The Stream: The movie is a bit predictable, lacks originality and the end leaves you a little empty.

The Big Screen: The movie looks great on the big screen particularly in action sequences.

The Final Bill: Being the end of an era, X-Men fans should catch it in the theaters and general watchers should watch the other movies first and then consider a matinee, if you have free time.

No after credit scene. Parents be warned that unlike the other 3 movies PG-13 is accurate with some language and violence towards the end.

-S2S

Notable Movie Trailers: Spiderman: Homecoming, Gemini Man, Hobbs and Shaw, Joker, Ad Astra, and Stuber

Stream to Big Screen is back at it again. This week we will be reviewing the long awaited, X-Men: Dark Phoenix. The fourth, and final, movie of this recent X-Men reboot. A movie marking a last for 21st Century Fox films with the X-Men due to the Disney/Marvel acquisition. The third movie of the series had mixed reviews but ultimately was very entertaining. Let’s see if Dark Phoenix arose from the ashes for one last flight.

Let’s dive deep into the ashes. I wouldn’t say that there are elements of this movie that are bad, just ones that were lacking. The movie is missing some minor detail that would lead you to say, “Oh, that right there was on point.” Even in the ending, the viewer just feels like the movie was good, but something was missing. I’m not sure what 21st Century Fox and director, Simon Kinberg, were thinking when they looked at the product as a whole. Looking back on it, the movie made you feel like when you pick up your cup expecting orange juice, but actually you picked up the wrong cup and drank apple juice. It’s still healthy for you and it quenched your thirst to a degree, but it wasn’t the taste you expected.

On top of that, this movie is too eerily similar to X-Men: The Last Stand. Too many elements of the movie made me feel as if I was watching a reboot of Last Stand rather than it’s own independent movie. No seriously, the plot was similar, except the stupid cure aspect. With that said, Dark Phoenix is actually a better version of Last Stand. This may be the reason why the movie feels like it’s lacking originality, but ultimately the movie is just too predictable on its own. This may also be because of the movie trailer. The movie trailer was very good, but also gives away too much. The movie did hide a couple secrets from the viewers, which were worth it, but again execution was lacking. Finally, the director let the movie live in flashbacks too much. An issue not too horrible, but we got the point of the flashbacks the first time we saw them. The 5th time was understood, but just too much.

Now, the part that you’ve been waiting for. This movie looks like they spent a $200 million budget. The scenes seem to literally jump off the screen at times. The scene that was in space look great and the action scenes are very clear and well cgi-ed, except for some running and flying. Unlike the previous installments, the movie’s action towards the end is closer to a John Wick film than X-Men. Quite welcomed, even though it’s short lived.

The storyline, while predictable, still was executed well, except the ending of the franchise. We take a ride with the X-Men every step of the way. Just like the movie jumps off the screen, so do the emotions we feel. Sansa, while not a great actress, displays a nice depiction of a person drinking in /falling prey to power, yet keeping true to who we’ve known her character to be. James McAvoy, again does a good job, but the movie missed an opportunity to truly use Michael Fassbender. Clearly, the producers were featuring the Queen of the North, but they could have still taken advantage of the star talent in the cast. Lastly, the movie has a little comedy in it, compared to the previous installments, but the few chuckles were good.

Long story short, X-Men: Dark Phoenix is a solid movie, but is just lacking a little in execution that would make you say it was a great movie. For fans of the series, you should see this through to the end and the action scenes will make it worth a matinee price. For everyone else, go check out the previous installments first, and then consider seeing the movie during an early matinee.