The remark about yellow spandex was also about the uniforms worn by the original X-Men (Cyclops, Iceman, Beast, Angel, and Marvel Girl [Jean Grey]). Yellow and blue with blue 'ski-masks'.
I had forgotten just how well the BFFs Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen work together. Their chemistry on screen really reflect the friendship they have off-screen, and I believe that is what is necessary for Xavier and Magneto.
Ian McKellan plays Magneto. He also plays Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings. His eyes are so kind in LotR and so cruel in his X-Men movies. What I'm saying is he's a great actor.
He's also one of those old-school British theater actors who doesn't particularly like doing movies, and only picks film roles that look interesting to him. Lucky for all of us that he did for these two roles; it's hard to picture anyone else in them.
Magneto's name is Eric Lensher, played by Ian Mckellan, Professor X is Charles Xavier, played by Patrick Stewart. The two characters were estranged friends in the comic, and Stewart and McKellan becmae good friends during the making of these films. They have amazing chemistry on screen together. :)
"People like you are why I was afraid to go to school as a child." is my favorite 'What the XMen are about' line in ALL of the X-Men franchise, comics included.
Some fun facts about this movie: Hugh Jackman's terrified reactions when he meets Ian McKellen at 16:52 are real; he was told Magneto was going to tear open the train car, and assumed that meant ripping off the door, not tearing the entire car in half. And yes, the special effects crew used hydraulics to tear the train for real. Jackman thought they were just going to take off the door or something similarly small-scale, hence why he was so scared. The crew actually had to rush in with extinguishers as soon as the shot was done, because sparks were falling and catching on fire near people. It's one of the most famous parts of the production, and was featured on the bonus "making of" documentary. When he stops falling at during his fight with Sabretooth on top of the Statue of Liberty, he lets out a real yell of pain; this is because the harness he was wearing slipped and pinched him in the groin. Also, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos accidentally kicked the senator for real in the scene 10:16. Also, Ian McKellen actually declined the role of Gandalf because he was busy filming this; director Bryan Singer changed the filming schedule so McKellen could finish his scenes first at the end of 1999, and then travel to New Zealand in January 2000.
For those that don't know, there's an interesting reason as to why the little boy is smiling at Cyclops at 16:23: The extras that were there filming for that scene weren't told by the cast, the crew, the director, or anyone else working there that day as to what movie they were filming for, but the little boy was a very big fan of the 1992 X-Men Animated Series and when he laid eyes on James Marsden, he KNEW that in that moment that he was actually staring at a live action iteration of the character of Scott Summers/Cyclops and he couldn't stop smiling because Cyclops was his favorite X-Men character of the bunch. The reactions shared between Marsden and the boys were genuine and even though the scene WASN'T originally written in the script to play out that way, Bryan Singer (the film director) liked what he saw and decided to keep it in the final cut of the movie. I guess that just goes to show you that sometimes the really nice moments in a film are the ones that WEREN'T planned. 🙂
That and James Marsden was standing on a box to make the height difference bigger for the camera. A thing Tyler (Sabertooth) made sure to rib him every chance he got.
Toad was played by Ray Park who was also Darth Maul in The Phantom Menace. He does a lot of fight choreography for these movies. He's been in a bunch of stuff as a henchman villain.
@@mogwaimofo I also liked his role in Gross Pointe Blank. He plays a hitman hired to kill John Cusack's character. Those two had an extraordinary fight. In fact, Park was Cusack's personal martial arts teacher. I wish reactors would do that movie. It's one of my favorites.
I will always stan Rebecca Romajn as Mystique, she looks so fire. Also the relationship between Charles and Eric (Prof X and Magneto) is one of the best in comics imo and these movies did a great job with it.
Hugh Jackman is 6'2 and Famke Janssen is 6'0. While James Marsden is reasonably tall at 5'10, the filmmakers didn't want Cyclops to be noticeably shorter than both Wolverine and his own love interest. A number of tricks were done to make up the difference, including Marsden standing on apple boxes or wearing platform shoes. Janssen also went barefoot in some scenes where her feet aren't visible. A behind-the-scenes feature showcases Marsden humorously grousing about needing such tricks.
It's extra weird, because in the comics, Cyclops is the one that is tall and jacked and Wolverine is short and skinny. The roles could easily have been reversed here, but I can't imagine the timeline where we got X-men Origins: Cyclops instead...
Speaking for every woman above 5'6" I want to thank you. It's ridiculous how some men act when you don't have to look up at them. I have had bosses discriminate against tall ladies. We can't help our genetics.
Toad was played by the legendary Ray Park. He's usually known for fighting with staffs, even where staffs make no real sense. But he makes it work. Like with Darth Maul, where he broke the lore of lightsabres because he really, really wanted a staff, and now it is just accepted in the fandom that lightsabres come in all kinds of shapes and sizes.
Technically, double-bladed lightsabers had already existed since Tales of the Jedi #3, released on October 17, 1995. Ep1 just had the first high-profile use, still probably requested by Ray Park. Regardless, he always makes a staff work great.
🤣lightsabers came in all shapes and sizes _way_ before then in novels and comics. They already had double-bladed lightsabers and even stuff like lightwhips long before Episode 1.
@@Rhodair Interesting... Got any sources for that? I looked, and can't find any reference to any lightsaber that wasn't just a hilt with a blade until 1999. The first time different ones appeared in a game was in 2003. Before '99 there were a few mentions of some using multiple lightsabers, but no sabers of different designs, like Maul's double-bladed "lightstaff" or the Switchblade. Lightwhips might be a bit of a stretch though, those aren't exactly lightsaber designs. They also don't really fit the canonical description of how a lightsaber works, being some sort of whip already, then having a kyber-powered mode somehow...
The story of why Cyclops has to always wear the red shades (from the comics at least) is that he and his family were flying their prop engine plane near their home in Alaska when it was attacked. Their parents put Scott and his brother Alex in parachutes and tossed them out. Scott suffered a head injury on the way down that damaged the part of his brain that would later be the on/off switch for his eye beams. So unless his eyes are shut or covered by that material, he would be doing to everything in front of him what he did to that train station.
Don't forget, Scott and his family are from St. Louis Missouri. That's my home town. If I could meet him in real life, I'd ask him the famous St. Louis question. "What high school did you go to?" FYI here in St. Louis the high school you go to is like a part of your 'pedigree'. High schools compete against each other in lots of stuff like sports, music, art, etc.
Cyclops eyes are pretty much constantly open windows into another dimension. This dimensions energy doesn't heat up stuff but the energy from his eyes is physical, like imagine if a beam of energy could punch you. Really hard. His real brilliance for the team (though his power is really god dang powerful!) is in his tactical and strategical mind, which is why he is often depicted as the field leader of the team during the decades.
@@voltinator Two reasons. In the comic books, his glasses are part of his helmet, and also they are made to control and manipulate the energy, which is why he's able to turn it on and off at will. If they were just regular sunglasses then the energy would burst through the glasses.
I never liked the "other dimension" nonsense explanation. My explanation was more plausible, physically, I think, and based on notions presented back in the 70s, which said his body processed sunlight "in a manner not unlike photosynthesis." My explanation was that his body converted sunlight, producing highly unstable particles that would be stored in the less dense areas of his body, notably in the aqueous humour of his eyes. Highly energetic, these particles exist under pressure within his body, and are expelled through his eyes, as the least dense part of him in contact with air. As the particles come in contact with air molecules, they draw electrons from the air molecules, propagating through the air by pulling themselves to the next air molecule. This process accumulates energy within the particle, and causes the escape of a low frequency photon, causing the particle to glow red. This does mean the beam is weakest at the point of origin, something Giant-Man noted when fighting Cyclops. When the particles come into contact with a material too dense to draw energy from, they instead discharge their energy as kinetic force. This means the particle beam will have a much greater impact than would be usual for their mass and velocity. This also explains why the beam doesn't propel Cyclops BACKWARDS (Newton's third law would have Cyke being blasted off his feet, otherwise). At equilibrium, his body will expel particles as fast as it makes them, but if he exerts himself, he can increase the flow of particles from his body. Of course, this will exhaust the supply, given time (as happened to him often back in the Original X-Men days). As he's grown older, he's developed better control and endurance. I like this MUCH better than the idea his eyes are holes into some other dimension... which just strikes me as silly. Just my headcanon, of course.
Also, funny you should mention that Magneto could tear Wolverine's adamantium skeleton out... that literally happened in the comics once. Wolverine managed to survive it and then they found out that 1) His claws were natural bone, so he always had those, and 2) his regeneration factor was actually being slowed down by the metal, and he could heal fatal wounds in seconds or even regrow limbs. Unfortunately he started turning feral and bestial, and eventually Magneto (who regretted his actions) helped re-graft the adamantium back on.
yea the adamantium poisons his body so he has to always fight off the poison so he heals better without the metal in his body. Also his bone claws were introduced to his character when the comic writers started writing about time travel, flashbacks, etc because without his claws he's boring so they couldn't have him without claws, so they made bone claws before he had metal claws.
That is one of my favorite books. It's so tragic and sad. First Wolverine almost eviscerates Magneto, then Magneto tears the adamantium out of Logan, nearly killing him. Then Professor X basically lobotomizes Magneto. Just amazing and moving and scary.
Loved this when it came out, having been a huge fan of the cartoon and other super-hero stuff. Fun fact - the comment at 20:50 about Wolverine not liking the outfits & Cyclops asking if he'd prefer yellow spandex is a reference to Wolverines comic and cartoon outfit, which was a yellow and blue/black spandex combo.
I know you didn't know at the time, but that has to be one of the funniest questions I have ever heard asked about Wolverine "Do you have any broken bones?" 7:05 When Patrick Stewart was first asked to consider playing Professor X on film, the actor had no idea who the character was. So when one of the producers handed him an 'X-Men' comic from her desk he responded, "What am I doing on the front of a comic book?"
I'm so excited you've gotten around to the X-men. I grew up in the 70-80s reading X-men comics and although movies offer pros and cons relative to books it's soo cool watching someone else get into the characters I love.
Me too! I remember when my wife and I went to see this in the theater when it came out. We were both such comic book nerds and loved how they showed our favorite characters. It would be another eight years before Iron Man and the start of the MCU.
12:15 "You gonna tell me to stay away from your girl?" "If I had to do _that,_ she wouldn't be my _girl."_ This romantic triangle between Scott, Jean and Logan is a _defining_ trait in the X-Men. Every iteration has it.
I think they almost overuse the love triangle. Especially when they let the romantic rivalry overshadow what should be first and foremost a clash of personalities between Scott's by-the-book idealism and Logan jaded cynicism. I find their relationship with each other more interesting than either man's relationship with Jean.
I collected and still have the X-Men comics from issue #1 to the Great reset (when they started all titles over at #1). Jean and Scott had a permanent mind link when Wolverine became part of the team. Every thought that Jean or Scott thought was instantly known to the other. So, they were both aware that they were occasionally attracted to others, but the bond they shared was more intimate. Later in the comics the link was severed, but the attraction of between Logan and Jean was rarely spoken of between them. Scott however is kind of hard to understand, but as far as his relationships go he was a jerk. Way to big a topic for here, but that's the basics. I have never been a fan of the X-Men movies as the comics had better stories, basically the way most movies just can't compare to books they were created from except the foundation for the movies (the first X-Men movie) was desperately flawed.
Professor x and magneto are friends with very different ideas about how things should be done but they each have utmost respect for one another. It's really quite beautiful how their relationship is portrayed. Like most "bad" guys, they have reasons, and they see themselves as justified and good in their methods and intentions. I also reckon Magneto's story is mirrored by Ian McKellen's own struggles with the world, especially in later movies.
It’s how most well-written bad guys are, you mean. No one thinks themselves as bad, they’re just trying to help. “Treason is simply a matter of dates.”
