(SPOILER WARNING!!! This article does contain spoilers, if you haven’t seen the movie, just see the first paragraph to be informed without spoilers!!!)

X-men: Apocalypse still adds a very well acted and emotional punch, however, it is the weakest  in this trilogy in character development, story, and action, but I was still entertained!!!

Rating: 4 Stars

With all the different trilogies in the X-men franchise, I have enjoyed this recent trilogy very thoroughly. I loved X-men: First Class mainly for their great character development and a good story for the beginning of the X-men story. I also enjoyed X-men: Days of Future Past for their great story writing. Both of these movies pack a great emotional punch that really drives the story and characters into full gear. So when they announced that their final installment in this trilogy will have Apocalypse, I was immediately excited. Apocalypse is one of my favorite villains in the X-men story. He is a force to be reckon with. Add to the fact that a fellow Guatemalan, Oscar Isaac, was playing him, I was in. Sometimes, too much of a good thing on can lead to bad things in the movie. Unfortunately, that kind of happened.

What I Like: This particular trilogy did continue on what really works for them. That is some great character development and great acting. They had plenty of that in this latest epic. Once again, Michael Fassbender playing Magneto really took it home with an emotional and thought provoking scene. It showed, once again, both sides of the his character spectrum. You have him living a normal life after the events of the last movie, and he is happily married with a child. However, once he used his powers, and this time for something heroic, he still gets judged unfairly. These events lead to the accidental death of his family which captured another powerful moment. This leads to his rage where he kills all the officers with his slain daughter’s locket, and turned him back into the dark side of hating humans once again. This leads him to be manipulated by Apocalypse, played by Oscar Isaac, and actually giving him some greater power. That particular scene shows why the X-men franchise is so great, and some great literature for everyone to read. There were plenty of other cool scenes, like bringing Hugh Jackman back as Weapon X Wolverine (though the trailer ruined the element of surprise) and really showed the savagery and ruthless character of Wolverine that we haven’t seen in a while.  It was a breathe of fresh air for a small time. I also enjoyed the younger version of Jean Grey, played by Sophie Turner, and really enjoyed catching that small glimpse of Phoenix in her effort of defeating Apocalypse. Nightcrawler, played by Kodi Smit-McPhee, finally comes back in a movie, and showed more of his great power that was effective to the story. The after credits scene shows that Mister Sinister will be appearing in the next Wolverine movie which brings some excitement for future movies as well.

The So So: I thought some of the action had some messy CGI in certain scenes. It really made the film’s action very subpar. It is minor, but distracting to the trained eye, and I expected better from director Bryan Singer. They brought back one of the best scenes from the last film in Quicksilver, played by Evan Peters, showing his true powers of speed, but this time on steroids. Don’t get me wrong, it was a cool scene seeing him saving all the students from an explosion, but some scenes kind of looked sloppy. It didn’t give that element of shock and awe like in the last movie. Still fun to watch, but not as impressive in my opinion.

What I Didn’t Like: The villain Apocalypse was a disappointment to me. I did like the character development and acting for this villain, but they really washed down his true powers from past cartoons and comic book stories. He was menacing, but it looked like he was just more bark than bite. The only time you see his true power was in his mind fighting with Professor X, played by James McAvoy. For a powerful mutant in this film, he didn’t seem stronger than Magneto, to be quite honest, and that is disappointing for me. I thought Psylocke, played by Olivia Munn, was underused. Mystique’s, played by the beautiful Jennifer Lawrence, story for this movie was underwritten. It seemed like they tried to put one too many characters for this film, and kind of failed. It is not as bad as X-men: The Last Stand, but still a sore spot.  Lastly, and I know this shouldn’t bother me, but in the last movie they erased their past history from the other X-men movies, but the continuity errors was still bothersome for me and I wish I can shake that off. I really can’t and that is unfortunate for me.

Overall: This movie may have its flaws, but it was still entertaining. Any X-men fan will find enjoyment. I find it ironic that in a scene  in this film, where some student mutants were coming out from watching Star Wars: The Return of the Jedi (another Marvel and Star Wars collaboration) and talking about how the third installments in the movies are usually not that good. The same can be said about this latest second sequel. Once again I will say this, it may be the weakest of this franchise, but it is still fun to watch. I’m still looking forward to see what they have next in stock of this beloved franchise!!!

Rating: 4 Stars