‘Dark Phoenix’: Rental Review
Fox’s X-Men movie franchise comes to an inert and dull end
Quick disclaimer: There are some spoilers in this review if I’ve actually remembered the movie correctly. It’s also been out since June, get over yourself.
Wait just a minute here, can somebody tell me just what the Vuk (Jessica Chastain) is going on.
“Dark Phoenix” is writer/director Simon Kinberg’s second and most recent failed attempt in telling his own derivation of one of comic’s most revered and iconic storylines, The Dark Phoenix Saga. His first try being, 2006’s “X-Men: The Last Stand” of which he’s credited as co-screenwriter along with Zak Penn. Hey, you know what they say right if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again in a more turgid, self-serious way.
If the thinking was that the series eminently forgettable and equally awful previous entry, “X-Men: Apocalypse,” was too big, overwrought, and at specific points downright dumb this film massively overcorrects for those issues. Launching the X-men franchise into a fiery bird-shaped death spiral of static performance, pseudo-psychological thriller mishegoss, and worst of all utter boredom.
A floating phosphorescent blob or “solar flare” or “alien force of unimaginable power” endangers a NASA space shuttle mission the President of the United States picks up the ol’ X-Phone and dials up everyone’s favorite merry mutants, the X-Men. Now you’d probably be right in thinking this is a bit of a change in the X-Men’s typical status quo. Usually they, mutants, are more or less hated and feared by humanity on the whole. But in the time since we last saw them, Professor Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) has been on a public relations mission of sorts. Offering up his plucky team’s mutant talents to win over the hearts and minds of an already skeptical human public.
This, the first of the several expensive-yet-wonky CGI action set pieces of the movie, is one of its most compelling. Unfortunately, it’s all downhill from here. The team saves the shuttle crew by giving each of its junior members, Cyclops (Tye Sheridan), Jean Grey (Sophie Turner), Nightcrawler (Kodi Smit-McPhee), Storm (Alexandra Shipp), and Quicksilver (Evan Peters), an opportunity to display their own unique mutant power. All while their blue-hued elders look on, Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) barking out orders and Beast (Nicholas Hoult) piloting the now space-ready X-Jet. Even though the X-Men save the day, there is a cost but isn’t there always.
Jean Grey’s transformation into the cosmic entity known as the Phoenix/Dark Phoenix is at the center of this movie. Heck, you probably could have guessed from the title. Though the actual word, Phoenix, is only ever referenced once and in the lamest possible of ways. “Hey, you know what the kids are calling you? Phoenix, because you came back from the dead.” A real cool utterance from my man, Cyclops. Listen, this might not be the actual dialogue from the movie, but it’s pretty damn close and equally as clunky.
Sophie Turner (Game of Thrones) does her best to embody the chaos and rage of the Phoenix. Equal parts possessed by a celestial world-eating force and her own personal demons. James McAvoy is solid as a well-meaning monster of his own, locking away Jean’s past to spare her potential pain. Only to have those good intentions literally blow up right in his face. The other performances are adequate, Tye Sheridan (Ready Player One) does his able best with the little given to him. The rest of the cast are given less to do than Sheridan or are collecting their superhero sized paychecks; I’m looking at you, Jennifer Lawrence and Michael Fassbinder.
This is the point in the review where I must, re-invoke the name of Jessica Chastain’s ridiculously monikered alien baddie simply known as Vuk. Let’s all say it together… Vuk, Vuk, Vuk! Chastain is undoubtedly bad in this role, but her character is so pointless you can hardly hold her accountable for that fact.
Simon Kinberg was honestly trying his damndest to ground this larger-than-life space and superheroes soap opera into some kind of Christopher Nolan-esque circa Dark Knight Trilogy reality. Who could blame him though after the complete balls to the wall madness of its predecessor, “Apocalypse.” But in the end, his instincts were terrible and almost a decade too late tonally. “Dark Phoenix” is a stiff, muddled, joyless mess. If there was a happy middle ground between hyperactive nonsense and street-level grittiness, Kinberg indeed did not find it.
