X3: Retold

Hey Kids,

So the Wolverine movie opens tomorrow and its release has generated a lot of talk about the previous X-Men movies… mostly unfond memories of X-Men: The Last Stand, the third and final “film”.

Now I was never really a fan of the previous X-Men films — They were OK. They weren’t horrible, they just didn’t really do anything for me — but I absolutely HATED The Last Stand. I hated it so much I had to go home and write a treatment for how the movie should have been.

I mentioned this to my friend Judah Thor and he was pretty interested in seeing how I would have worked the story. Instead of emailing it to him, I thought I’d post it here for all to see. So, if you’ve already read this three years ago when I originally wrote it or actually liked the film — or, at least, hated my treatment — blame Judah.

Hope this would have turned out better that the actual movie.
Frank Cvetkovic

If I wrote the X3 script…

So, I saw the latest X-Men movie a week or two ago and, like a lot of people, I did some bitching afterwards. I’m not a huge X-Men fan, but I know the characters and I know how they should be written. It wasn’t until a few days ago that I decided to stop complaining about it and write a few words on what should have happened and where Kinberg and Penn went wrong with their screenplay. I don’t have a lot of time here, so forgive me if I am brief.

First of all, I liked the beginning of the film. They at least they got that right. I like Xavier and Magneto going to visit the Grey Family and the talk they had with Jean. After that, they pretty much fucked almost everything else up.

Cyclops should NOT have died OFF SCREEN in the first ten minutes of the movie. This should have been his movie, but if Marsden didn’t want to have too much involvement with the film (because he wanted to take on a role in the upcoming Superman film, from what I heard), they could easily have given him a smaller part for most of the movie instead of just senselessly killing him off. Let’s say, he can’t handle Jean’s death (at the end of X2) so he fuck’s off for most of the movie to go bowling or something. I don’t care. He just has to live.

The movie goes on as normal from there. There is the threat of the mutant “cure”. Jean is resurrected. Magneto springs Mystique from her holding cell, but does not go camping out in the woods. He’s the Master of frggin’ Magnetism, for Christ’s sake! Why would he hide out where there is NO METAL? He should be hiding out in fucking Detroit, for fuck’s sake!

If Kinberg and Penn where on the ball while writing their little screenplay, they would have had Magneto take over a little country called Genosha, where he would have hidden out until his moment to strike the facility holding the mutant “cure”. The X-Men would have followed him there. Battle ensues. Genosha is destroyed, furthering the hate and fear of mutants in the public eye.

In short, the Master of Magnetism does NOT go camping.

MAGNETO: Soon, we shall strike! We shall show these homosapiens that we are homosuperior and we are not to be fucked with!
*looks down*

MAGNETO: Aw, my weenie fell in the fire again! It’s all ashy now…

Anyway.

So, finally, the X-Men must stop Magneto. They have their big battle, like at the end of the flick, expect for a few minor details. It comes down to the main players: Magneto, Phoenix, Wolverine, Cyclops, and Xavier (who did not die a pussy death).

Wolverine and Cyclops take on Phoenix, but they are getting nowhere. Xavier and Magneto shout battle instructions to their teams, until Magneto is taken out by the “cure” (they got that right, at least). Xavier telepathically tells Wolverine that there is no humane way to stop Jean and the he has to kill her. Wolverine stabs Jean and she dies. Cyclops flips out. Xavier explains himself, but Cyclops is still angered. He attacks Wolverine for killing the love of his life.

They exchange blows in a short fist fight before Wolverine pops his claws. This gives Cyclops an excuse to take off his glasses and blast Wolverine into the pavement relentlessly. After a few moments of fighting, Cyclops stops and exits distraught. Wolverine gets back up, growing back whichever parts of himself that need to be grown back. He says to Xavier “I could have taken him, Chuck. You know I could have. But the kid just lost the love of his life. He needed to get rid of some aggression. Better he take it out on me instead of someone who couldn’t grow back.”

Wolverine tells Xavier that this was his last mission. He loved Jean and he couldn’t stay on the team after having killed her. He quits and goes off on his own, which easily sets up the premise for the Wolverine movie that is already being planned.

My two cents,

-Boom Boom Storm Cloud