X2 Turns Mutant Rights Into a War Story

X2 opens with a teleporting mutant named Nightcrawler attacking the President of the United States inside the White House. He is shot and retreats. That single sequence sets the terms for everything Bryan Singer’s sequel wants to do: put the mutant question at the center of American power, then watch the machinery of the state answer with force.

The film is the second installment in the X-Men series and the sequel to X-Men (2000). Singer directs from a script by Michael Dougherty, Dan Harris and David Hayter, based on a story by Singer, Hayter and Zak Penn. It runs 133 minutes and carries the tagline “The time has come for those who are different to stand united.”

Trailer, via MovieStation.

Colonel Stryker and the Assault on Xavier’s School

Brian Cox plays Colonel William Stryker, the military scientist who turns a security crisis into a mandate. After the attack on the President, Stryker approaches the President and gets approval to investigate Xavier’s mansion for its ties to mutants. Then his forces invade the school and abduct some of the students.

The plot is a genocide story, and it does not dress the point up. Stryker’s goal is to build his own version of Xavier’s mutant-tracking computer, Cerebro, and use it to destroy every mutant on Earth. The stated aim is to save the human race from them. That is not subtext. That is the text, and X2 is better for saying it out loud.

Patrick Stewart’s Charles Xavier is a pacifist who believes humans and mutants can live together in harmony. He founded a School for “Gifted Youngsters” and uses Cerebro, which he designed with Magneto, to track mutants worldwide. He is regarded as an authority on genetic mutation. When Stryker’s assistant Yuriko Oyama captures Cyclops and Xavier, the film takes its central voice off the board and leaves the rest of the cast to react.

Wolverine, Alkali Lake and the Past That Won’t Stay Buried

Hugh Jackman’s Logan opens the film at Alkali Lake in Alberta, exploring an abandoned military installation for clues to his past. He finds nothing. That failure matters, because the film keeps promising Logan an answer and keeps the answer just out of reach.

Logan is a mutant with amnesia and little recollection of his life before he was grafted with an indestructible adamantium skeleton. He has six durable adamantium blades that come out of his fists, keen animal-like senses, and rapid healing. He is a gruff loner, in love with Jean Grey, and acts as a father figure to Rogue.

During the invasion, Logan confronts Stryker, who addresses him as “Wolverine” and appears to know his past. It is the film’s sharpest hook. Stryker is not just a villain with a plan; he is a villain with a file on the hero.

Nightcrawler, Mystique and the Alliance Nobody Wanted

Alan Cumming plays Kurt Wagner, a kindly German mutant with a strong Catholic faith and the appearance of a blue demon. Stryker used him in the assassination attempt on the President. Nightcrawler can teleport himself and others instantly from one location to another. On his body are many tattoos, one for every sin.

Cumming was always Singer’s choice for the role, but scheduling conflicts nearly kept him out. Neil Patrick Harris auditioned, and Ethan Embry was reported to be in contention. Development ran long enough that Cumming could accept. Singer also felt comfortable casting him because Cumming is fluent in German. The makeup design drew on drawings by Adam Kubert and took four hours.

The film’s best structural move is forcing the X-Men to team up with the Brotherhood of Mutants. Mystique, played by Rebecca Romijn, helps Magneto escape and finds Cerebro schematics. Ian McKellen’s Magneto then becomes a temporary ally, which is exactly the kind of alliance that should make Xavier’s students uneasy.

The time has come for those who are different to stand united.

The Boston House and the Jet That Goes Down

Logan, Rogue, Iceman and Pyro visit Iceman’s family in Boston. Iceman’s brother calls the police after learning he is a mutant. Officers surround the house, and one shoots Logan after feeling threatened. Aaron Stanford’s Pyro fights back with his pyrokinesis. Anna Paquin’s Rogue absorbs his powers and uses them to put out the fire.

This is the film’s clearest statement of its own thesis. The danger is not a mutant plot. The danger is a family, a phone call, and armed men at the door.

Storm, Jean and Nightcrawler pick the group up in their jet. On the way back to the mansion, fighter jets attack the X-Jet despite Storm and Jean’s defenses, and it is shot down. Rogue is sucked out and saved by Nightcrawler, while Magneto controls the jet and saves everyone. Famke Janssen’s Jean Grey has been having premonitions and struggling to concentrate as her powers become harder to control, and the film plants that thread without paying it off here.

What X2 Gets Right, and Where It Stalls

Ranked against what the film is actually trying to do, here is where it lands:

1. The Stryker plot. A government scientist weaponizing Cerebro to kill every mutant is the strongest villain premise in the series so far. It gives the ensemble a target and a deadline.
2. The Nightcrawler opening. A White House attack staged by a man who does not want to be there. It is the best sequence in the film and it earns its place.
3. The Boston house. Small, ugly and effective. It shows the ordinary machinery of fear better than any speech.
4. The Logan mystery. Alkali Lake gives him nothing, and Stryker’s recognition gives him only a taunt. The film withholds too cleanly.
5. The ensemble. Too many characters, too little time. Rogue, Iceman and Pyro get one scene that matters and then recede.

The weaknesses are real. X2 has a large cast and a plot that has to move all of them, and the middle stretches thin. The alliance with Magneto is more interesting in theory than in execution, because the film never lets the unease sit long enough to bite. And the Logan thread, the one the film keeps waving, ends where it started: a man with no past and a promise of one later.

Still, this is a sequel that improves on its predecessor by widening the argument rather than repeating it. X2 is about a state that decides a minority is a threat and builds a machine to act on that decision. Stryker gets approval from the President. He invades a school. He abducts children. The film does not pretend this is ambiguous.

The parts that will stay with you are the ones where the fear is domestic: a brother picking up a phone, a cop pulling a trigger, a jet falling out of the sky. X2 is not the best film in its series, and it is not the tightest. But it knows what it is about, and it says so.

Bryan Singer · Marvel movies · movie review · superhero films · X-Men · X2