Do I WANT To See X-Men Days of Future Past

I've been asking myself this question since the first trailer came out, possibly a year ago.

I mean, I loved X-Men: First Class. A LOT. And I really really liked The Wolverine (except for the silly climax). And, as weird as it sounds and as unpopular as this opinion might be... I liked Bryan Singer's Superman Returns. It's a really pretty movie.

So, that should erase all ill-will I have from X3 and Wolverine: X-Men Orgins, right? This is fixing the old franchise and tying it into the new, right? The cast is amazing, right?

I just... can't, though. Not after seeing the trailers. And the corporate tie-ins. Something feels... askew. Too removed from reality. Too removed from the mood of either version of the X-Men franchise.

Maybe it's because the whole "save us from this apocalyptic future" thing is exhausted (in my opinion). Maybe it's because it feels like a money grab. Maybe it's because I sort of have this inkling that when First Class did well, Singer suddenly felt a little jealous for only being involved on an executive producer level and wanted back in on the glory and pushed Matthew Vaughn out of the director's chair. Which was stupid, if you ask me. Just like it was stupid when Singer was ousted on X3 because of hissyfits over him doing Superman Returns.

X3 was a weird parody of the universe Singer had developed in the first two films. And I fear that Days of Future Past will be Singer trying to not only re-claim things too late in the game, but also try to partially parody Vaughn's new universe. Because Vaughn and writer Jane Goldman brought a very specific (and very British) tone to the film. A tone that appears to be present in the trailer for their other 2014 comic book movie- Kingsmen: The Secret Service. A movie which I AM very excited about, thankyouverymuch. A tone very different from Bryan Singer's tone, no matter how much involvement Singer had in First Class.

But don't judge a book by it's cover and don't judge a movie by it's trailers & posters. Right?

And... Dinklage! Lawrence! McAvoy! Jackman! Sir Patz & Serena!

Gah, that's a terrible poster.

I'm conflicted. Someone convince me one way or another.

Catching Fire: This Is How You Spread Blood-Borne Pathogens!

On Thursday night, the roommate and I started texting about seeing Catching Fire and realized that it was actually being released at 8 pm on Thursday rather than midnight.

So, we saw a 10 pm showing at our local theater, surrounded by pajama-clad teenage girls. Which made it so we not only got the show of getting to see the movie based on the book we've both read, but getting to hear the reactions of the teenage girls and how they differed from our natural reactions AND I got an extra show in how indignant my roommate was about the Twilight-y behavior from our fellow audience members.

There was also then the fact that it was after 10 pm and we were both bone tired to begin with. We then also became a little punchy and started a rather terrible running joke of how various things in the movie are ways that you end up with a blood-borne pathogen of some sort. There were a lot of not-so-sterile looking needles happening, among other things.

But the other thing was that Catching Fire allows, among all the terrible death and destruction, to give Jennifer Lawrence some time to be hilarious. Her best moment, by far, being a silent moment.

It's all in the face, really.

I had to find a way to get a screen cap. It was too amazing. Okay, maybe not in this screen cap. But... go see the movie. It's amazing. Jennifer Lawrence is amazing.

Oh, but there is the fact that about an hour and a half into the movie, I suddenly remembered how much the last third of the book made my skin crawl and made me just want to read faster to get away from the ridiculousness. Holy crap, a lot of that stuff gets a lot more terrifying in the visual format.

I told the roommate that I wasn't sure at all if I would go see the third and fourth films in the theater when they came out. The Hunger Games is a diminishing returns series in book form. I don't know if they can (or, rather, will) fix Mockingjay to be a bit less like pulling teeth. Catching Fire is good, don't get me wrong, I just don't know if I ever want to sit through the last third or so of the book ever again. Also, this movie was ridiculously more violent. No more shaky cam trying to hide the violence for the tween audience. You see defenseless and innocent characters brutally beaten and/or killed with nary a cut away compared to Hunger Games. Also: swearing. But that comes with the Johanna territory.