Ikr, there's even something vaguely reminiscent of religion in it: different beliefs, and different ideas of what constitutes right or wrong, but underneth there's still that desire to try and be nice to everyone.
fun fact about the "do you know what happens to a toad when it gets struck by lightning" line. The script for this movie went through a shitload of rewrites before the film went into production. one of the people who worked on a draft was Joss Whedon. You know him as the guy who wrote and directed Avengers and Avengers Age of Ultron. In his draft, he had a more comedic tone and one of the gags he had was that when Toad would fight he would taunt his enemies by saying stuff like "do you know what happens when a toad gets backed into a corner? He hops away!" Storm's line about a toad getting struck by lightning was her throwing his taunts back in his face. For some weird reason in the final draft they cut that gag but left her punchline in the finished film and its the only line of dialogue they kept from Whedon's script.
In fact, in the comics, Magneto really did rip the metal out of Wolverine. The experience was so tramatic, it broke his mind causing him to act like an animal. He regeneration got even more powerful, though, because the metal is actually toxic, and his regeneration was constantly working to keep him alive.
I think it was a failed attempt by another supervillain to put the metal back into Logan that made him go feral. Either way it lead to a weird and unforgettable moment where Wolverine, acting on pure animal instinct, saved unconscious Cyclops from falling to his death and then woke him up by licking his face like a dog.
I feel ya. The last movie I saw with my Mom was the final Star Wars movie. She and Dad took me to see the very first one in 1977 as a little kid. Not sure I can watch that last one any time soon. Was just she and I this last time, and it was very special.
X-men was always my favorite comic book while growing up. You have no idea how huge this movie was for me when I saw it in the theater senior year of high school. Seeing my favorite characters on the big screen was such a dream come true. It’s not like today where every character is now in movies.
Oh yeah, being on the inside of nerd shit used to mean something. Before the special editions came out, if someone could tell you what the word "yoda" means, then you knew you were around someone you could talk to. As much as i've enjoyed being on the MCU train for the past fifteen years, there is a bit of nostalgia for the days when nerd and geek stuff was the _sub_ culture and not just the culture.
I still freak out when I see the MCU using characters like Eternity and The Watcher in a big budget movie. But X-men walked in black “Matrix inspired” leather so the MCU could run in comic accurate costumes. I recall reading the letters to the editor at the end of comics in the early 90s and seeing when this movie was just a rumor. People were speculating who would play who. One random guy suggested the captain from Star Trek would make a great Professor X. And to see it all come together was magical.
To me always I love any comic book adaption but they need to take a decade long break for people to appreciate them more. I remember the antisipation waiting spiderman and batman and others to arrive now it seems like it's every other month
Scott Summers (Cycolps) suffered a brain injury as a child, it made him incapable of controlling his power. Professor X created the visor\glasses which helps him hold it back. Without them he can not control, them.
There's an interesting fact that you may like Ashley, when Bryan Singer was pitching the idea of this movie to Stan "The Man" Lee he kept referencing the Usual suspects. Stan at one point asked him why he kept doing that and Bryan said because I made that movie. Turns out that was one of Stan and his wife's favorite movie. And how he actually got to make the X-Men
I'll always appreciate the love that Hugh Jackman has for Wolverine and his fans. He went above and beyond to nail the superhero body and delivered one of the best super hero movies. And always remembers and is grateful that this character was the one that made him known all around the world, that he included it in his performing song when he hosted the Oscars.
Back in 2000, Hugh Jackman could get away with having "just" a muscular body. In the following years and decades, with more and more superhero movies coming out, he (and loads of other actors) "had" to be super-jacked and ripped. Meaning years upon years of eating nothing but boiled chicken and broccoli to create and maintain such a physique. Worth it? I dunno. +/- Ashley seemed swooned by the OG Logan.
@@ergoat Well, he didn't have the time to grow "Comics" muscles or the hair (ugh... that wig !!) for X1. Remember he was hired at the last minute after Dougray Scott had to leave the project due to Mission:Impossible 2 going overschedule.
Jackman said that his biggest mistake in the early days was he thought he could just get ripped before filming X-Men 1. Well he showed up on set a bit doughy and they ended up changing the shooting schedule to move more of his shirtless scenes later in production to give him more time. He said he's still a little embarrassed at how he looks in X-Men 1.
Cyclops (Scott Summers) has eye beams that continually shoot out of his eyes. He has to wear ruby sunglasses or his visor in order to stop them. In the comics he's the leader of the X-Men when Xavier isn't around. He's played by James Marsden, who you probably have seen in a lot of other movies, but the only other superhero movie he's in is Superman Returns.
And they're not just laser beams shooting out of his eyes. His eyes are actually portals to another dimension that has infinite power. His visor is the only thing that controls it and he can adjust it to shoot as narrow of beam. As he'd like. He could fit through a keyhole without touching the sides or be the width of a football field.
Also, note that the REASON he needs glasses to control his eyebeams is that a childhood injury damaged the nictating membranes he would have had to seal off the power naturally. Scott also has an incredibly developed sense of objects around him, and can (with his visor) adjust his beam to give only a light tap instead of a full blast, and has cleared a pool table without using a pool cue in the past.
My boy was given the shaft in these movies. He was cast perfectly and they completely ignored him. Fingers crossed when the MCU introduces mutants, we'll finally get to see him shine.
Cyclops is James Marsden who is Prince Edward in Enchanted and Corny Collins in Hairspray the movie! Storm is Halle Berry, and Rogue is Anna Paquin (known for TrueBlood) Can’t wait for your excursion into these films. I watched these a lot as a teen. Also, if you ever get the chance, Charlie’s Angels 1&2. They are quite the guilty pleasure of mine 😅
Can't believe I was 19 when this came out and I saw it in the cinema in Greece. I was just so blown away by this after being a pre teen watching the cartoon in the early 90s and who would have known now at 42 time went by like a river.
Joss Whedon did some uncredited script work, which included Toad repeatedly bragging about things that toads could do better than other animals, with the payoff of Storm's line that the same thing happens to a toad hit by lightning as anything else. Then someone had the bright idea of taking out all the setup (resulting in Toad never speaking once) but leaving in the payoff, which now just feels like an especially lame one-liner. Also, Toad is played by Ray Park, who'd made a huge splash as Darth Maul the previous year. After getting out of the elevator, he holds the steel bar exactly the same way he did with Maul's lightsaber.
Interesting casting: Famke Janssen (Jean Grey) and Patrick Stewart (Charles Xavier) worked together on an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. The episode was called “The Perfect Mate”; in the episode Janssen played an alien who was meant to be given to another alien as a form of marriage, but through unforeseen circumstances winds up having a relationship…and a romance with Stewart’s character of Captain Jean-Luc Picard.
My friends and I were all OBSESSED with this movie when it came out. My one friend even bleached her hair to have a streak like Rogue's, and ended up starting a trend in my school.
I somehow missed out on the X-Men movies growing up, but I got into them last year. You're in for some great times with this one Ashleigh. It's crazy how this series kept going on for 2 decades and actually predates the M.C.U. while also technically being based on only one property. That joke about Wolverine in yellow spandex is actually a reference to his original outfit in the comics.
Mystique is played by Rebecca Romijn (pronounced romaine) who, at that time, was married to John Stamos. They divorced a few years later & she married Jerry O’Connell whose very first acting role was as Vern in “Stand By Me” which you saw not too long ago…he was the friend who was overweight. Rebecca started out as a model for the likes of Victoria Secret, Sports Illustrated, & Dior. She’s had a very successful career, recently seen as Number One a couple of Star Trek series & Guardian Eve Baird on The Librarians with Noah Wyle, John Larroquette & Christian Kane.
Rebecca's introduction in Star Trek Discovery as Number One remains one of the most ridiculous "yas queen" moments of modern media. To defuse the model hatred thing, they have her replicate a cheeseburger with fries, just so a manly-man can look uncomfortable in front of her eating it. She deserves better writers and better roles.
In fact, her husband, Jerry O'Connell also plays a first officer in another Star Trek series--Star Trek: Lower Decks. And I still say that if they don't randomly psych themselves up by shouting "We're Number Ones! We're Number Ones!" then what are they even doing together as a couple?
Although there were other Marvel films before this one, this was the first hugely successful film based on one of their books. They famously almost made a Spider-Man movie with James Cameron before it fell apart, and there's a hilariously bad unreleased 1994 Fantastic Four movie made just so Fox could hang onto the rights, and these things made people nervous that the movie would not be successful. Only Batman and Superman had successfully been turned into film franchises, and by 2000, both had fizzled. Instead, it was hugely successful and basically kicked off the modern superhero movie trend, leading to Tobey's Spider-Man, the Christopher Nolan Batman movies, and finally the MCU. Another actor named Dougray Scott was going to be Wolverine, but before making this he was cast in Mission: Impossible 2. When that film's production ran over schedule, Scott was forced to drop out, allowing Hugh Jackman to step in. The script features some uncredited rewrites by Joss Whedon, who would go onto write and direct The Avengers and Age of Ultron, and then the widely-hated Justice League. (He's also in a club with director Bryan Singer as a member of the production whose career was later derailed by misconduct allegations.)
I read Cameron's script/treatment for Spider Man in the 90s (on actual paper!). Man, it would've been great. Tobey and Sam did a great job...but...just imagine what could've been.
it was also the first film MCU chief Kevin Feige was involved in and is what started him down the road of eventually heading the Marvel film department. Lauren Schuler Donner, wife of Superman director Richard Donner, hired him specifically because of his expertise on Marvel and was credited as a major reason for the X-Men movies and Spider-Man movie series success during this era. Also don't forget that Captain America, Nick Fury and Thor had movies in the 80s and 90s as well.
@@snowdenwyatt6276 Well, Spider-Man, like Incredible Hulk were 70's TV series who's pilots were theatrically released outside of the US (as were the pilots for Buck Rogers and Battlestar Galactica). Dr Strange (70's) and Nick Fury (90's) were failed pilots. Thor and Daredevil were introduced in Hulk TV movies in the 90's but never went into series.
Another fun fact, the scene where Logan is running naked in his dreams trying to get away from the guys who are grafting adamantium on him, and he turns a corner and his eyes bug out and he's all shocked... they achieved that scene by having every single woman on cast and crew (including James Marsten's mother, who was visiting the set that day) standing there hooting and waving dollar bills. :D
Fun fact, the trucker who drove Rogue to the bar was played by Canadian actor George Buza. He voiced Beast on X-MEN: THE ANIMATED SERIES. Beast wouldn't be introduced until the third live-action film, X-MEN: THE LAST STAND.
I remember being SO upset when this first came out. Wolverine was supposed to be just a little over 5' tall and Storm close to 6 feet. "They got their heights backwards," I said! LOL X-Men have always been my favorite "super heroes" of all time! I got over it quick after I actually saw the movie. Yes, I am a full nerd. I have all the X-Men comics from #85 to #350 or so (when things got really crazy.)
Storm was totally my favorite as a kid! My friends and I would get together to watch the x-men cartoon Saturday mornings then we'd play like we were the xmen all day. So fun!
I still say a good quote for both Magneto and Killmonger is from the 40s play and movie 'The Heiress' based on the novella 'Washington Square': "Can you be so cruel?" "Yes I can be very cruel. I have been taught by masters." Don't tell me you can't see Magneto saying that last line.
Okay so the watch order of the films to go in after X-Men 3 is: X-Men: First Class, The Wolverine, Days of Future Past (Rogue Cut), Apocalypse, Dark Phoenix, Logan, Deadpool and it's sequel. The reason Logan (Wolverine) has metal claws is he was born with bone claws with a regenerative ability and his entire skeleton was done to be of metal called Atamantium which is stronger than Vibranium, Toad is played by Ray Park who was Darth Maul in Phantom Menace
You missed X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which is of course different from The Wolverine (and not very popular). There is also technically The New Mutants in there somewhere. My personal thought is that you could get enough of the story doing X2, X3, First Class, DoFP, and Logan. Personally, I'd also cut X3, FC, and DoFP and swap The Wolverine director's cut in for Logan, which I hated *so* much (very unpopular opinion, I know), but at that point the story is probably a bit incoherent.
