X Men 2 (2003)

X Men 2 (2003)

 

Release Date: May 2, 2003

After the success of the previous X Men film, much was expected of the sequel. Fortunately, X Men 2 meets those expectations.

The film hits the ground running with an excellent opening scene in which the US president is attacked by a teleporting mutant. The mutant’s movements and attacks look like something from a martial arts film, in the best possible way, as the mutant runs rings around the bodyguards shooting at him. This is what the fight scenes in Daredevil should have been, teleporting aside. This incident gives mutant hating military scientist Colonel William Stryker an excuse to attack mutants more openly. He interrogates Magneto in his plastic prison and learns of the X Mansion and Cerebro.

Professor Xavier is concerned about the potential for the White House incident to turn people against mutants, even moreso than usual, so he sends Jean Grey and Storm to find the attacker. He is found in a church in Boston, and Storm gets him to co-operate with some thunderbolt shaped encouragement. “Do you know what happens to a teleporting blue mutant with a German accent when it’s struck by lightning? The same thing that happens to everything else!” The mutant gives his name as Kurt Wagner, or Nightcrawler, and states that he doesn’t remember anything about the attack. A mysterious burn mark is found on the back of his neck.

After a trip to Alkali Lake to learn about his past ends up being a bust, Wolverine returns to the X Mansion and is left with the task of babysitting the students while Xavier and Cyclops visit Magneto in prison. Xavier learns from Magneto that Stryker knows about Cerebro and is planning an attack. Unfortunately, Xavier and Cyclops can’t do anything about it, because in the words of Admiral Ackbar, it’s a trap! Magneto’s cell is filled with gas, incapacitating Magneto and Xavier, and Cyclops is defeated by Stryker’s secretary, Lady Deathstrike. Cyclops better hope that Wolverine never finds out that Cyclops was beaten by a girl. Later, Mystique finds out where Magneto is being held, and injects a guard with iron while he is off duty, allowing Magneto to use it in order to escape his prison.

With most of the X Men away, Stryker attacks the X Mansion. He is able to capture a few of the students before his soldiers are discovered and Wolverine starts killing them all. The remaining students escape with Colossus as their leader, but Wolverine, Rogue, her boyfriend Bobby, who now calls himself Iceman, and his friend John are separated from the rest of the group and must make their own way. Stryker insists that he and Wolverine have a history together...

Which is not the one in which Stryker is played by Danny Huston, oh no. That never happened. There was this mercenary guy who had swords though. What was his name again? Was it Deathstroke or something? Anyway, Wolverine’s group head for Boston to meet up with Jean and Storm, making a stop at Iceman’s house for a change of clothing.

Iceman comes out to his parents and brother as a mutant, which upsets his brother and makes him run upstairs to his room. Instead of writing cringeworthy poetry about how life isn’t fair and nobody understands him, while listening to the most goth song in the world, he phones the police, thus getting himself permanently taken off Iceman’s Christmas card list. John is angry with Iceman’s family for their prejudice against mutants and when the police show up, he starts burning them all while calling himself Pyro. Rogue puts a stop to Pyro’s rampage by grabbing his ankle. Jean, Storm and Nightcrawler arrive in the X Jet to pick up the others, prompting attack jets to fire missiles at them. Jean’s powers are growing, but she is losing control over them, which prevents her from stopping the missiles from hitting the jet, but fortunately, Magneto saves the day.

Magneto proposes a truce, since Mystique has discovered that Stryker raided the X Mansion in order to examine Cerebro and build his own version under Alkali Lake to find all mutants and kill them. He abducted Xavier to make him operate it, but naturally Xavier wouldn’t go along with that. Stryker introduces his son Jason to Xavier. Jason is a mutant capable of creating powerful illusions, but Stryker had him lobotomised after the illusions drove Stryker’s wife to kill herself. Jason responds poorly to losing a staring contest with Xavier decides to play Let’s Mind Rape Professor Xavier to Make Him Operate Cerebro instead.

