The X-Men Cinematic Universe (General Discussion)

[JD]

Not sure what to think of Kinberg directing Dark Phoenix, like Kirk said, his history is a little mixed. I also tend to get a little concerned when they hand over something this big to a first time director. The guy might be able to write, but that doesn't necessarily mean he'll be able to direct.
Edit: Actually, looking back at his filmography, I've enjoyed pretty much all of the stuff Kinberg has written that I've seen, but that still doesn't mean he'll be a good director.

 

[kirk55555]

Enough people went to see the last four X-films with which Kinberg has been involved to make them financially successful, and FOX clearly believes in his ability to continue delivering financially successful films since they asked him to direct Dark Phoenix in addition to writing and producing it.

Or they just don't really care and keep assigning him because he's a familiar element and will make them just enough money its not worth finding someone else. Isn't it a bit weird to argue that a company should only focus on money and not quality? I mean, I gave some good monetary reasons to use different people, the movies Kinsberg has worked on since Days of Future Past have kept making less money and FOX really can't afford to kept that trend running forever. People who care can focus on money and quality, like the MCU. FOX's X-Men movies, outside of outliers like Deadpool and maybe Logan, just keep having a more and more tarnished reputation.

FOX is not in a position of "Make a good movie or make a profitable movie". They can do both, and they know they can and will generally make more money if a movie is generally considered good. They also know that Kinberg is at about 50/50 with good to bad X-Men movies. It really doesn't make much sense for them to keep hiring him as a writer, much less a director and having him be both on what is basically their second attempt at the Dark Phoenix storyline is bizarre. Hopefully if this one is bad makes even less money then Apocalypse (both of which are entirely possible even if I honestly hope it doesn't work out this way), he stops getting as much jobs on the creative side of things.

Apocalypse was mediocre, and unlike DC it didn't have a Batman or Superman level character to draw money. It made a profit, but a good chunk less then the two X-Men related movies before it. If that trend keeps up, it will be bad for them.FOX movies can be effected by bad reviews and word of mouth much more then DC movies could, and if Dark Phoenix goes over badly I can't imagine it will be good for their profits.

 

[DigificWriter]

@kirk55555 Should Kevin Feige step down from his position as studio head and creative overseer of the MCU because Doctor Strange and GotG 2 made considerably less money than Captain America: Civil War?

 

[JD]

The thing to keep in mind with these situations is that the creative people and the money people are two different groups, and it's the money people who have the real power, so as long as Kinberg brings in the money he'll stick around.
As for Kinberg, no writer is perfect, so as long I've enjoyed more of his stuff than not, which I now see I have, then I'm happy with sticking around. My big concern is the fact that Dark Phoenix is a pretty massive project to hand over to someone whose only exprience as a director was second unit on Fan4stic, which I didn't even know about until I just checked IMDB.

 

[kirk55555]

@kirk55555 Should Kevin Feige step down from his position as studio head and creative overseer of the MCU because Doctor Strange and GotG 2 made considerably less money than Captain America: Civil War?

They didn't make less money because they were mediocre or bad, though. Civil War, while definitely being a Captain america movie, also had most of the Avengers. It was also the sequel to The Winter Solider, which even for an MCU movie was really, really loved by most of the fans. Of course it was going to do better then Doctor Strange or even GotG. It was a juggernaut. DS and GotG have nowhere near the appeal of the Avengers characters, which is really saying something because DS did very well and GotG was a break out hit (also, I'll point out that GotG 2 still made more then GotG 1, unlike Apocalypse compared to DoFP).

One movie making more then another doesn't always mean anything. Sometimes there are good reasons that one will make more money. But, in the end, Apocalypse almost certainly made less money then DoFP (a movie a lot of people enjoyed and reinvigorated the franchise after the bad reactions to X3 and mixed reactions to First Class) because of the mediocre reaction that fans and critics had to it. It made 200 million dollars less then the movie directly before it (and I'm not even talking about Deadpool), and it was because of its quality. Kinberg was a big reason for that lack of quality (along with other factors in my opinion like the less then stellar acting of people like Jennifer Lawrence).

So, quality is a big factor in the FOX X-Men movies, arguably a good deal more then in the other two superhero movie franchises. Bad reviews hit them harder then they hit DC. Sure, Kinberg can (sometimes) make FOX a profit (as long as he's not writing F4), but his movies are making less. If he doesn't start producing better work, his stuff will keep making less and will keep hurting the X-Men movie franchise, which is already in a distant third place now that Sony and the MCU are pretty much together.

People in general don't seem to be that excited for the non-Deadpool X-Men movies anymore. Keeping Kinberg around instead of handing over the main X-Men movies to new blood is just going to hurt them more and more unless Kinsberg can really turn the ship around, and I'm far from convinced he can do that.

 

[Ethros]

Confirmed that the movie will be set in 1991.

So if Magneto was about 10 years old at Auschwitz, Fassbender was meant to be in his 30s in First Class, 40s in DOFP and 50s in Apocalypse, and he's gonna supposed to be 60s in this...
I know no one at Fox cares about any timeline stuff, but they really need to do some aging makeup work on this one.

 

[kirk55555]

Confirmed that the movie will be set in 1991.

So if Magneto was about 10 years old at Auschwitz, Fassbender was meant to be in his 30s in First Class, 40s in DOFP and 50s in Apocalypse, and he's gonna supposed to be 60s in this...
I know no one at Fox cares about any timeline stuff, but they really need to do some aging makeup work on this one.