Ironically, the first Wolverine voice actor in a an X-Men cartoon was Australian! 👀 X-MEN: A little too cautious, not knowing what direction to go in.. X-2: Definitely Hitting their stride X-Men The Last Stand: Tried to run in too many directions at once with it's shoe laces tied together and fell on its face... X-Men Origins Wolverine: It had its moments.. The Wolverine: Just confused and making up terrible characters X-Men First Class: Very creative and took risks that paid off with character development X- Men Days of Future Past: BRILLIANT X-Men Apocalypse: Sigh... Logan: Absolutely brutal and satisfyingly heartbreaking... X-Men Dark Phoenix: Didn't...even...bother... But I'm no gatekeeper
@@Rmlohner Yup. For all their faults recently, the MCU has been a master class in how to translate ridiculous over-the-top costumes into a practical looking, live-action adaptation.
@@ravenwraith1017 It helps they don't actually use a spandex, form-fitting leotard for most of them with their underwear on the outside. Plus society as a whole is much more accepting of forms of expression which superhero costumes are.
For me, this is the movie that changed the game for comics-based filmaking. The amazing cast, the story arcs, the solid (for the time) effects, the adherence to important parts of the cannon (certainly not all). Also: 16:05 "How do you stop someone like this?" You really don't lol, it's part of what makes Mystique such a great character.
This was made before Marvel Studios existed and Marvel comics were struggling a bit and started licensing their titles through movie studios. X-Men (and Fantastic Four) was licensed through 20th Century Fox. (Spider-Man would later go to Columbia). There is a very long story of the battle that happened after Marvel studios was formed and the desire of Marvel to get those licensed titles back to the Marvel studios ownership. Took the power of Disney and 20ish years for it to happen.
This was wonderful. Non-spoiler trivia: the character Storm is also a princess. Her weather-control powers are extreme and range from fog, hail, and snow to hurricane winds, heat waves, lightning, thunder, etc. She has crippling claustrophobia, which villains use against her frequently.
It's a shame that Storm never got her own solo movie (it was planned, but scrapped when the Wolverine movie wasn't well-received). She's one of my favorite comic book characters, and the movies never really got to explore her personality or her backstory all that much. And I have a feeling that when we finally get the X-Men in the MCU, they're not going to do her justice either.
They nerfed Storm for these movies and that really bugs me. I mean seeing Storm getting tossed around like a rag doll by Toad of all people? Yeah, I know they had Ray Park (Darth Maul) and wanted to show him off, but come on. Storm never really got the spotlight or the treatment she deserves out any of these movies.
@@lowkee1205they have to nerf most super powers in superhero movies. In some ways it makes Sen because comics reach nonsense levels of power and people need something to anchor their concepts to so they can grasp what's going on.
Before this movie came out, me and few other X Men fans were doing 'dream casting'. If we were in charge of casting actors for something like a movie, who would we pick and why. The top pick for Prof X was Patrick Stewart. Mostly because of his looks. Lol. Then his acting skill.
"I think I'd wanna be Storm" believe it or not Storm is radically mistreated by this movie. She is staggeringly more powerful than this movie would lead you to believe.
Movie adaptations tended to scale down superpowers. Now it's almost the opposite (MCU SPOILERS: e.g. Cap is almost Spider-Man strong and heals like Wolverine although it makes sense since MCU Hulk is connected to him and Captain Marvel is like her Binary level self in her first movie).
Also, Ke Huy Quan, the child actor who played Short Round in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and Data in The Goonies was a fight/stunt coordinator for the Wolverine vs Mystique fight scene -- he also just (very deservedly!) won Best Supporting Actor at the Oscars for his role in "Everything Everywhere All At Once" a couple of weeks back.
The thing about Cyclops / Scott is, he can't actually control his powers. Any time he opens his eyes, he fires lasers out of them, he can't stop it. The only thing he can do is close his eyes (leaving him totally blind) or wear special glasses to contain his power. Hence, he ALWAYS wears a pair of red sunglasses, or a visor with the same red lens, which allows him to articulate how much of a laser he wants to unleash at any one time (IE: a pencil-thin beam or a wall-shattering blast). At the end when Magneto took his visor off, he had fixed it so Scott's head was looking DIRECTLY at Jean. If he opened his eyes, even for a peek, he'd fire his lasers directly into the head of the woman he loves, and most likely killed her instantly.
Not laser, but concussion beams of energy from another dimension, his eyes beinga portal. In the Comics, he can't control them because of an injury he got on the head (while saving his baby brother, falling down in a burning parachute...).
@@jean-mi1825 Yeah, I figured that'd be unnecessary to explain the sole point of why he always needed to wear his glasses. 'Concussion beams of energy from another dimension' is a hell of a lot more to type than 'lasers', isn't it?
@@twofacetoo75 The fact that it's not laser beams is important to the lore of the character, because it neans it doesn't burn like a laser would, and that's a common mistake people make by wrongly assuming his power.
@@jean-mi1825 Yeah it's really important to the lore of the character in the movie where it's literally not addressed once. Are you gonna keep defending your nitpicking or are you gonna move the fuck on already?
I remember feeling awkward in the theater when Storm said the “toad” line. Such a dramatic build up to such an anticlimactic statement. I still cringe 😂
- due to a childhood head injury, Cyclops can't turn off his eyebeams. He has special glasses and visors to contain and control the energies, but essentially, if his eyes are open, he's blasting full bore. when he not wearing such, he tends to keep his eyes tightly closed to avoid potentially injuring/killing anyone by accident - Wolverine's healing factor is ridiculously powerful. Stabbing himself (while painful) wasn't particularly dangerous to him. He was likely fully healed within 30 seconds. - Professor X and Magneto have known each other for decades and consider each other friends, though each also believes the other to be misguided when it comes to human-mutant relations. (Magneto having been a child in a Nazi prison camp where his parents were killed, expects the governments to turn on mutants like the Germans turned on Jews, homosexuals, gypsies, and other minorities. Xavier has a more hopeful outlook) - I believe there have been a lot of women who share your reaction to Hugh Jackman 8D
The X-Men franchise are some of my favourite movies. My fave is Days of Future Past and then Apocalypse, but X-Men holds its own with both, imo. So glad you’re getting to these, Ashleigh! They’re so fun. Also, I LOVE your nail polish 😍😍
The Apocalypse movie was garbage, they got the character completely wrong. Also Magneto would never follow someone like Apocalypse and Storm and Psylocke were never Horsemen. But that can be forgiven because the actual Horsemen outside of Angel are unknown side characters, but I cannot forgive how they bastardized Apocalypse.
@@andrewft31 that’s fair. I didn’t grow up reading the comics, I knew nothing of the character before the movie. I just think it’s fun. And I love Quicksilver’s scenes.
@@andrewft31 ...If we're not to complain about a Rogue who can't fly and a 6'-3" tall Wolverine, I refuse to worry that "Storm and Psylocke were never Horsemen".
Am so glad to see you breaking into this franchise. There’s a couple of rough patches, but the prequel films are amazing as is most of the the Wolverine trilogy. Hell, Logan is arguably the best superhero film ever put to screen. This is gonna be fun!
@@lonewolfmcqade5554 there is nothing wrong with pineapple on pizza, tomatoes are fruits, from that point on, its been established fruit on pizza is acceptable.
X-Men 2000 is so underrated! Great script, great cast, and I love that early-2000s style. It was the first great superhero movie since Batman '89 (I class Blade as more of a vampire movie). Has Ashleigh seen Blade yet?
It's hard to describe watching this in the theaters was. Because before this super hero movies had a bag track record. For the most part it's pretty close to the source material. It still holds up amazing well.
One of my favorite TV moments was watching 12 year old Anna Paquin (Rogue) collect an Oscar for her work in the movie 'The Piano'. She is visibly shaken by the honor, but collects herself onscreen to give her little acceptance speech. What a trooper! By the way, you would love 'The Piano'. It's great.
Hi Ashleigh, I`m glad you enjoyed the film. :) Those of us who had been reading the comics of all the different Super-Heroes, were glad to finally get them on the big screen. The X-men obviously had to wait until the special effects part of films, could deal with all their different powers. Whereas, we were able to get Superman & Batman earlier, needless to say, the original stories have proven themselves at the box office.
Fun fact: the actor who played Toad, is the same actor who played Darth Maul in Star Wars Episode I. Also, the X-Men characters (maybe not the actors) are coming to the MCU. And also, when Cyclops made the joke about yellow spandex, its because Wolverine, in the comics and animated shows, is usually in yellow spandex.
I saw this in the theater with a bunch of my friends the day it came out. At the time we were in hs and we all started laughing uncontrollably when Wolverine got yeeted through the windshield. Then the whole theater just started laughing too when they heard us. This movie brings backs good feelings for me.
One of your best reaction video I have seen yet. Looks like you had so many surprises both good and bad and great reactions to so many events throughout and it was all new and unknown. Loved it. Thanks. The yellow spandex is a reference to the comics and how the X-Men are dressed in it, fans who knew loved it.
17:30 Most pistol bullets are made of a lead-antimony alloy encased in a soft brass or copper-plated soft steel jacket. In rifle and machine-gun bullets, a soft core of lead is encased in a harder jacket of steel or cupronickel. Ferromagnetic metals, meaning metals that attract magnets, are iron, cobalt, steel, nickel, manganese, gadolinium, and lodestone; which would technically suggest that some bullets might remain unburdened by magnetism, in fact most of them.
Wow, I haven't seen this in ages and it actually holds up much better than I would've expected. Now if you'll pardon me, I'm off to have frog legs for dinner. ⛈
I don't know if this is true, but someone told me the line was supposed to be "You know what happens to a toad when it's struck by lightning? It croaks." But they changed the line at the last minute.
@Ashleigh Burton there are 2 people who played mystique there is this one and the other one is in a confusing time line that is probably multivers version because multivers is a theory that our world is connected to a series of panel worlds that channel and vibrant so fast that they can't see each other but, if you can open a opening then you can enter a another world .dc comics and marvel have multivers and on the panel worlds copy of every body but they act like doppelgangers with different outcomes than our outcomes in life ,just like there are different actors who played spiderman ,Toby Mcguire, Andrew Garfield, and Tom Holland and their spiderman multivers nor spidervers and Nick cage is one of the multivers version of Peter Parker in a film noir detective style movie earth and a different spiderman costume that inspired the black shield suit in spiderman far from home when he was fighting mystero illustrations ,but spiderman noir had a hat and coat long and even a version of Gwen Stacy that on her earth Peter Parker was not bit by the radioactive spider,she was and she became spider Gwen but in some version she goes by ghost spider and to answer your questions about wolverine back story , watch wolverine for the complete back story and the costumes is leather and while spandex is flexible as leather some designs combined with spandex and leather and some times the costumes designers go with special fabric that I guess is like spandex in a way . In the tv show stargirl the star costume was made out of the spandex like fabric and some other super hero tv show and movies, antman and wasp costumes are made out of spandex like fabric I think because it looks like it. And if you look at antman costume in antman and wasp the antman suit has a ant on it on the chest if you look hard enough and there is two actors that play quick silver because he and his sister are magneto 's kids and are mutants but, fox and Disney did not team up yet so the theory is that the xmen movie and the many sequel and spin off movies are on a another world in the multivers and the marvelcinemauniverse version is on another earth ,and Sam raim the director of spiderman Toby Mcguire and Oz the great and powerful the supposed prequel to the first wizard of Oz before Dorothy land In Oz and evil dead and evil dead 2 and dark man his own super hero is the director of Dr strange 2 and the multivers of madness . So that's why there is a news actors playing the same character in the marvel movie, Stan is in the xmen movies and the idea for the x men is that Stan went to his boss and told him the idea and he likes the idea but he said that Stan 's readers would not know what a mutant is and in 1960s people might be confused so Stan short it to x men and explained what a mutant is and they're motivated and powers and the ice guy is called ice man and the girl that went through the door is kitty pride and she is queer and rogue in the comics and animated series of the 90s she could fly thanks to Mrs marvel Danvers before she became captain marvel . Wolverine does have a super hero suit which is yellow body suit with blue claw marks on it and a cowl with black point on it and it's more of a combat suit that shows his muscles. Ashleigh burton : am I going to see more of Hugh Jackman as wolverine ? Me: and a lot more and every thing else . You're sick. He does get the comic book version of the costume but ,Hugh is not wearing the comic book version of the costume because he said he looks good with out it.