Nightcrawler is caught eavesdropping ona private conversation with Magneto, but Jean remembers that he was being brainwashed by Stryker, so she reads his mind, and learns that Stryker is operating from beneath Alkali Lake. The X Men and Brotherhood head there to save Xavier, Cyclops and the kids and defeat Stryker. Jean finds Cyclops, who had been brainwashed by Stryker, and quickly brings him back to his senses, but their battle damages the dam, causing it to start leaking. Wolverine finds Stryker, who tells him that he was responsible for giving Wolverine his adamantium skeleton, and that he did the same to Lady Deathstrike, as well as brainwashing her to be his loyal henchwoman with a chemical on the back on her neck. The chemical was also used on Nightcrawler, Magneto and Cyclops. She and Wolverine fight, but Wolverine wins by injecting her with liquid adamantium. Stryker escapes during the battle, but Wolverine catches up and ties him up in metal chains. Cerebro is activated and causes extreme pain to all mutants, but Magneto thought ahead and wore his helmet to block out the noise, allowing him to move some panels to make the machine affect regular people instead. (Let’s not think about the people who died because they were driving, performing surgery, or operating heavy machinery when Cerebro was turned on.) Thanks to all the commotion, the dam starts to fall apart as Storm and Nightcrawler rescue the children and save Xavier from Jason’s illusion, leaving Jason to die as the roof caves in.

The group escapes Alkali Lake as the dam bursts. Stryker manages to escape the chains, just as Magneto finds him and binds the chains again, tying him up again with no way to avoid drowning. Magneto and Mystique escape, and Pyro decides to join the Brotherhood instead. Jean sacrifices herself to hold back the rushing water as the X Jet takes off.

In the comics and the first film, there was a subtext to the mutant condition as a stand in for real life racism and hate. That returns here, though there is also a comparison to be made with homosexuality issues and pride. This is particularly prominent in the scene where Iceman admits to his parents that he is a mutant, which was designed in such a way as to echo conversations about coming out of the closet, complete with Iceman’s mother asking “Have you tried not being a mutant?” Ian McKellen helped write this scene, using his experience of coming out as gay as an influence. In addition, Mystique is shown as being proud that she is a mutant. At one point, Nightcrawler asks her why she chooses to not look like everyone else, even though she can shapeshift. She responds that she shouldn’t have to hide the fact that she is a mutant.

Among the new characters, the highlights are Nightcrawler and Stryker. As I have already discussed earlier, Nightcrawler makes the most of his opening scene in the White House, and he is just as good in the more quiet scenes. His strong religious beliefs juxtaposed with his demonic appearance combine to make him one of the most tolerant and likeable characters for his peaceful ways. He also ties in nicely to the theme of co-operation between humans and mutants. On the other hand, Stryker is an opposite to Nightcrawler. He fills a similar role to Senator Kelly in the first film, a mutant phobic government official. He is a nasty piece of work, going as far as to lobotomise his own son for his cause, and he doesn’t learn his lesson. Despite his racism, he isn’t stupid, engineering events in order to sway the public in his favour, removing Xavier before launching his raid on the X Mansion, and taking the presence of Mystique into account during the events at Alkali Lake. He is played by Brian Cox, who is quite effective in the role, frightening yet charismatic. In the comics, Stryker was a televangelist who preached genocide of mutants. He also had a military background, which was expanded for the film. By contrast, Lady Deathstrike is less successful. In the comics, she hates Wolverine because she thinks that he stole her father’s research, and the two have a history together, which could have been explored. Unfortunately, she spends the entire film under Stryker’s control and following his orders, so her personality isn’t seen. It’s comparable to how Scorpion and Sub-Zero were portrayed in the Mortal Kombat film, though not as egregious as that example. The two are notorious for having one of the most heated rivalries in video games, but in the film, they were brainwashed henchmen of the antagonist, with their animosity mentioned once in passing.

X Men 2 manages to improve on the first film by exploring issues of tolerance and peace in greater depth, as well as improving on the already good action scenes from the first film.

Next Time: In which 10 year old me’s hopes and dreams are cruelly destroyed, crushed underfoot. Smashed, if you will.

Bonus: Nightcrawler’s absence from the third film was explained in the tie in video game for the third X Men film. At the end of the game, Nightcrawler decided to leave the X Men because he disliked their violent lifestyle. Then again, he could have just been annoyed at past villains refusing to stay dead, since the game’s main antagonist was Jason Stryker, who had somehow survived the events of this film and was understandably miffed at Nightcrawler for not saving him. Sabretooth and Lady Deathstrike were also revived without explanation to serve as bosses.