Movie Review -- X-Men: Apocalypse

Today we have yet another Marvel movie, this one hailing from the X-Men universe. It's X-Men: Apocalypse. Is it worth your time? Let's find out.

The story takes place in 1983. Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) is currently running his school for mutants when a new student arrives: Scott Summers (Tye Sheridan). Scott has gained the ability to shoot devastating optic blasts from his eyes, and the school quickly sets about helping him to control it.

Meanwhile, the all-powerful first mutant Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac) awakens from his long slumber and begins recruiting followers to help him conquer the world. He starts with Ororo Munroe (Alexandra Shipp) before gaining Psylocke (Olivia Munn) and Angel (Ben Hardy). But he's still one horseman short, so he approaches Magneto (Michael Fassbender) who has recently suffered a terrible tragedy and has lost all hope. A grief-stricken Magneto agrees to join Apocalypse in his quest for world domination.

Elsewhere, Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) has gone to Xavier for help in finding Magneto. But their attempts backfire when Apocalypse learns of Xavier and his ability to control minds. Apocalypse then figures out what he needs to dominate mankind, and he wastes no time putting his sinister plan into action. The X-Men unite to save the world, but do they stand a chance against the seemingly unstoppable power of Apocalypse?

This might be the best X-Men movie ever. I've been waiting a long time to see Apocalypse on the big screen, and I was not disappointed. They didn't gimp his powers like they did with some characters *coughroguecough* and he's portrayed as genuinely intimidating. The film also has another great sequence with Quicksilver (Evan Peters) doing his super-speed thing while everything blows up around him. His character is used far better than the Avengers: Age of Ultron version.

The only thing that I don't like is the fact that Psylocke has no depth here. I was really looking forward to seeing her in action, and I feel Olivia Munn was a great choice to play her, but her character is pretty flat and her motivations remain ambiguous. Hopefully this will be resolved in future installments.

Other than that, X-Men: Apocalypse will satisfy comic book fans everywhere.