X-Men: Last Stand Review/Analysis

So to be honest I've had quite a lot of trouble writing things recently, don't if this is an adjustment to the blog form or others things or both...whatever, in any case here is a review of X-men: Last Stand.

While the most recent X-men movie, Last Stand was you know, that kind of movie, by being more epic in scope it was required to have a larger political message than before. And while as a movie it lacked the pacing and was too light in its character development (and shallow in its circumstances) to really come forth with its strengths, it nevertheless was entertaining enough, though certain scenes like the final battle were particularly weak as very few of the attacking mutants had any visible powers (excluding ones for comic relief) leaving it a battle of heroes vs. goons which is not what it should of been. Moreover, the plot's movement was based on a very poor understanding of politics and in particular how discourses (set of ideas in the world) work: after such an attack the ending come together is unthinkable and this lack of political complexity ends in dooming the interestingness of the characters as well.

So while the movie ends with the rather uninteresting "we can all live together" message, embodied by Angel, who both escapes his human father's desire to make all mutants into humans, and also saves his father from the more anti-human mutants, due to his (yes, Angel-like) wings there is more going on then that. Consider Jean/Pheonix the other "focused upon" (one person, two personalities) the most powerful mutant out there who can do anything with her mind. Unfortunately, she is composed of a conscious, controlled, "good" self, and an 'unconscious' "uncontrolled" self which the professor kept apart until it was destroyed by her near-death experience in the previous movie. She proceeds to kill her lover, Cyclops, and the big-good-guy Professor X, though it is only her other love interest and "main character" Wolverine who has the potential to "save her"...which he does by killing her. The last extremely powerful mutant, Magneto (who can control metal) gets hit with a un-mutanizing bullet, and ends the movie as a human, contemplating what his transformation from almost limitlessly powerful leader of the radical anti-human movement to just another human might mean. Meanwhile, Prof X who was killed has taken over the body of a brain-dead man in a hospital, proving as such that good will prevail.

All and all this provides us with some ideas concerning power quite fitting to us of the "privileged West" in the two pairs of Magneto/Prof X and Jean/Pheonix. This first pair is split between self-consciousness of power and its consequences and that it should therefore be used extremely carefully, if constantly (and to be fair by knowing everything that is going on at all times gives Prof-X a kind of intense self-consciousness that is beyond our reach) and an idea that we must become what we are, in this case quite literally gods, a doctrine of "naturalness" that requires the goal-oriented use of power for the good of those who are powerful against in this case those that wish to eliminate them (the beginning of the X-men story with the holocaust of WWII creates a kind of repetition of history, a new chance to address what are "similar?" problems). In this case, Prof X dies, but survives magically, sacrificed to allow for the larger good and the greater control of power, while Magnito is reduced to humanness, and is faced with the underside of his ideas (same ideas new position), what then, as a human should he do? It is with this question via the metaphor of a chess board that the movie ends. Similarly, Jean/Pheonix kills her first lover and through love allows herself to be killed for the good of the world, and later gets an honorary burial next to the professor. A last example is Rouge/Iceman, who are in love but cannot touch as Rouge's powers would kill Iceman. In the end Rouge chooses to become a human so that there love can become physical..and this is not what Iceman wanted but what she wanted, a very clear (and fantastic) example of taking on the desire of the (Big) Other. Here we have the giving up of power to be able to achieve what is the primary good in the movie--love--in this case between humans and mutants, like between Angel and his father.

The subtext of all of this includes the black power movement, the gay movement, and whiteness; all of which resonate in different ways, with mutants simultaneously queer ("other" but typically born to non-mutants), oppressed blacks organizing for well-being and autonomy, and first-world whites whose power and influence is felt throughout the world. Notice that the X-men story is based solely within the West (US/England?), so that the international division of labor is completely obscured and power is literally genetic (as it might appear to those of us who wish to be blind), based in the mutant gene as opposed to say colonialism, imperialism, and the present crystallization of capitalism. Moreover, this combined privileged/oppressed role of mutants (consider also the Jewish position to whom the possible genocide of mutants is linked) serves to embody the fantasy-other from the perspective of whites, those who have "real" or "authentic" identities, who are "different", etc, while combining this status with special, covetable powers, which fails to represent the very real oppression that exists today (in every aspect of our society and to a degree that is extremely shocking when one begins to look at the figures) all the while preaching what could be called a doctrine of self-marginalization, keep the normals normal, just don't kill the mutants (thus leaving the humans, i.e. whites, as superior).

X-men then is useful in that it can create a springboard for identification with the oppressed and also produce a narrative about our privileged position and its responsibilities. Nevertheless this should not be at the expense of the ways in which oppression at home and abroad is covered over and we clearly see the hollywood in a very hollywood movie, bland liberalism and status-quo-capitalism yet again. 2.5/4 stars.