THE NEW MUTANTS: A LATE REVIEW

 

When theaters were announcing a gradual re-opening here in Kenya, I was elated to jump at the first opportunity to sit in a dark room and be entertained. So, on a Saturday morning, I woke up early and rushed to another part of town, and found that only The New Mutants was showing. No worries, I was looking forward to it anyway; turns out I was the only one in the theater that morning;

Enough of the backstory, now to the meat on the bone.

Premise

The New Mutants is a story of a young lady, Dani Moonstar, who finds herself in a facility with other mutants that’s intended to help them get better, but in reality is a prison meant to keep them there under the watchful eye of Dr. Reyes, who has her own agenda for them.

Likes

I’ve always loved the tone of the X-men films, and this one is no different. It didn’t feel like a superhero movie, but rather a mystery-type thing.(Not a horror, like we were promised)

I liked the connection to Logan, where the Essex facility was the one pulling the strings behind Reyes, determining who lives and who dies. Though I have some questions about this, which I’ll ask in a later part of this article.

The power display was a visual treat, though it was too short for its own good. Having watched X-Men Evolution, it was nice to see other mutants there as opposed to the usual suspects.

My best character in this movie was Sam Guthrie. For whatever reason, I found myself rooting for him more than any other person. His backstory was heartbreaking, and having to carry that with you for the rest of your life isn’t something happy in particular. His bromance with Berto was a great part of the film for me, and it actually made me warm up to Berto in a way.

Another person I liked was Rahne. I liked how friendly she was in general, particularly to Dani, to a point where she convinces her not to commit suicide (or whatever she was planning to do on that tower). Her backstory was also quite interesting; having people think you’re some kind of demon for mutation fits well in the X-men canon of being despised for not being normal.

 

I almost forgot this: the fight scenes. Ilyana’s fight with the Demon Bear in particular was really cool to watch. Having go back and forth in Limbo to the real world gave me a sense of how powerful she was, and I enjoyed the fleeting moment of CGI coolness.

Dislikes

The main issue I had in this film was how underutilized all the mutants were. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that Dr. Reyes was a mutant herself, and as I mentioned earlier, the power display, albeit short, was nice to see. I really wished they would have made each of them do more.

The tone of this film. We were promised for months on end about a super-horror(patented phrase by me). I’m an avid fan of horror in any form, and I was quit looking forward to be scared half to death in a dark theater. Though there were some moments here and there, I kept wondering: that’s it?

Ilyana Rasputin was unnecessarily bitchy in this movie. I get that she thought she was the most powerful mutant there, but being unkind to Moonstar just for the sake of it wasn’t something I liked. The racist undertones felt kind of forced on as well. I felt as though there was more to her and I wished they had brought out that more than just giving her the trademark ‘mean girl of the group vibe.

Sunspot. Days of Future Past gave us a Sunspot who could fly and shoot fire from his hands and stuff, and while I do understand that this one had no control over his powers, towards the end I was almost an annoying heckler. I kept saying “For goodness sake, man! Do something! Come on!”. And when he did step up, it was to throw a bench? He had used his powers earlier with those monster faced things, why didn’t he do it then?

That ending was anticlimactic as hell. They’ve all come together to fight, trying to wake Dani up to help, and when she does, she pets the bear? That’s it? After all that, petting it and saying stuff to make it disappear?

Questions

Now to what was baffled me in this movie:

1.     In Logan(2017), Essex sent a contingent of soldiers after ONE mutant, i.e Laura. Why couldn’t they put in more resources to keep five of them contained easily, or at the very least to their own facility, where I’m certain they’re better equipped at dealing with mutants?

2.     What exactly is the extent of Dani’s powers? I understood that she brings YOUR worst nightmare to life, so how is it that Berto was the only one who could see a version of Ilyana, yet everyone could not only see Ilyana’s and Dani’s nightmare, but lived through it? Can she manifest it in the real world for all to witness? Comic fans, help me out here.

3.     When Dr Reyes died, the boundary she placed around the facility disappeared. Now, if Ilyana was able to spike her drink, why couldn’t any of the very, VERY powerful mutants just take her out of the question from the word go?

 

Overall

The film has a lot of promise. It almost scratched the surface of it with the more somber tone, though I do hope that there is a sequel. There’s a lot of potential in it, though not fully realized, and a good distraction from the real world (For me.)

All images used are credited to their respectful owners.