Magneto should already look like Ian McKellan at this point based on X3 (since Magneto and Charles met Jean Grey in the old timeline before the year Apocalypse is set in, and they definitely looked older even with effects to make them look younger in that movie). I'm starting to think that they'll eventually have Fassbender playing a Magneto that is older then mcKellan but not put any age effect on him and instead just ignore it. That might be kind of funny, actually.

If they say anything at all about his age, it will probably be some BS about how, in this timeline, whatever Apocalypse did to Magneto kept him from aging (so Storm gets white hair, "Angel" gets metal wings and Magneto gets to keep the same actor playing him for as longas that actor is willing to come back ).

 

[Nerys Myk]

Fox Formalizes Simon Kinberg To Helm ‘X-Men: Dark Phoenix’; Jennifer Lawrence, Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy Back, Jessica Chastain In Talks

I hope this doesn't mean a story about Jean Grey will turn into another chapter of the Charles/Magneto/Mystique show.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

The real problem is all of the decade jumping. What's the point of it other than to say each film is in the next decade? It made sense for Days of Future Past (Erik in prison for the JFK assassination, Vietnam, Charles disillusioned, etc.) but the following two don't make any sense.

 

[Tosk]

Meh, sliding timescale just like the comics. Not worth getting worried about at this point.

 

[Gaith]

I know no one at Fox cares about any timeline stuff, but they really need to do some aging makeup work on this one.

I hear getting a power-up from Apocalypse really gives your longevity a boost...

The real problem is all of the decade jumping. What's the point of it other than to say each film is in the next decade? It made sense for Days of Future Past (Erik in prison for the JFK assassination, Vietnam, Charles disillusioned, etc.) but the following two don't make any sense.

I agree it was mostly pointless in Apocalypse, but at this point I'm pretty much resigned to it. It makes sense (while at the same time being creatively disappointing) that the studio would want to return to the present era, to save on period production costs and not alienate the kiddies (because history is for dweebs), and at this rate they'll get there the movie after this one.

I still that the follow-up to DoFP had built a new team shortly after that story's events, with Erik building his Genosha or Asteroid M mutant-only society, thereby finally giving us full-on supervillain Magneto, with an Apocalypse tease for the fourth First Class cast movie, rather than having him be taken down by newbies. But, we buy X-tickets for the movies they give us, I guess...

 

[Grendelsbayne]

The real problem is all of the decade jumping. What's the point of it other than to say each film is in the next decade? It made sense for Days of Future Past (Erik in prison for the JFK assassination, Vietnam, Charles disillusioned, etc.) but the following two don't make any sense.

I think the decade concept was great for First Class and DoFP. It tied into their stories very well and did a fantastic job making this franchise stand out in comparison to other offerings in Hollywood - not to mention bringing a great sense of history to the X-universe. The problem with Apocalypse in this regard is not that it took place in the 80s, but that it made no effort to take place in the 80s. It was just stock newsreel and funny clothes/hair with no actual connection to the time period.

 

[M.A.C.O.]

They lost me at JLaws return. Between her and Felicity Jones' phoned in performance as Jyn Erso, I'm not sure who was worse in the blockbusters last year.

Nobody cares about JLaw in these movies and inflating Mystique's importance to accomadate JLaw has turned out bad. Give us the X-Men or go home.

 

[Turtletrekker]

Dazzler will be making her long overdue live-action debut in Dark Phoenix.

http://ew.com/movies/2017/06/23/dark-phoenix-dazzler/

 

[kirk55555]

Dazzler will be making her long overdue live-action debut in Dark Phoenix.

http://ew.com/movies/2017/06/23/dark-phoenix-dazzler/

I'm a fan of Dazzler, but knowing FOX she'll be in it for probably a minute and a half and have nothing in common with the comic version except maybe having the same powers

 

[Turtletrekker]

I'm a fan of Dazzler, but knowing FOX she'll be in it for probably a minute and a half and have nothing in common with the comic version except maybe having the same powers

Sad, but probably true.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

You'd think she would have appeared in the more timely Apocalypse. Aside from the terribly wasted deleted scene (better than much of the film).

 

[Mr. Adventure]

Dazzler should be in a crazy standalone 70s period piece.

 

[kirk55555]

The thing about Dazzler is that she works just as well outside of the Disco era (with modern Dazzler they usually explain her Disco phase as kind of a retro gimmick, since of course with the time scale she wasn't even alive in the 70s anymore). My favorite Dazzler stuff was in the time traveling X-treme X-Men book from a few years ago. She doesn't dress like its 1975, but is just a fairly powerful mutant and a singer. She was also a pretty good leader I mean, I like disco Dazzler too, but I'd prefer a serious character and any attempt to do her early stuff would just be a farce.

There is honestly a lot more to her as a character then people who only know her early years probably realize. She's grown over the decades, and that's the character I'd like to see, not a joke character done because "LOL disco is lame".

But, again, this is FOX. Even if their "Dazzler" is anything but Dazzler in name and powers only she'll probably only be on screen for about 2 minutes and do absolutely nothing important (like Jubilee in Apocalypse).

 

[JD]

I swear at times that it seems like the more they promote a character, the smaller their role ends up being.
It does seem odd to wait until the '90s to introduce Dazzler, if you want to introduce a period singer, the '70s or '80s would be a lot more fun than the '90s. I tthink at that point, I'd rather they just introduce her in a modern movie, and have her a Katy Perry, or Lady Gaga style of performer.