X-men: First Class Review - thoughts on gender and the women.

[prozacpark]

So, I went to see X-men: First Class last night because apparently, when it's not being marred by my disdain for Wolverine, Emma Frost's appearance in a movie is just as much of a draw for me as one would expect. Friendslist, have I mentioned lately how much I love Emma Frost? And how I wish I could grow up to be her? And how she's the one who

Comments

[ide_cyan]

(sort of half looking at the spoilers) I knew about the change to Moira McTaggart, but Mystique being stuck at the kiddie-table is disappointing.

& I read elsewhere that they basically kill the black guy first. *headdesk*

Still interested in seeing this, but my hopes for it have lowered from the excitement I felt a week ago.

[prozacpark]

I was oddly okay with the Moira origins switch, but the fact that the movie sort of downplayed both Emma's and Mystique's intelligence (Emma isn't the brain of the Hellfire operations and Mystique isn't worthy of sharing Xavier's intellectual legacy) sort of made that stand out in a negative way?

And I might have been a bit harsh...the new mutants aren't technically kids, but they're very much coded as kids and Xavier (and Moira) coded as authority figures over them.

I find that I like things better when I'm prepared for the fail. I probably was expecting too much, sigh.

Re: My Hatred of Bromance: LET ME SHOW IT TO YOU

[prozacpark]

Bromance: a short, easy way of saying "Let's celebrate male privilege some more, because we don't do that nearly enough already!"

THIS, YES. Gah, this is why epic friendships between men always piss me off because they're always privileged over the said men's relationships with the women in their lives. And I think what's at the core of it is really that relationships between men and women are not considered or coded as relationships between equals.

[prozacpark]

I keep thinking that if they had spread this out over a trilogy, we would've gotten much more. At least in terms of the mutant relationships, even if they went with the plot. That would've given the Bromance more time to develop, leaving room for other characters to grow.

Of course, given the industry's track record, we might have just ended up with three movies all about the Bromance and still no focus on the women. Not that I'm bitter! ;)

[gryphonsegg]

Thank you for posting this. I've been on the fence about whether or not to watch this movie because I'm a giant ball of goo for Xavier/Magneto but I was afraid of something like this. Actually, what you've described is worse than what I was afraid of. I'm not an Emma fan, but if the movie is going to use the character, I resent it portraying her as having less power than in the comics. I am a big Moira fan, and part of my love for her stems from her having been a sympathetic female scientist character at a time when I couldn't find many of those. If she's no longer a world class scientist, or even a brilliant up-and-coming scientist, she loses some of her appeal for me. In real life, there are probably more women in biological research than in the CIA and its counterparts, but in comics, women who are gun-wielding intelligence against seem to be more common than women who are really great scientists in any field. Also, CIA? Does that mean she's not Scottish anymore? Because the Americanization of non-American-born characters

[prozacpark]

I love the relationship between Xavier/Magneto, and that was part of why I was looking forward to this movie. I am...probably disappointed even with the way their relationship is portrayed, and yes, a large part of that is the timeline. I mean, it's entirely possible that I mis-read the year captions and it ran longer, but if so, there's no feeling within the text of that much time having gone by. Mystique and Xavier feel like they have been friends forever, but Xavier's treatment of Mystique is iffy at best

[gryphonsegg]

I would have loved the idea of Mystique being Xavier's buddy since childhood OR one of his first students. Making her be both in the same timeline is infuriating

[prozacpark]

Of course you can use the Bromance bit in your review. I keep wanting to write meta on the fail of this trope, but then I find myself not caring enough to write about it. ;)

And yay for fic! I shall buy you till you deliver.