X-Men: Days of Future Past

A film that joins two separate casts. The future is finished. Machines called Sentinels have hunted mutants and anyone who helped them; a small group is left, hiding in camps. A plan is made. One person's consciousness will be sent back to prevent the assassination that led to the machines being built. Only one person can survive that journey. Logan is sent to 1973. From there the film takes place in the 1970s. Charles is on medication and has shut off his ability, Erik is in prison, and Raven is planning an assassination. From there the job becomes assembling a team. A prison break, a peace conference and a stadium. What the narrative is interested in is not heroism but the consequence of one decision: the film says a choice made in a moment determined forty years, and tries to take that moment back. The fast rescue in the kitchen is the best constructed section and uses one idea all the way through. The scene in which Charles speaks to his own future is the emotional centre. The film is also a correction. What happened in some earlier films of the series is voided by this narrative, and that is openly intended. A well-known comic story from the series was used as the source. Hugh Jackman, James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, Peter Dinklage and Evan Peters are in the cast. Bryan Singer directed. Who it is for: anyone following the series. Who it is not for: anyone starting here; the narrative assumes two separate film series and its time rules are tangled.