The yellow spandex is from the comics. That was why the comment was funny. From what I remember, the movie was well-received and really honored the source material. A well crafted movie and pretty understated compared to the FX extravaganzas of today's Marvel films.
As someone who grew up with the X-Men and has a lot of affection for these characters, seeing a first-tine genuine reaction to all the classic X-Men tropes is delightful.
Good morning Ashleigh, thanks for the fun reactions as always. Two items: 1. Stan Lee is often placed in the movies as a cameo due to the fact that he created these characters, up until his passing which took place right around Avengers End Game. My favorite is when he refers to Tony Stark as "Tony Stank" Number 2. Wolverine wears yellow spandex in the original comic books, which is the joke regarding yellow spandex in the movie. Please let us know when you have a yellow spandex costume to show us! We prefer it to be for you, but a costume for Beans would work too. Thank you!
X-Men is far and away my favorite superhero franchise. I think one of the best things about it is how it gives so many characters rich backstories, and actual character motivations. For example, unlike sooooo many two dimensional movie villains, we can really sympathize with Eric, even though he does bad things. As a holocaust survivor he had a front row seat how truly awful humans can be to people who are different, and Eric and Charles's relationship ranks among the best hero/villain stories in superhero fiction. Also, as a queer person, it's pretty hard to miss the parallels between being a mutant and being gay. For the record Storm is my absolute favorite superhero not just in the X-Men universe but of all time (I named my first cat Storm). She got pretty nerfed in the movies and became more of a human taser who create wind. Canonically she is exceptionally powerful and would wipe the floor with any of the other X-Men except Charles (and one other under certain circumstances but that's a story for another movie).
I've read that the series is popular amongst minorities of all persuasions too - anyone who has ever been 'othered' gets the analogy which makes sense when apparently the basis for Prof X and Magneto was MLK and Malcolm X, as a pacifist and militant who had somewhat of the same goal but different methodologies. I'm basically in all the privileged categories, so it doesn't speak to me on that personal level, but it's my favourite superhero series because of the things you mention about the characters. Heroes and the villains all feel richer, and the morality of the stories is more interesting
The X-Men comics were originally created to be a comic version of the historical figures Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. Which is to say Professor X was designed to be MLK and Magneto for some reason was Malcolm X (I guess making the more militant figure "X" would have been too on the nose for Marvel in the 60s). The original team was composed of Cyclops/Scott Summers, Jean Grey/Marvel Girl, Iceman/Bobby Drake, Beast/Hank McCoy and Angel/Warren Worthington III. Magneto was also an ally of Professor Charles Xavier before becoming a rival and leading the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants (which was mostly made up of the evil crew in this). Cyclops was Professor X's first recruit and became the de jure field leader. He has to use a visor because of a childhood plane accident that damaged the part of his brain that controls the "laser eyes". His concussive blasts are strong enough to carve into a mountainside. Wolverine, due to his popularity, usually contests him for leadership of various X-Men teams. Oh also, funny you (unintentionally) ask if Cyclops actor was in superman... Wolverine debuted in an Incredible Hulk issue in the 1970s before shifting to X-Men. In a contrast to Hugh Jackman who is quite tall, the comic Wolverine is notoriously short...being around 5'2-5'3". Additionally, Storm and Rogue were also later entries to the X-Men with Storm appearing in the 1970s and Rogue coming around in the 1980s after debuting in an Avengers story. Rogue is much stronger in the comics than presented in this movie. In addition to having absorption powers, she has the powers of flight, super strength, etc because she permanently absorbed the powers of Carol Danvers/Captain Marvel. The girl that can walk through walls is a well-known mutant in the comics and has quite an unique name. Kitty Pryde is from Deerfield, Illinois which is a northern Chicagoland suburb. Senator Kelly plays a much bigger role as a villain in the comics. This was Hugh's breakthrough role in Hollywood. Also since he replaced Dougray Scott so close to filming he had to have a fake beard applied to his face until he could grow it out. LOL Director Bryan Singer was the director of the Usual Suspects. He has a checkered past along the lines of Kevin Spacey or a Harvey Weinstein. If you are familiar with what they have done, he's done some similar things himself. X2 will be even better.
When the X-Men came out, MLK and Malcolm X were not the symbols they are now, they were in the Civil Rights struggle, and would have been too controversial, too political, to be seen that way in that time. Magneto was a straight up villain, and leader of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.Chris Claremont was the one to bring out that symbolism, and make Magneto less 'evil' and much more sympathetic.
@@scottboswell6406 Except you are forgetting that Marvel has almost always been pretty progressive/forward thinking as a company mission since it revived its super hero comics division in the early 60s, so controversy/political doesn't necessarily fly (See: Black Panther). Also Malcolm X and MLK were absolutely major figures (and definitely symbols of their movement & factions) by summer of 1963. I will grant that X and Magneto were not likely to have been carbon copies of the civil rights leaders (or at least they weren't created with those men in mind--then again Timely kind of neutered the scope of the comics at the time as a policy [that's not the same thing as being too controversial or political...I am suggesting they merely simplified, shortened and dumbed them down]) but they took up the two sides of the civil rights coin (from the side of the oppressed) and that mutant struggle were loosely based on the movement at the time (in fact Lee so much as said it was a good metaphor, suggesting it was his intent from the beginning), only to amplify it during Claremont's run. Tl;dr while Xavier and Magneto may not have been strictly based on those Civil Rights leaders, their philosophies of the time and the two ideological factions they led were in mind when X-Men was created by Lee and Kirby.
@@Dularr I might have gotten the fact regarding the Civil Rights leaders incorrect, but Lee has outright claimed to the X-Men being a Civil Rights analogue, so it wasn't just a Claremont run.
![Seungmin "그렇게, 천천히, 우리(As we are)" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/kAzmhLHePqU/mqdefault.jpg)
The yellow spandex joke by Cyclops is a callback to the comics, where Wolverine wears a tight yellow and blue costume.
And his hair is also a callback to that costume as well
I can imagine Ashleigh imagining Hugh in yellow spandex now.
@@jaskim5723 The hair made Jackman into Wolverine. Well, and the physique. He was able to look and act the part with absolute conviction.
Or a brown and tan one, which I personally prefer.
The remark about yellow spandex was also about the uniforms worn by the original X-Men (Cyclops, Iceman, Beast, Angel, and Marvel Girl [Jean Grey]). Yellow and blue with blue 'ski-masks'.
Ashleigh: "Couldn't Magneto just suck all of the metal out of him?"
Comic book readers: *awkward glances*
It raises an Onslaught of emotions.
Wait until Ashleigh finds out how Wolverine got his claws and metal skeleton!!
I had forgotten just how well the BFFs Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen work together. Their chemistry on screen really reflect the friendship they have off-screen, and I believe that is what is necessary for Xavier and Magneto.
Their friendship is my absolute favorite! I love all the pictures of them together. :)
*SPOILER WARNING*
yeah they’re gonna be back in DP3
If you haven't seen them (along with Hugh Jackman) together on The Graham Norton Show, I can't recommend it highly enough. They are a riot together.
I think I had heard they only became close making X-Men and loved each other so much, the chemistry developed that fast.
@@jlzombiecat They've actually been friends for over 40 years.
Ian McKellan plays Magneto. He also plays Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings. His eyes are so kind in LotR and so cruel in his X-Men movies. What I'm saying is he's a great actor.
He's also one of those old-school British theater actors who doesn't particularly like doing movies, and only picks film roles that look interesting to him. Lucky for all of us that he did for these two roles; it's hard to picture anyone else in them.
@@orboobleck5366 "WE are the future, Charles. Not them." is one of my favourite lines in film. just the delivery and rawness
Magneto was one of the first villains I sympathised with. I find "baddies" are more interesting when you can understand their justifications.
I an McKellan is amazing with his abilities convey emotions thru eyes. Another amazing actor capable of that is Denze Washington.
That's Sir Ian McKellan. He was knighted.
Magneto's name is Eric Lensher, played by Ian Mckellan, Professor X is Charles Xavier, played by Patrick Stewart. The two characters were estranged friends in the comic, and Stewart and McKellan becmae good friends during the making of these films. They have amazing chemistry on screen together. :)
In comics Erik Lehnsherr is alias and real name Magnus Eisenhardt.
"People like you are why I was afraid to go to school as a child." is my favorite 'What the XMen are about' line in ALL of the X-Men franchise, comics included.
Yeah it hits the nail on the head for the intended social commentary. It applies to so many marginalised people who were traumatised as children.
Completely right. The entire ethos of the comic books is anti bigotry.
@@steved1135 It's always strange when some X-Men fans turn out to be bigots themselves.
Along with Iceman parents telling him "Have you tried not being mutant?"
The X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants represent Martin Luther King (X-Men) and Malcolm X (BoM)
Some fun facts about this movie: Hugh Jackman's terrified reactions when he meets Ian McKellen at 16:52 are real; he was told Magneto was going to tear open the train car, and assumed that meant ripping off the door, not tearing the entire car in half. And yes, the special effects crew used hydraulics to tear the train for real. Jackman thought they were just going to take off the door or something similarly small-scale, hence why he was so scared. The crew actually had to rush in with extinguishers as soon as the shot was done, because sparks were falling and catching on fire near people. It's one of the most famous parts of the production, and was featured on the bonus "making of" documentary. When he stops falling at during his fight with Sabretooth on top of the Statue of Liberty, he lets out a real yell of pain; this is because the harness he was wearing slipped and pinched him in the groin. Also, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos accidentally kicked the senator for real in the scene 10:16. Also, Ian McKellen actually declined the role of Gandalf because he was busy filming this; director Bryan Singer changed the filming schedule so McKellen could finish his scenes first at the end of 1999, and then travel to New Zealand in January 2000.
Some of us would have paid good money to be kicked in the face by a barefooted, young Rebecca Romjin. ;-)
Omg I love this movie but if we almost lost Gandalf for this...??!!
I thought the most famous part of the production was when a guy in a Spider-Man costume showed up in the blooper reel.
good of Bryan Singer to do that, lest we would of been robbed of the perfect version of Gandalf that we got.
For those that don't know, there's an interesting reason as to why the little boy is smiling at Cyclops at 16:23:
The extras that were there filming for that scene weren't told by the cast, the crew, the director, or anyone else working there that day as to what movie they were filming for, but the little boy was a very big fan of the 1992 X-Men Animated Series and when he laid eyes on James Marsden, he KNEW that in that moment that he was actually staring at a live action iteration of the character of Scott Summers/Cyclops and he couldn't stop smiling because Cyclops was his favorite X-Men character of the bunch.
The reactions shared between Marsden and the boys were genuine and even though the scene WASN'T originally written in the script to play out that way, Bryan Singer (the film director) liked what he saw and decided to keep it in the final cut of the movie.
I guess that just goes to show you that sometimes the really nice moments in a film are the ones that WEREN'T planned. 🙂
Thanks, I never knew that. Neat!
That and James Marsden was standing on a box to make the height difference bigger for the camera.
A thing Tyler (Sabertooth) made sure to rib him every chance he got.
Would never have known. Just looked like a kid smiling at a guy that looked like a goober wearing that visor.
Yeah, I'm sure Bryan Singer was happy with what he saw...
I don't know, the camera work on that scene would have to be hitting a major coincidence for it to work that way.
'i wonder when we'll know what Storm's power is.... the weather..' might've been the hardest I've laughed in a while lol 😂
Well, to be fair to Ashleigh Storm's power could have been more telekinesis based.
Toad was played by Ray Park who was also Darth Maul in The Phantom Menace. He does a lot of fight choreography for these movies. He's been in a bunch of stuff as a henchman villain.
I believe he was up to play Iron Fist in a project that never materialized.
There is a small nod to his previous role in this film. He is seen spinning a pole in a similar fashion to how Maul wields his double-bladed saber.
@@Nymphonomicon I think that's sort of a "signature move" for him. He does it again as the double for the headless horseman in Sleepy Hollow.
@@mogwaimofo I also liked his role in Gross Pointe Blank. He plays a hitman hired to kill John Cusack's character. Those two had an extraordinary fight. In fact, Park was Cusack's personal martial arts teacher. I wish reactors would do that movie. It's one of my favorites.
