Wolverine: So that's a "no"?
Bobby: Yeah, that's a "no."
Wolverine: Got anything other than chocolate milk?

 Ice..Ice.. baby!

The second film in the X-Men series, X2: X-Men United directed by Bryan Singer continues the story of our mutant heroes and villains from the first X-Men, after the events at Liberty island. After an assassination attempt on the President of the United States by a teleporting mutant known as the Nightcrawler (Alan Cumming), the president gives permission for human military scientist, Colonel William Stryker (Brian Cox) to raid Xavier's School for mutants. Professor X (Patrick Stewart) and his team of X-Men (Famke Janssen as Jean Grey, Halle Berry as Storm, James Marsden as Cyclops, Anna Paquin as Rogue, Shawn Ashmore as Iceman, Hugh Jackman as Wolverine) then have to find the mutant assassin, only to learn there's a plot involving the extermination of mutants around the world by Colonel William Stryker. They then have to band together with their former foe, Magneto (Ian McKellen) and Mystique (Rebecca Romijin) in order to stop Stryker. But ultimately William Stryker holds the key to the mystery of Wolverine's past.

 What's better than a mutant villain? A human Villain!

One of the best comic book sequels around! I think as far as the story goes, it's actually good. Having the heroes and the villains of the first movie put their differences aside to go against a common enemy is a bit of a cliche but looking back, but it's a good cliche and a good direction for a sequel. I'm surprise there's not much to the Magneto's Brotherhood of Mutants, consisting only of Magneto and Mystique, but then again, you have them team up with the heroes, there's already a good number of characters you have to follow. But that being said, this movie essentially plays out like a proper Wolverine movie cause it's very much character driven and really focuses on Wolverine and William Stryker. There's not much going on with Rogue with her social isolation issues and her relationship with Bobby the Iceman, and there's not much also going on too with Cyclops and Professor X, who pretty much wasn't around in a huge center chunk of the movie. And as for Jean Grey, her story is pretty much written to hint and set up for the next sequel. So yea, this should be called X-Men 2: Wolverine Origins.

That's right, this movie is a spotlight on Wolverine.

Action wise, well if you put Wolverine Adamantium claw action aside, there's really not much. Nightcrawler's menacing and cool teleportation fight in the White House stole the limelight in the introduction scene before he's reduced to a wimp and Mystique acrobatic take down of Stryker's guards was not only cool but humorous at times, especially when you as the audience also get caught off guard when she disguised herself as Stryker. Perhaps, the most boring fight scene is between Cyclops and Jean Grey. Somehow there's a potential to be good... you know, having the two lovebirds pit against one another and Jean is moving closer to her "Pheonix" Dark side. But it all came out pretty boring. But really, the action is best when Wolverine is unleashed. How he deals with Stryker soldiers during the attack at the school was really cool...and looks pretty painful too. Then you get the fight scene with him and Lady Deathstrike. It's like a female version of Wolverine (They haven't introduce X-23 yet), sexy yet deadly...and instead of claws, she has..nails. I guess nothing gets more feminine than that. Although Wolverine has his healing powers and indestructible claws, it's good that he has a foe that really deals him a lot of harm and pain, and brings a form of threat to him. Lady Deathstrike will then be the staple form of Adamantium enemies that Wolverine is going to have to fight with in the future movies. Think about it, the messed up Deadpool has healing factors and Adamatium swords..including an array of powers and abilities and then in the recent Wolverine movie, you get him to fight the Silver Samurai which is pretty much Adamantium steel armor. So, his fight scene with Mystique in the first movie is perhaps the most unique and interesting foe he has to fight with.

If you don't cut your nails for like 20 years and you paint them silver, you can cosplay as Lady Deathstrike.

The special effects still stands up to today. The teleportation effect that Nightcrawler may look a little dated, and you can tell there's some wiring and green screen effect. Cause now you can compare with the X-Men Origin's Deadpool's teleportation fight which came out a lot smoother. But back then, Nightcrawler's fight, flips in the White House and teleportation effects were really cool and mind blowing. A good step up from the first movie.

Even the make up is really good.. Smile! =D

Continuity wise, here's a list I've noted when watching X2:

• Remy LaBeau a.k.a Gambit's name on Stryker's computer. In Origins, he was mentioned to have escape from Stryker's island. So, Stryker certainly have kept a record of him.
• Lady Deathstrike as Stryker's bodyguard is also consistent with Stryker's character on experimenting on mutants in the past with Adamantium and mind controlling them as his puppet.
• Mystique talk to Nightcrawler about not needing to hide is consistent with Mystique's choice of not hiding at the end of First Class.
• Magneto's talk about asking Pyro to reveal his REAL name is consistent with Magneto's talk to Mystique to reveal the REAL her.

 Hey, looks it's Gambit!

 Inconsistency-

• Dr Hank McCoy is featured on the television without his beastly hair. I guess one can argue that this dude could be a different Hank McCoy. Some tease...
• The conversation between Stryker and Professor X revealed a history that Professor X once took in Stryker's son to his school.. which the story was either never bothered to be showcased in Origins or it could have took place before or after Origins. Well, we got to see young Jason frozen in ice in Origins.
• We are treated with plenty of Wolverine's flashbacks which were very and vastly different from what we see in Origins. Even the lab of Wolverine's Adamantium experimentation looked so much different from the lab we see in Origins. Even the look and the location of Alkali lake and the dam is very different from what we see in Origins. Can somebody please do a proper Wolverine origins movie?!

Hey, look it's Beast...cleanly shaven and de-blued.

Yup, this was before the series fell apart with the next sequel. This was comic book movie gold back then. It's a real pity Bryan Singer has to leave to do Superman Returns and as a result, we got a fairly moderate Superman movie (I personally don't think it's bad but it's not good either) and two bad X-Men sequels. I think this one works so well because it really explores more on our favourite X-Men character, Wolverine. It's ashamed that Wolverine's back story was then crapped all over by X-Men Origins: Wolverine and the follow up story to X2 was crapped all over by X-Men 3. But I have to say, X2 may be the best in the X-Men franchise. But there's still hope in the series, especially after X-Men: First Class and The Wolverine. I'll give X2: X-Men United, a 10 out of 10 Iceman-cooled Dr Pepper's.

Click below to view the trailer

Where's the chess playing scene?

There must always be a chess playing scene when Charles and Eric is around.

Think there's nothing wrong with X2? Think again... click below: