Allow me to provide you with some context. On YouTube, there are a significant number of filmmaking oriented channels. Including Brown Table, Nerdwriter, and A Different Perspective, a show hosted by my best friend, Joseph Bresett. These are all excellent YouTube shows, and if you enjoy video essays on cinema and filmmaking in general, I recommend you check them out. For today's blog entry, I would like to bring your attention to one YouTube channel, mainly Nando V Movies. On this channel, the host presents thought experiments in which he showcases how some movies might have been better if they had made one small change to the script. Incidentally, his video on how he would have changed the film X-Men Days of Future Past is quite intriguing.
One of the other things Nando V Movies does is he occasionally invites other YouTube movie people to pick a particular scene from a specific series of movies and discuss why they're great and why they work for storytelling. He previously got some YouTubers to contribute a series of videos on Marvel films, One Marvelous Scene, and it has resulted in some very insightful content. Recently, Nando V Movies decided to take another crack at the concept with the X-Men film franchise. While I was not on the official list of invitees to this challenge (assuming there is such a thing), I was intrigued by the idea and wanted to contribute my own two bits anyway.
For those of you who don't know or need a quick refresher, The X-Men are a group of comic book superheroes from Marvel Comics. They consist of a band of evolved people with special abilities referred to as Mutants. In their respective stories, Mutants are feared and discriminated against to the point that Government officials can openly campaign as "Anti-Mutant." They are, in essence, an allegory for the disenfranchised.
If you search YouTube for "One X-Cellent Scene," you will likely see most of them discussing a scene from X-Men First Class. Regarded by many, including myself, as the best X-Men movie. Others may mention a scene from Deadpool, which is just cheating. Because, as excellent as the film is, it's only an "X-Men" movie by association. I think it would be easy for me to point out a scene from X-Men First Class, but as I said, it's an easy film to draw material. Mostly because of its incredible quality and because most people have already discussed one of the many great scenes. Instead, I am going to talk about a scene that I think is the most provocative and useful in the whole X-Men film franchise, which is not recognized as well as it should, because it happens to be in one of the worst X-Men movies ever produced. In case you're wondering, no, it is not X-Men Dark Phoenix.
It's this film:
Now, please hear me out.
Yes, this is still one of the worst X-Men movies ever made. It has significant pacing issues, and it retains some of the less-than-stellar bits of writing that plagued the franchise from the beginning. Also, it tries too hard to be an unofficial adaptation of one of the greatest X-Men comic stories ever told. Spoiler-Alert, it failed even at that. However, on its own merits as a movie, it's technically not that bad. It raises the steaks as any sequel should, it has some of the best performances from the whole cast, and in some parts of the script, it has better writing than earlier X-Men films. However, I am not here to defend the trainwreck that is X-Men The Last Stand. I am here to discuss the one scene in this film that I think is one of the best moments of the entire franchise that is sadly never brought to its full potential throughout the film.
That scene happens right at the beginning of the movie, and it involves this character named Angel.
There are two opening scenes in the movie. Both of them are flashbacks and serve to introduce essential plot points. At least one of them is crucial to the film, while the other gets shoved to the sidelines for no good reason, but I'll discuss that later.
Anyway, the scene I want to discuss is the second one—the one about Angel.
The second opening scene is a flashback of Angel as a child, about twelve or so. His father is a wealthy man who does not like Mutants, which doesn't become apparent until later on in the scene.
It begins with the boy in the bathroom. He is scrapping his back for some reason, and it is incredibly apparent that it's painful. A moment later, his father knocks at the door and asks if he's alright. The boy proclaims that he's fine and will be out in a second. The father mentions that he's been in there for over an hour and insists that he come out. In a panic, the boy screams, "Just one second!" and frantically tries to hide his actions. We see the bathroom countertop littered with files, razors, and bloody cotton swabs. The father demands that he open the door, but the boy ignores him and keeps trying to cover up what he's been doing to himself. Suddenly, the father bursts through the door. He sees his little boy standing there without his shirt. As the boy begins to cry, the father looks down on the floor and sees bloody cotton swabs, and feathers. The father proclaims, "No, not you!" as the son replies, "Dad, I'm sorry." Then, the camera turns to face the mirror so we may see the boys back. It turns out he is growing a pair of wings as his mutation, and he had been deliberately mutilating himself to hide or prevent it—a shocking introduction.
For me, this remains one of the most provocative and impactful scenes in the entire X-Men movie franchise, made even more astonishing by its short runtime of only sixty-nine seconds. This opening scene accomplishes three things:
First, it introduces a new character not yet seen in the movies and gives the impression that he is to be our new protagonist. Second, it showcases the unhealthy and awful feelings the boy's father has for what his son is. Third, it presents the overall conflict of the story. In the film, scientists claim to have discovered a "cure" for Mutants. However, by the end of the film, it becomes apparent that while you can choose to suppress who or what you are, you can never really destroy your genuine self. True harmony comes from embracing yourself for who you are. Not to mention society learning to welcome that which is different and beautiful. While X-Men The Last Stand fails as a movie in many ways, the overarching theme of the dangers of repression and self-denial is probably one of the few things it did well.
As I hinted at earlier in this blog entry, some of the things presented in this opening scene are never brought up again throughout the movie. The themes are there, and Angel does have a moment where he shows his father how wrong he is about Mutants, but the essential aspect is absent from the rest of the film. By placing this scene at the beginning of the film, it gives the impression that the story is about him. This could have been a fantastic opportunity to make a new X-Men film that focused on a new relatable protagonist that seriously drove home the homophobia allegory presented by the previous films. Instead, Angel only has, at most, two additional minutes of screentime, most of which is utterly wasted.
This disappointed me more than the films failed attempt to adapt the most excellent X-Men story ever told, as mentioned earlier. Yet, despite that, the opening scene with Angel as a child will forever remain engraved into my memory. It is an image that is important and vital for many reasons. It shows how not to be a parent, the dangers of unhealthy societal pressure, and the importance of love for yourself and others from all walks of life. Even though the rest of the movie didn't take advantage of this opportunity, I am glad it at least left the critical impression that it needed to.
Ladies & gentlemen, I am TheNorm, thank you all for reading.