As soon as Ashley started talking about the Emperor, I was thinking, "there IS a Star Wars connection in this movie."
I will always stan Rebecca Romajn as Mystique, she looks so fire. Also the relationship between Charles and Eric (Prof X and Magneto) is one of the best in comics imo and these movies did a great job with it.
She certainly beats the next one in her shoes.
Ian Mckellen and Patrick Stewart being besties irl doesn't hurt, either. lol I love them when they're together.
Hugh Jackman is 6'2 and Famke Janssen is 6'0. While James Marsden is reasonably tall at 5'10, the filmmakers didn't want Cyclops to be noticeably shorter than both Wolverine and his own love interest. A number of tricks were done to make up the difference, including Marsden standing on apple boxes or wearing platform shoes. Janssen also went barefoot in some scenes where her feet aren't visible. A behind-the-scenes feature showcases Marsden humorously grousing about needing such tricks.
What makes the casting even weirder is the fact that in the comic books, Wolverine is described as being only 5'3.
It's true... I'm 5'7" so I know the struggle
It's funny because it's backwards from the comics.
It's extra weird, because in the comics, Cyclops is the one that is tall and jacked and Wolverine is short and skinny. The roles could easily have been reversed here, but I can't imagine the timeline where we got X-men Origins: Cyclops instead...
Speaking for every woman above 5'6" I want to thank you. It's ridiculous how some men act when you don't have to look up at them. I have had bosses discriminate against tall ladies. We can't help our genetics.
Toad was played by the legendary Ray Park.
He's usually known for fighting with staffs, even where staffs make no real sense. But he makes it work. Like with Darth Maul, where he broke the lore of lightsabres because he really, really wanted a staff, and now it is just accepted in the fandom that lightsabres come in all kinds of shapes and sizes.
Technically, double-bladed lightsabers had already existed since Tales of the Jedi #3, released on October 17, 1995. Ep1 just had the first high-profile use, still probably requested by Ray Park. Regardless, he always makes a staff work great.
🤣lightsabers came in all shapes and sizes _way_ before then in novels and comics. They already had double-bladed lightsabers and even stuff like lightwhips long before Episode 1.
He also plays the Headless Horseman in Tim Burton's 'Sleepy Hollow' when he's headless, with Christopher Walken playing the role when he has his head.
He's in a lot of stuff. Technically he's a stunt actor, but he's so good they keep putting him in actual roles.
@@Rhodair Interesting... Got any sources for that? I looked, and can't find any reference to any lightsaber that wasn't just a hilt with a blade until 1999.
The first time different ones appeared in a game was in 2003.
Before '99 there were a few mentions of some using multiple lightsabers, but no sabers of different designs, like Maul's double-bladed "lightstaff" or the Switchblade.
Lightwhips might be a bit of a stretch though, those aren't exactly lightsaber designs. They also don't really fit the canonical description of how a lightsaber works, being some sort of whip already, then having a kyber-powered mode somehow...
The story of why Cyclops has to always wear the red shades (from the comics at least) is that he and his family were flying their prop engine plane near their home in Alaska when it was attacked. Their parents put Scott and his brother Alex in parachutes and tossed them out. Scott suffered a head injury on the way down that damaged the part of his brain that would later be the on/off switch for his eye beams. So unless his eyes are shut or covered by that material, he would be doing to everything in front of him what he did to that train station.
Except his father was actually abducted by aliens because comic books. :)
@@gregsteele806 Yeah, I left that part out to avoid opening up the Summers Family Wormhole ^_^
And the material of his glasses and visor (ruby quartz) allows him to focus the beams to make them more precise.
Don't forget, Scott and his family are from St. Louis Missouri. That's my home town.
If I could meet him in real life, I'd ask him the famous St. Louis question. "What high school did you go to?" FYI here in St. Louis the high school you go to is like a part of your 'pedigree'. High schools compete against each other in lots of stuff like sports, music, art, etc.
Cyclops eyes are pretty much constantly open windows into another dimension. This dimensions energy doesn't heat up stuff but the energy from his eyes is physical, like imagine if a beam of energy could punch you. Really hard. His real brilliance for the team (though his power is really god dang powerful!) is in his tactical and strategical mind, which is why he is often depicted as the field leader of the team during the decades.
Then why don't the glasses fly off his face?
@@voltinator comic book magic fuckery lmao
@@voltinator Two reasons. In the comic books, his glasses are part of his helmet, and also they are made to control and manipulate the energy, which is why he's able to turn it on and off at will. If they were just regular sunglasses then the energy would burst through the glasses.
I never liked the "other dimension" nonsense explanation. My explanation was more plausible, physically, I think, and based on notions presented back in the 70s, which said his body processed sunlight "in a manner not unlike photosynthesis."
My explanation was that his body converted sunlight, producing highly unstable particles that would be stored in the less dense areas of his body, notably in the aqueous humour of his eyes. Highly energetic, these particles exist under pressure within his body, and are expelled through his eyes, as the least dense part of him in contact with air.
As the particles come in contact with air molecules, they draw electrons from the air molecules, propagating through the air by pulling themselves to the next air molecule. This process accumulates energy within the particle, and causes the escape of a low frequency photon, causing the particle to glow red. This does mean the beam is weakest at the point of origin, something Giant-Man noted when fighting Cyclops.
When the particles come into contact with a material too dense to draw energy from, they instead discharge their energy as kinetic force. This means the particle beam will have a much greater impact than would be usual for their mass and velocity. This also explains why the beam doesn't propel Cyclops BACKWARDS (Newton's third law would have Cyke being blasted off his feet, otherwise).
At equilibrium, his body will expel particles as fast as it makes them, but if he exerts himself, he can increase the flow of particles from his body. Of course, this will exhaust the supply, given time (as happened to him often back in the Original X-Men days). As he's grown older, he's developed better control and endurance.
I like this MUCH better than the idea his eyes are holes into some other dimension... which just strikes me as silly.
Just my headcanon, of course.
@@STNeish Yes. Science
Also, funny you should mention that Magneto could tear Wolverine's adamantium skeleton out... that literally happened in the comics once. Wolverine managed to survive it and then they found out that 1) His claws were natural bone, so he always had those, and 2) his regeneration factor was actually being slowed down by the metal, and he could heal fatal wounds in seconds or even regrow limbs. Unfortunately he started turning feral and bestial, and eventually Magneto (who regretted his actions) helped re-graft the adamantium back on.
I just came to the comments to mention that. :)
I still have those issues.
yea the adamantium poisons his body so he has to always fight off the poison so he heals better without the metal in his body. Also his bone claws were introduced to his character when the comic writers started writing about time travel, flashbacks, etc because without his claws he's boring so they couldn't have him without claws, so they made bone claws before he had metal claws.
Magneto didn't give Logan his metal back, Apocalypse did.
That is one of my favorite books. It's so tragic and sad. First Wolverine almost eviscerates Magneto, then Magneto tears the adamantium out of Logan, nearly killing him. Then Professor X basically lobotomizes Magneto. Just amazing and moving and scary.
Loved this when it came out, having been a huge fan of the cartoon and other super-hero stuff.
Fun fact - the comment at 20:50 about Wolverine not liking the outfits & Cyclops asking if he'd prefer yellow spandex is a reference to Wolverines comic and cartoon outfit, which was a yellow and blue/black spandex combo.
All the X-Men actually. Yellow & blue are the school colors.
And yes some of us complained at first
It still amazes me that Anna Paquin was already an Oscar winning actress by the time this movie was released.
To be fair, you could get away with 25 years old playing teenagers at that time.
She’s such a good actress, I hope she watches more of her movies
@@TheZapan99 Anna Paquin was 18 or 19 during filming of this movie
@@TheZapan99 Anna Paquin was 18 when this movie came out
She won an Oscar for her role in The Piano.
I know you didn't know at the time, but that has to be one of the funniest questions I have ever heard asked about Wolverine "Do you have any broken bones?" 7:05
When Patrick Stewart was first asked to consider playing Professor X on film, the actor had no idea who the character was. So when one of the producers handed him an 'X-Men' comic from her desk he responded, "What am I doing on the front of a comic book?"
Whaaaat? You mean cast someone who looks like the carackter is a good thing now? ;-)
I always said even back in the 90's That Patrick Stewart should play Xavier no matter what
I'm so excited you've gotten around to the X-men. I grew up in the 70-80s reading X-men comics and although movies offer pros and cons relative to books it's soo cool watching someone else get into the characters I love.
Me too! I remember when my wife and I went to see this in the theater when it came out. We were both such comic book nerds and loved how they showed our favorite characters. It would be another eight years before Iron Man and the start of the MCU.
Thank you, John, for laying the tracks for this Hot Mess Express journey through Marvel.
I actually think watching X-Men before WandaVision only sets you up for frustration 😬 iykyk
@@CrowTRobot but it is important to see *spoiler* before watching doctor strange 2. Kind of.
12:15 "You gonna tell me to stay away from your girl?"
"If I had to do _that,_ she wouldn't be my _girl."_
This romantic triangle between Scott, Jean and Logan is a _defining_ trait in the X-Men. Every iteration has it.
Do Scott and Logan ever get it on?
@@Aeroldoth3 Well, you know, I don't know the comics as well as I, perhaps, ought to. They might. 🤷
@@Aeroldoth3 they do in the fan fictions, but I don't recall it ever actually happening in the comics.
I think they almost overuse the love triangle. Especially when they let the romantic rivalry overshadow what should be first and foremost a clash of personalities between Scott's by-the-book idealism and Logan jaded cynicism. I find their relationship with each other more interesting than either man's relationship with Jean.
I collected and still have the X-Men comics from issue #1 to the Great reset (when they started all titles over at #1). Jean and Scott had a permanent mind link when Wolverine became part of the team. Every thought that Jean or Scott thought was instantly known to the other. So, they were both aware that they were occasionally attracted to others, but the bond they shared was more intimate. Later in the comics the link was severed, but the attraction of between Logan and Jean was rarely spoken of between them. Scott however is kind of hard to understand, but as far as his relationships go he was a jerk. Way to big a topic for here, but that's the basics. I have never been a fan of the X-Men movies as the comics had better stories, basically the way most movies just can't compare to books they were created from except the foundation for the movies (the first X-Men movie) was desperately flawed.
Professor x and magneto are friends with very different ideas about how things should be done but they each have utmost respect for one another. It's really quite beautiful how their relationship is portrayed. Like most "bad" guys, they have reasons, and they see themselves as justified and good in their methods and intentions.
I also reckon Magneto's story is mirrored by Ian McKellen's own struggles with the world, especially in later movies.
It’s how most well-written bad guys are, you mean. No one thinks themselves as bad, they’re just trying to help.
“Treason is simply a matter of dates.”
Sir Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellan are now besties in real life. One of the best bromances ever.
PROFESSOR X = MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.
MAGNETO = MALCOLM X
@@tonystark5-29-70 this. Stan Lee said these were the real life inspirations for those characters.
Ikr, there's even something vaguely reminiscent of religion in it: different beliefs, and different ideas of what constitutes right or wrong, but underneth there's still that desire to try and be nice to everyone.
fun fact about the "do you know what happens to a toad when it gets struck by lightning" line. The script for this movie went through a shitload of rewrites before the film went into production. one of the people who worked on a draft was Joss Whedon. You know him as the guy who wrote and directed Avengers and Avengers Age of Ultron. In his draft, he had a more comedic tone and one of the gags he had was that when Toad would fight he would taunt his enemies by saying stuff like "do you know what happens when a toad gets backed into a corner? He hops away!" Storm's line about a toad getting struck by lightning was her throwing his taunts back in his face. For some weird reason in the final draft they cut that gag but left her punchline in the finished film and its the only line of dialogue they kept from Whedon's script.
"Blue scaley b*tch!"
That is a fantastic callout of Mystique.
In fact, in the comics, Magneto really did rip the metal out of Wolverine. The experience was so tramatic, it broke his mind causing him to act like an animal. He regeneration got even more powerful, though, because the metal is actually toxic, and his regeneration was constantly working to keep him alive.
