Bamf! Snikt! Unnnggghhh! (X-Men 2 / X2: X-Men United)

Ethan Switch - Friday, 2 May 2003 - Print Version

In X-Men 2 onomatopoeic mutations finally get the work out they deserved in the first film. Most notable of all would have to be the contribution from Kurt "Nightcrawler" Wagner (Alan Cumming) kicking off the festivities by bamfing in and out of the walls and ceilings of the White House as he undergoes what is a rather uncharacteristic attack on the President. Bamfing all about the Oval Office Nightcrawler puts the mutant fear into the President and the Secret Service and sets things up for the entire movie.

On the other end of the sound stage is Logan aka Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) who finally gets to go berserker and manages to notch himself a few dead bodies in the manic process of defending the mansion from an ambush of nefarious unseen political moves set in motion by a gruff and evil William Stryker (Brian Cox).

One major gripe with the first film which bleeds into the sequel like the supposed stains on Nightcrawler's jacket are the missing Gambit and Beast. In his pre-blue fur phase, Beast was known as a Dr. Hank McCoy. Nodding off as such he makes a little cameo appearance on a mounted TV in a bar scene where Mystique (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos) goes to work on a fat and dopey security guard from Magneto's (Sir Ian McKellen) plastic prison hold.

Which is more screentime than Gambit gets. Relegated to nothing more than his birth name of Remy LeBeau. Gambit, along with a few other mutant names appears for just a fraction of a second as the database of mutants known pops up during the course of a little hacking from Mystique. The quick fleeting glances don't end there. Jubilee for instance, would otherwise be just another one of the few students actually present at the school if it weren't for the fact that she gets credited in the credits during the credit roll. Only the patented huge earrings she wore from the first film give off any such indication that she is even there at all. And the mainly yellow attire.

Blink and you'll miss 'em.

Minor mentions of events that happened in the first film happen here and there but they don't hinder the movement of the story. Supplemental if at all like those little editorial boxes in the panels of the comics themselves. There is no need to watch the first in order to appreciate and understand the second.

Fight scenes held some high paced and quality action. Wolverine going at it against Lady Deathstrike (Kelly Hu) was perhaps the better of the lot after Nightcrawler's entrance. To counterbalance all of the choreography and special effects was the emotional content in the storyline. The characters were better developed and well drawn.

One such factor would be that of the mane on Wolverine. Looking every much the part of someone who woke up on the wrong side of gravity in the first the hairs have been tamed and combed into a respectable showing. It would seem as though the stylist took it upon themselves to give him a rather well-groomed look mixed with the fiery nature of the raging follicular growth.

The biggest shame would have to be the relegation of Cyclops (James Marsden) into the background. For all intents and purposes Cyclops is the actual team leader of the X-Men and yet from the way he's treated by everyone he has his light stolen yet again by Wolverine and Xavier (Patrick Stewart).

In-jokes and references to the comicbook roots were rife compared to the first one. An improvement to be sure.

Ethan Switch