I think it was a failed attempt by another supervillain to put the metal back into Logan that made him go feral. Either way it lead to a weird and unforgettable moment where Wolverine, acting on pure animal instinct, saved unconscious Cyclops from falling to his death and then woke him up by licking his face like a dog.
This movie was the last time I was able to go to the movies with my mom. She took me to every movie in the 80’s, all the classics. 🥰
I feel ya. The last movie I saw with my Mom was the final Star Wars movie. She and Dad took me to see the very first one in 1977 as a little kid. Not sure I can watch that last one any time soon. Was just she and I this last time, and it was very special.
X-men was always my favorite comic book while growing up. You have no idea how huge this movie was for me when I saw it in the theater senior year of high school. Seeing my favorite characters on the big screen was such a dream come true. It’s not like today where every character is now in movies.
Oh yeah, being on the inside of nerd shit used to mean something. Before the special editions came out, if someone could tell you what the word "yoda" means, then you knew you were around someone you could talk to. As much as i've enjoyed being on the MCU train for the past fifteen years, there is a bit of nostalgia for the days when nerd and geek stuff was the _sub_ culture and not just the culture.
Me too. I had a few DC. But 99% was Marvel. I even have the Wolverine origins comic. Has a hard and yellow cover with 3 cuts across it.
I still freak out when I see the MCU using characters like Eternity and The Watcher in a big budget movie. But X-men walked in black “Matrix inspired” leather so the MCU could run in comic accurate costumes. I recall reading the letters to the editor at the end of comics in the early 90s and seeing when this movie was just a rumor. People were speculating who would play who. One random guy suggested the captain from Star Trek would make a great Professor X. And to see it all come together was magical.
Ditto
To me always I love any comic book adaption but they need to take a decade long break for people to appreciate them more. I remember the antisipation waiting spiderman and batman and others to arrive now it seems like it's every other month
Scott Summers (Cycolps) suffered a brain injury as a child, it made him incapable of controlling his power. Professor X created the visor\glasses which helps him hold it back. Without them he can not control, them.
There's an interesting fact that you may like Ashley, when Bryan Singer was pitching the idea of this movie to Stan "The Man" Lee he kept referencing the Usual suspects. Stan at one point asked him why he kept doing that and Bryan said because I made that movie. Turns out that was one of Stan and his wife's favorite movie. And how he actually got to make the X-Men
I'll always appreciate the love that Hugh Jackman has for Wolverine and his fans. He went above and beyond to nail the superhero body and delivered one of the best super hero movies. And always remembers and is grateful that this character was the one that made him known all around the world, that he included it in his performing song when he hosted the Oscars.
Back in 2000, Hugh Jackman could get away with having "just" a muscular body. In the following years and decades, with more and more superhero movies coming out, he (and loads of other actors) "had" to be super-jacked and ripped. Meaning years upon years of eating nothing but boiled chicken and broccoli to create and maintain such a physique. Worth it? I dunno. +/- Ashley seemed swooned by the OG Logan.
@@ergoat he's doing it all again! Dieting and getting back in shape to be Wolverine... Fun times ahead.
@@ergoat
Well, he didn't have the time to grow "Comics" muscles or the hair (ugh... that wig !!) for X1. Remember he was hired at the last minute after Dougray Scott had to leave the project due to Mission:Impossible 2 going overschedule.
Jackman said that his biggest mistake in the early days was he thought he could just get ripped before filming X-Men 1. Well he showed up on set a bit doughy and they ended up changing the shooting schedule to move more of his shirtless scenes later in production to give him more time. He said he's still a little embarrassed at how he looks in X-Men 1.
Yeah, the way his body gets by _The Wolverine_ is wild
Cyclops (Scott Summers) has eye beams that continually shoot out of his eyes. He has to wear ruby sunglasses or his visor in order to stop them. In the comics he's the leader of the X-Men when Xavier isn't around. He's played by James Marsden, who you probably have seen in a lot of other movies, but the only other superhero movie he's in is Superman Returns.
And they're not just laser beams shooting out of his eyes. His eyes are actually portals to another dimension that has infinite power. His visor is the only thing that controls it and he can adjust it to shoot as narrow of beam. As he'd like. He could fit through a keyhole without touching the sides or be the width of a football field.
Also, note that the REASON he needs glasses to control his eyebeams is that a childhood injury damaged the nictating membranes he would have had to seal off the power naturally. Scott also has an incredibly developed sense of objects around him, and can (with his visor) adjust his beam to give only a light tap instead of a full blast, and has cleared a pool table without using a pool cue in the past.
My boy was given the shaft in these movies. He was cast perfectly and they completely ignored him. Fingers crossed when the MCU introduces mutants, we'll finally get to see him shine.
He's also in the two live action Sonic The Hedgehog films.
Cyclops is James Marsden who is Prince Edward in Enchanted and Corny Collins in Hairspray the movie! Storm is Halle Berry, and Rogue is Anna Paquin (known for TrueBlood)
Can’t wait for your excursion into these films. I watched these a lot as a teen. Also, if you ever get the chance, Charlie’s Angels 1&2. They are quite the guilty pleasure of mine 😅
and funny enough.. he's also in Superman Returns!
Marsden was also Donut Lord in the Sonic movies
Like how are we forgetting Spike in Buffy!
@ADayinMyLife that's James Marsters not James Marsden
@@kimwatchesstuff You are thinking of James Marsters. Yeah, similar names.
Can't believe I was 19 when this came out and I saw it in the cinema in Greece. I was just so blown away by this after being a pre teen watching the cartoon in the early 90s and who would have known now at 42 time went by like a river.
I was in Thessaloniki when it came out and saw it in a cinema there! Saw X2 in Dublin!
same, 42 this year aside from seeing it in Greece, i saw it on Cable TV.
I'm from Greece and let me tell you that I wasn't even born when this movie came out.
I was born the year X-Men the Last Stand came out😂
I love 1 of the Bloopers for this Movie... when Cyclops Storm and Jean go to regroup, someone dressed as Spiderman shows up in the background.
Joss Whedon did some uncredited script work, which included Toad repeatedly bragging about things that toads could do better than other animals, with the payoff of Storm's line that the same thing happens to a toad hit by lightning as anything else. Then someone had the bright idea of taking out all the setup (resulting in Toad never speaking once) but leaving in the payoff, which now just feels like an especially lame one-liner.
Also, Toad is played by Ray Park, who'd made a huge splash as Darth Maul the previous year. After getting out of the elevator, he holds the steel bar exactly the same way he did with Maul's lightsaber.
Toad speaks multiple times in the movie...
Also the "same thing that happens to anything else" was intended as a sarcastic line. Like "duh of course" rather than delivered so grandious.
Interesting casting: Famke Janssen (Jean Grey) and Patrick Stewart (Charles Xavier) worked together on an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. The episode was called “The Perfect Mate”; in the episode Janssen played an alien who was meant to be given to another alien as a form of marriage, but through unforeseen circumstances winds up having a relationship…and a romance with Stewart’s character of Captain Jean-Luc Picard.
My friends and I were all OBSESSED with this movie when it came out. My one friend even bleached her hair to have a streak like Rogue's, and ended up starting a trend in my school.
I love that! : )
I have natural skunk spots in my hair at the temples and many people, to this day, think I'm trying to be Rogue. I'm not mad about it 😄
@@steviekc9057 Sometimes our abnormalities are cool. Rock them.
I somehow missed out on the X-Men movies growing up, but I got into them last year. You're in for some great times with this one Ashleigh. It's crazy how this series kept going on for 2 decades and actually predates the M.C.U. while also technically being based on only one property.
That joke about Wolverine in yellow spandex is actually a reference to his original outfit in the comics.
Did you watch Logan yet?
@@frederiquem6725 Yes. I thought it was great.
@@videobeta5324 it was the best of all the x-men movies IMO. I hope Ashley will like it too 😌
James Marsden was the Prince in Enchanted. He got some pipes on him.
Mystique is played by Rebecca Romijn (pronounced romaine) who, at that time, was married to John Stamos. They divorced a few years later & she married Jerry O’Connell whose very first acting role was as Vern in “Stand By Me” which you saw not too long ago…he was the friend who was overweight. Rebecca started out as a model for the likes of Victoria Secret, Sports Illustrated, & Dior. She’s had a very successful career, recently seen as Number One a couple of Star Trek series & Guardian Eve Baird on The Librarians with Noah Wyle, John Larroquette & Christian Kane.
Rebecca's introduction in Star Trek Discovery as Number One remains one of the most ridiculous "yas queen" moments of modern media.
To defuse the model hatred thing, they have her replicate a cheeseburger with fries, just so a manly-man can look uncomfortable in front of her eating it.
She deserves better writers and better roles.
@@TheZapan99not on Disco. But on SNW...OH YEAH
In fact, her husband, Jerry O'Connell also plays a first officer in another Star Trek series--Star Trek: Lower Decks. And I still say that if they don't randomly psych themselves up by shouting "We're Number Ones! We're Number Ones!" then what are they even doing together as a couple?
Although there were other Marvel films before this one, this was the first hugely successful film based on one of their books. They famously almost made a Spider-Man movie with James Cameron before it fell apart, and there's a hilariously bad unreleased 1994 Fantastic Four movie made just so Fox could hang onto the rights, and these things made people nervous that the movie would not be successful. Only Batman and Superman had successfully been turned into film franchises, and by 2000, both had fizzled. Instead, it was hugely successful and basically kicked off the modern superhero movie trend, leading to Tobey's Spider-Man, the Christopher Nolan Batman movies, and finally the MCU.
Another actor named Dougray Scott was going to be Wolverine, but before making this he was cast in Mission: Impossible 2. When that film's production ran over schedule, Scott was forced to drop out, allowing Hugh Jackman to step in.
The script features some uncredited rewrites by Joss Whedon, who would go onto write and direct The Avengers and Age of Ultron, and then the widely-hated Justice League. (He's also in a club with director Bryan Singer as a member of the production whose career was later derailed by misconduct allegations.)
Blade was pretty successful, but also r rated and doesn't get that super wide appeal of ticket sales
I read Cameron's script/treatment for Spider Man in the 90s (on actual paper!). Man, it would've been great. Tobey and Sam did a great job...but...just imagine what could've been.
it was also the first film MCU chief Kevin Feige was involved in and is what started him down the road of eventually heading the Marvel film department. Lauren Schuler Donner, wife of Superman director Richard Donner, hired him specifically because of his expertise on Marvel and was credited as a major reason for the X-Men movies and Spider-Man movie series success during this era.
Also don't forget that Captain America, Nick Fury and Thor had movies in the 80s and 90s as well.
@@scottb3034 Plus Spider-Man & Dr Strange.
@@snowdenwyatt6276
Well, Spider-Man, like Incredible Hulk were 70's TV series who's pilots were theatrically released outside of the US (as were the pilots for Buck Rogers and Battlestar Galactica).
Dr Strange (70's) and Nick Fury (90's) were failed pilots.
Thor and Daredevil were introduced in Hulk TV movies in the 90's but never went into series.
YAY!!! X2 is my fave of the first round, but there are other absolute GEMS sprinkled throughout this series. We are all in for a treat!!! 🥰
Ngl I think even after all these years X2 holds up EXTREMELY well, one of the best superhero movies of all time imo
@@Wuffskers agreed. That opening sequence is *chef's kiss* 😘
Another fun fact, the scene where Logan is running naked in his dreams trying to get away from the guys who are grafting adamantium on him, and he turns a corner and his eyes bug out and he's all shocked... they achieved that scene by having every single woman on cast and crew (including James Marsten's mother, who was visiting the set that day) standing there hooting and waving dollar bills. :D
The Yellow spandex reference was because that's wolverine's costume in the comics and animated series.
Cyclops’ best role: The American Death at a Funeral. Him on drugs and Zoe Saldana trying to keep him under control is comic gold
That version was utter trash. The original British version was far superior.
Agree with JakkFrost! The British version is the better film.
Would love a reaction to that! Hilarious movie!
Plus, that's Cyclops and Gamora!
Fun fact, the trucker who drove Rogue to the bar was played by Canadian actor George Buza. He voiced Beast on X-MEN: THE ANIMATED SERIES. Beast wouldn't be introduced until the third live-action film, X-MEN: THE LAST STAND.
He actually has an uncredited appearance on the TV, in X2, but played by a different actor.
🇨🇦👏
I remember being SO upset when this first came out. Wolverine was supposed to be just a little over 5' tall and Storm close to 6 feet. "They got their heights backwards," I said! LOL X-Men have always been my favorite "super heroes" of all time! I got over it quick after I actually saw the movie.
Yes, I am a full nerd. I have all the X-Men comics from #85 to #350 or so (when things got really crazy.)
Yeah, I was upset when they said Hugh Jackman was going to play Wolverine. He's too tall, but dang was I wrong. He's Wolverine.
We all complained about his height hehe, but now I can't imagine another actor as Wolverine. He made it his own.
Storm was totally my favorite as a kid! My friends and I would get together to watch the x-men cartoon Saturday mornings then we'd play like we were the xmen all day. So fun!
White Mohawk storm is my fave iteration
I still say a good quote for both Magneto and Killmonger is from the 40s play and movie 'The Heiress' based on the novella 'Washington Square':
"Can you be so cruel?"
"Yes I can be very cruel. I have been taught by masters."
Don't tell me you can't see Magneto saying that last line.
Okay so the watch order of the films to go in after X-Men 3 is:
X-Men: First Class,
The Wolverine,
Days of Future Past (Rogue Cut),
Apocalypse,
Dark Phoenix,
Logan,
Deadpool and it's sequel.
The reason Logan (Wolverine) has metal claws is he was born with bone claws with a regenerative ability and his entire skeleton was done to be of metal called Atamantium which is stronger than Vibranium,
Toad is played by Ray Park who was Darth Maul in Phantom Menace
You missed X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which is of course different from The Wolverine (and not very popular). There is also technically The New Mutants in there somewhere.
My personal thought is that you could get enough of the story doing X2, X3, First Class, DoFP, and Logan. Personally, I'd also cut X3, FC, and DoFP and swap The Wolverine director's cut in for Logan, which I hated *so* much (very unpopular opinion, I know), but at that point the story is probably a bit incoherent.
@@tylerfoster6267 I intentionally left out Origins.
If only they made a movie giving the origins of wolverine
@@jamesmoyner7499 I does suck but it does help with some of the Deadpool jokes.
@@ingibingi2000 Unfortunately they didn't.
Ironically, the first Wolverine voice actor in a an X-Men cartoon was Australian! 👀
X-MEN: A little too cautious, not knowing what direction to go in..
X-2: Definitely Hitting their stride
X-Men The Last Stand: Tried to run in too many directions at once with it's shoe laces tied together and fell on its face...
X-Men Origins Wolverine: It had its moments..
The Wolverine: Just confused and making up terrible characters
X-Men First Class: Very creative and took risks that paid off with character development
X- Men Days of Future Past: BRILLIANT
X-Men Apocalypse: Sigh...
Logan: Absolutely brutal and satisfyingly heartbreaking...
X-Men Dark Phoenix: Didn't...even...bother...
But I'm no gatekeeper
👍👍👍
The traditional uniforms in the comics for the X-Men was yellow spandex. It was an in-joke.
oh.. well.. there we go. I didn't get it.
@@awkwardashleigh Wolverine in particular is famous for his yellow costume.
And it's aged especially poorly now that the MCU has made comic-accurate costumes very trendy.
@@Rmlohner Yup. For all their faults recently, the MCU has been a master class in how to translate ridiculous over-the-top costumes into a practical looking, live-action adaptation.
@@ravenwraith1017 It helps they don't actually use a spandex, form-fitting leotard for most of them with their underwear on the outside. Plus society as a whole is much more accepting of forms of expression which superhero costumes are.
When they were younger, Ian McKellen told Patrick Stewart NOT to do science fiction.
After seeing his success in Star Trek, McKellen took these on !
For me, this is the movie that changed the game for comics-based filmaking. The amazing cast, the story arcs, the solid (for the time) effects, the adherence to important parts of the cannon (certainly not all).
Also: 16:05 "How do you stop someone like this?" You really don't lol, it's part of what makes Mystique such a great character.
This was made before Marvel Studios existed and Marvel comics were struggling a bit and started licensing their titles through movie studios. X-Men (and Fantastic Four) was licensed through 20th Century Fox. (Spider-Man would later go to Columbia). There is a very long story of the battle that happened after Marvel studios was formed and the desire of Marvel to get those licensed titles back to the Marvel studios ownership. Took the power of Disney and 20ish years for it to happen.
This was wonderful. Non-spoiler trivia: the character Storm is also a princess. Her weather-control powers are extreme and range from fog, hail, and snow to hurricane winds, heat waves, lightning, thunder, etc. She has crippling claustrophobia, which villains use against her frequently.
At one time, the writers beefed her up to the extent that she could control solar winds
It's a shame that Storm never got her own solo movie (it was planned, but scrapped when the Wolverine movie wasn't well-received). She's one of my favorite comic book characters, and the movies never really got to explore her personality or her backstory all that much. And I have a feeling that when we finally get the X-Men in the MCU, they're not going to do her justice either.
They nerfed Storm for these movies and that really bugs me. I mean seeing Storm getting tossed around like a rag doll by Toad of all people? Yeah, I know they had Ray Park (Darth Maul) and wanted to show him off, but come on. Storm never really got the spotlight or the treatment she deserves out any of these movies.
@@lowkee1205they have to nerf most super powers in superhero movies. In some ways it makes Sen because comics reach nonsense levels of power and people need something to anchor their concepts to so they can grasp what's going on.
She's also an expert gardener (having control over weather doesn't hurt)
The series peaks with X2. X2 is a masterpiece.
Before this movie came out, me and few other X Men fans were doing 'dream casting'. If we were in charge of casting actors for something like a movie, who would we pick and why.
The top pick for Prof X was Patrick Stewart.
Mostly because of his looks. Lol. Then his acting skill.
Can't wait for part 2, imho even better.
omg i can't wait for x-men 2! its one of the best superhero movies ever!
AND one of the rare case of sequel actually being better than the original.
Disagree.
@@jean-mi1825a lot of sequels are better than the first one. It's the third in the trilogy that tends to drop the ball.
Immediately followed by two of the worst superhero movies ever 😢😢😢
Now we need to get Ashleigh to watch Mystery Men!
She needs to see Watchmen before, or she won't be able to understand it's a parody.
"I think I'd wanna be Storm" believe it or not Storm is radically mistreated by this movie. She is staggeringly more powerful than this movie would lead you to believe.
Movie adaptations tended to scale down superpowers. Now it's almost the opposite (MCU SPOILERS: e.g. Cap is almost Spider-Man strong and heals like Wolverine although it makes sense since MCU Hulk is connected to him and Captain Marvel is like her Binary level self in her first movie).
The 'would you prefer yellow spandex' line is direct comic reference, as that's what the x-men wear in the comics.
Also, Ke Huy Quan, the child actor who played Short Round in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and Data in The Goonies was a fight/stunt coordinator for the Wolverine vs Mystique fight scene -- he also just (very deservedly!) won Best Supporting Actor at the Oscars for his role in "Everything Everywhere All At Once" a couple of weeks back.
Oh wow - I had no idea, I just knew his acting roles
The thing about Cyclops / Scott is, he can't actually control his powers. Any time he opens his eyes, he fires lasers out of them, he can't stop it. The only thing he can do is close his eyes (leaving him totally blind) or wear special glasses to contain his power. Hence, he ALWAYS wears a pair of red sunglasses, or a visor with the same red lens, which allows him to articulate how much of a laser he wants to unleash at any one time (IE: a pencil-thin beam or a wall-shattering blast).
At the end when Magneto took his visor off, he had fixed it so Scott's head was looking DIRECTLY at Jean. If he opened his eyes, even for a peek, he'd fire his lasers directly into the head of the woman he loves, and most likely killed her instantly.
Not laser, but concussion beams of energy from another dimension, his eyes beinga portal. In the Comics, he can't control them because of an injury he got on the head (while saving his baby brother, falling down in a burning parachute...).
@@jean-mi1825 Yeah, I figured that'd be unnecessary to explain the sole point of why he always needed to wear his glasses. 'Concussion beams of energy from another dimension' is a hell of a lot more to type than 'lasers', isn't it?
@@twofacetoo75
The fact that it's not laser beams is important to the lore of the character, because it neans it doesn't burn like a laser would, and that's a common mistake people make by wrongly assuming his power.
@@jean-mi1825 Yeah it's really important to the lore of the character in the movie where it's literally not addressed once.
Are you gonna keep defending your nitpicking or are you gonna move the fuck on already?
I remember feeling awkward in the theater when Storm said the “toad” line. Such a dramatic build up to such an anticlimactic statement. I still cringe 😂
It doesn't help that most people nowadays don't know the old wives' tale that toads can survive a lightning strike.
Because all the set-up lines from Toad were cut from the film, only leaving this anticlimactic pay-off !
- due to a childhood head injury, Cyclops can't turn off his eyebeams. He has special glasses and visors to contain and control the energies, but essentially, if his eyes are open, he's blasting full bore. when he not wearing such, he tends to keep his eyes tightly closed to avoid potentially injuring/killing anyone by accident
- Wolverine's healing factor is ridiculously powerful. Stabbing himself (while painful) wasn't particularly dangerous to him. He was likely fully healed within 30 seconds.
- Professor X and Magneto have known each other for decades and consider each other friends, though each also believes the other to be misguided when it comes to human-mutant relations. (Magneto having been a child in a Nazi prison camp where his parents were killed, expects the governments to turn on mutants like the Germans turned on Jews, homosexuals, gypsies, and other minorities. Xavier has a more hopeful outlook)
- I believe there have been a lot of women who share your reaction to Hugh Jackman 8D
@20:47 Cyclops says, "Yellow Spandex" Wolverine's original costume in the Incredible Hulk #181 was Yellow and Blue.
I didn't realize she hadn't watched this yet, given how many marvel movies she's seen so far. Can't wait to see her eventually watching Logan.
The X-Men franchise are some of my favourite movies. My fave is Days of Future Past and then Apocalypse, but X-Men holds its own with both, imo. So glad you’re getting to these, Ashleigh! They’re so fun. Also, I LOVE your nail polish 😍😍
The Apocalypse movie was garbage, they got the character completely wrong. Also Magneto would never follow someone like Apocalypse and Storm and Psylocke were never Horsemen. But that can be forgiven because the actual Horsemen outside of Angel are unknown side characters, but I cannot forgive how they bastardized Apocalypse.
@@andrewft31 that’s fair. I didn’t grow up reading the comics, I knew nothing of the character before the movie. I just think it’s fun. And I love Quicksilver’s scenes.
@@andrewft31 ...If we're not to complain about a Rogue who can't fly and a 6'-3" tall Wolverine, I refuse to worry that "Storm and Psylocke were never Horsemen".
You definitely gotta watch the 90s X-Men animated series. It's a classic.
It still holds up incredibly well too.
Theme song is iconic.
@@IcedEarth426 Yes 💯
@@rhoetusochten4211 hell yeah 💯
@@rhoetusochten4211
I had goosebumps when I heard it in Doctor Strange 2!
Thanks
The "yellow spandex" line is a reference to the uniform that Wolverine wore in many of the comic books and in the animated TV series from the 90s.
Am so glad to see you breaking into this franchise. There’s a couple of rough patches, but the prequel films are amazing as is most of the the Wolverine trilogy. Hell, Logan is arguably the best superhero film ever put to screen. This is gonna be fun!
Logan was all right, I don't understand the hype.
This statement is the equivalent to people liking pineapple pizza. It's just a personal choice, i understand, but it feels just wrong.
This is in reference to the "hype" of Logan.
@@lonewolfmcqade5554 there is nothing wrong with pineapple on pizza, tomatoes are fruits, from that point on, its been established fruit on pizza is acceptable.
Logan was half good.
X-Men 2000 is so underrated! Great script, great cast, and I love that early-2000s style. It was the first great superhero movie since Batman '89 (I class Blade as more of a vampire movie). Has Ashleigh seen Blade yet?
It's hard to describe watching this in the theaters was. Because before this super hero movies had a bag track record. For the most part it's pretty close to the source material. It still holds up amazing well.
YESSSSS im so excited for you to see more xmen!!!! The " If thats green-" 👀 comment had me screaming 🤣🤣
One of my favorite TV moments was watching 12 year old Anna Paquin (Rogue) collect an Oscar for her work in the movie 'The Piano'. She is visibly shaken by the honor, but collects herself onscreen to give her little acceptance speech. What a trooper!
By the way, you would love 'The Piano'. It's great.
Loved the level of excitement you had during this watch. The Xmen are my favorite team.
Hi Ashleigh, I`m glad you enjoyed the film. :) Those of us who had been reading the comics of all the different Super-Heroes, were glad to finally get them on the big screen. The X-men obviously had to wait until the special effects part of films, could deal with all their different powers. Whereas, we were able to get Superman & Batman earlier, needless to say, the original stories have proven themselves at the box office.
"Yellow spandex" - the Wolverine of the comic books wears yellow spandex.
Also, you killed me with "what's-her-tits in Kill Bill". 😂😂😂
Fun fact: the actor who played Toad, is the same actor who played Darth Maul in Star Wars Episode I.
Also, the X-Men characters (maybe not the actors) are coming to the MCU. And also, when Cyclops made the joke about yellow spandex, its because Wolverine, in the comics and animated shows, is usually in yellow spandex.
I saw this in the theater with a bunch of my friends the day it came out. At the time we were in hs and we all started laughing uncontrollably when Wolverine got yeeted through the windshield. Then the whole theater just started laughing too when they heard us. This movie brings backs good feelings for me.
Side note: Xaviers School For The Gifter is in Westchester NY where I lived and grew up. So I like telling people that
Thank you John for making this possible. I always love to see someone react to the X-men for the first time. Hope everyone has a good time!
One of your best reaction video I have seen yet. Looks like you had so many surprises both good and bad and great reactions to so many events throughout and it was all new and unknown. Loved it. Thanks. The yellow spandex is a reference to the comics and how the X-Men are dressed in it, fans who knew loved it.
Can't wait for the _'X2: X-Men United'_ reaction; by far my favourite of the *X-Men* movies!
Kate and Leopold was really good too
17:30 Most pistol bullets are made of a lead-antimony alloy encased in a soft brass or copper-plated soft steel jacket. In rifle and machine-gun bullets, a soft core of lead is encased in a harder jacket of steel or cupronickel. Ferromagnetic metals, meaning metals that attract magnets, are iron, cobalt, steel, nickel, manganese, gadolinium, and lodestone; which would technically suggest that some bullets might remain unburdened by magnetism, in fact most of them.
Her calling Cyclops "Robocop" was hilarious 🤣
Wow, I haven't seen this in ages and it actually holds up much better than I would've expected. Now if you'll pardon me, I'm off to have frog legs for dinner. ⛈
HAHAHAAHAH
I don't know if this is true, but someone told me the line was supposed to be "You know what happens to a toad when it's struck by lightning? It croaks." But they changed the line at the last minute.
@@ShawnRavenfire That would have actually been a good quip.
Toad actor also played Darth Maul. He's a physical acting expert.
@Ashleigh Burton there are 2 people who played mystique there is this one and the other one is in a confusing time line that is probably multivers version because multivers is a theory that our world is connected to a series of panel worlds that channel and vibrant so fast that they can't see each other but, if you can open a opening then you can enter a another world .dc comics and marvel have multivers and on the panel worlds copy of every body but they act like doppelgangers with different outcomes than our outcomes in life ,just like there are different actors who played spiderman ,Toby Mcguire, Andrew Garfield, and Tom Holland and their spiderman multivers nor spidervers and Nick cage is one of the multivers version of Peter Parker in a film noir detective style movie earth and a different spiderman costume that inspired the black shield suit in spiderman far from home when he was fighting mystero illustrations ,but spiderman noir had a hat and coat long and even a version of Gwen Stacy that on her earth Peter Parker was not bit by the radioactive spider,she was and she became spider Gwen but in some version she goes by ghost spider and to answer your questions about wolverine back story , watch wolverine for the complete back story and the costumes is leather and while spandex is flexible as leather some designs combined with spandex and leather and some times the costumes designers go with special fabric that I guess is like spandex in a way . In the tv show stargirl the star costume was made out of the spandex like fabric and some other super hero tv show and movies, antman and wasp costumes are made out of spandex like fabric I think because it looks like it. And if you look at antman costume in antman and wasp the antman suit has a ant on it on the chest if you look hard enough and there is two actors that play quick silver because he and his sister are magneto 's kids and are mutants but, fox and Disney did not team up yet so the theory is that the xmen movie and the many sequel and spin off movies are on a another world in the multivers and the marvelcinemauniverse version is on another earth ,and Sam raim the director of spiderman Toby Mcguire and Oz the great and powerful the supposed prequel to the first wizard of Oz before Dorothy land In Oz and evil dead and evil dead 2 and dark man his own super hero is the director of Dr strange 2 and the multivers of madness . So that's why there is a news actors playing the same character in the marvel movie, Stan is in the xmen movies and the idea for the x men is that Stan went to his boss and told him the idea and he likes the idea but he said that Stan 's readers would not know what a mutant is and in 1960s people might be confused so Stan short it to x men and explained what a mutant is and they're motivated and powers and the ice guy is called ice man and the girl that went through the door is kitty pride and she is queer and rogue in the comics and animated series of the 90s she could fly thanks to Mrs marvel Danvers before she became captain marvel . Wolverine does have a super hero suit which is yellow body suit with blue claw marks on it and a cowl with black point on it and it's more of a combat suit that shows his muscles. Ashleigh burton : am I going to see more of Hugh Jackman as wolverine ? Me: and a lot more and every thing else . You're sick. He does get the comic book version of the costume but ,Hugh is not wearing the comic book version of the costume because he said he looks good with out it.
So glad you are watching these - Halle Berry is Storm! You will love the prequels as well and we must all prepare for when you watch Logan………….❤
The yellow spandex is from the comics. That was why the comment was funny. From what I remember, the movie was well-received and really honored the source material. A well crafted movie and pretty understated compared to the FX extravaganzas of today's Marvel films.
As someone who grew up with the X-Men and has a lot of affection for these characters, seeing a first-tine genuine reaction to all the classic X-Men tropes is delightful.
We really watching all of x men to lead to the Deadpool movies lol
I love it 😂
Hopefully not the 3rd one.
Good morning Ashleigh, thanks for the fun reactions as always. Two items: 1. Stan Lee is often placed in the movies as a cameo due to the fact that he created these characters, up until his passing which took place right around Avengers End Game. My favorite is when he refers to Tony Stark as "Tony Stank" Number 2. Wolverine wears yellow spandex in the original comic books, which is the joke regarding yellow spandex in the movie. Please let us know when you have a yellow spandex costume to show us! We prefer it to be for you, but a costume for Beans would work too. Thank you!
X-Men is far and away my favorite superhero franchise. I think one of the best things about it is how it gives so many characters rich backstories, and actual character motivations. For example, unlike sooooo many two dimensional movie villains, we can really sympathize with Eric, even though he does bad things. As a holocaust survivor he had a front row seat how truly awful humans can be to people who are different, and Eric and Charles's relationship ranks among the best hero/villain stories in superhero fiction. Also, as a queer person, it's pretty hard to miss the parallels between being a mutant and being gay. For the record Storm is my absolute favorite superhero not just in the X-Men universe but of all time (I named my first cat Storm). She got pretty nerfed in the movies and became more of a human taser who create wind. Canonically she is exceptionally powerful and would wipe the floor with any of the other X-Men except Charles (and one other under certain circumstances but that's a story for another movie).
I've read that the series is popular amongst minorities of all persuasions too - anyone who has ever been 'othered' gets the analogy which makes sense when apparently the basis for Prof X and Magneto was MLK and Malcolm X, as a pacifist and militant who had somewhat of the same goal but different methodologies.
I'm basically in all the privileged categories, so it doesn't speak to me on that personal level, but it's my favourite superhero series because of the things you mention about the characters. Heroes and the villains all feel richer, and the morality of the stories is more interesting
At 20:45, when Cyclops asks if Logan would prefer yellow spandex, it refers to Woverine's costume from the comics/cartoons.
I can't wait to hear about Storm's superpower
pause
It's the weather.
Is genuinely the best thing I've heard this year.
The X-Men comics were originally created to be a comic version of the historical figures Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. Which is to say Professor X was designed to be MLK and Magneto for some reason was Malcolm X (I guess making the more militant figure "X" would have been too on the nose for Marvel in the 60s). The original team was composed of Cyclops/Scott Summers, Jean Grey/Marvel Girl, Iceman/Bobby Drake, Beast/Hank McCoy and Angel/Warren Worthington III. Magneto was also an ally of Professor Charles Xavier before becoming a rival and leading the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants (which was mostly made up of the evil crew in this). Cyclops was Professor X's first recruit and became the de jure field leader. He has to use a visor because of a childhood plane accident that damaged the part of his brain that controls the "laser eyes". His concussive blasts are strong enough to carve into a mountainside. Wolverine, due to his popularity, usually contests him for leadership of various X-Men teams. Oh also, funny you (unintentionally) ask if Cyclops actor was in superman...
Wolverine debuted in an Incredible Hulk issue in the 1970s before shifting to X-Men. In a contrast to Hugh Jackman who is quite tall, the comic Wolverine is notoriously short...being around 5'2-5'3". Additionally, Storm and Rogue were also later entries to the X-Men with Storm appearing in the 1970s and Rogue coming around in the 1980s after debuting in an Avengers story. Rogue is much stronger in the comics than presented in this movie. In addition to having absorption powers, she has the powers of flight, super strength, etc because she permanently absorbed the powers of Carol Danvers/Captain Marvel.
The girl that can walk through walls is a well-known mutant in the comics and has quite an unique name. Kitty Pryde is from Deerfield, Illinois which is a northern Chicagoland suburb. Senator Kelly plays a much bigger role as a villain in the comics.
This was Hugh's breakthrough role in Hollywood. Also since he replaced Dougray Scott so close to filming he had to have a fake beard applied to his face until he could grow it out. LOL
Director Bryan Singer was the director of the Usual Suspects. He has a checkered past along the lines of Kevin Spacey or a Harvey Weinstein. If you are familiar with what they have done, he's done some similar things himself.
X2 will be even better.
Scrolling just to find the real ones, thanks for sharing the storylines and wonderful illustrations from Mr. Stan Lee and Mr. Jack Kirby.
Not exactly. That was a later storyline. With a bit of a retcon.
When the X-Men came out, MLK and Malcolm X were not the symbols they are now, they were in the Civil Rights struggle, and would have been too controversial, too political, to be seen that way in that time. Magneto was a straight up villain, and leader of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.Chris Claremont was the one to bring out that symbolism, and make Magneto less 'evil' and much more sympathetic.
@@scottboswell6406 Except you are forgetting that Marvel has almost always been pretty progressive/forward thinking as a company mission since it revived its super hero comics division in the early 60s, so controversy/political doesn't necessarily fly (See: Black Panther). Also Malcolm X and MLK were absolutely major figures (and definitely symbols of their movement & factions) by summer of 1963.
I will grant that X and Magneto were not likely to have been carbon copies of the civil rights leaders (or at least they weren't created with those men in mind--then again Timely kind of neutered the scope of the comics at the time as a policy [that's not the same thing as being too controversial or political...I am suggesting they merely simplified, shortened and dumbed them down]) but they took up the two sides of the civil rights coin (from the side of the oppressed) and that mutant struggle were loosely based on the movement at the time (in fact Lee so much as said it was a good metaphor, suggesting it was his intent from the beginning), only to amplify it during Claremont's run.
Tl;dr while Xavier and Magneto may not have been strictly based on those Civil Rights leaders, their philosophies of the time and the two ideological factions they led were in mind when X-Men was created by Lee and Kirby.
@@Dularr I might have gotten the fact regarding the Civil Rights leaders incorrect, but Lee has outright claimed to the X-Men being a Civil Rights analogue, so it wasn't just a Claremont run.