X-Men: Dark Phoenix [Blu-ray review]

X-Men: Dark Phoenix proves that you can stray too far away from the source material.

When I see people wax on about how much they like these movies, I’m reminded of something that I learned from the MCU. A lot of fans are just looking for a Sci-Fi/Action movie. Anything have to do with character work or decades of history is just extra. They’d watch a movie about Magnet Man and Baldy Psychic if you could work in some CG and a Post Malone song.

Sophie Turner tries very hard with one of the key X-Men. Her Jean Grey always feels like a kid desperately fighting to be an adult. If you’ve hung with the X-Men at any point in the last decade, you’ve seen 90% of this movie. I can’t control my powers, I accidentally hurt somebody, I flee to the bad guys, now everyone has to work together to redeem me. But, this movie had forced reshoots.

So, you get all of that old hat plus a bizarre alien plot that never manages to be anything. Much like the Jim Shooter ordered changes to the original story, the entire third act feels like it was edited and controlled to the point of being unpleasant to everyone. What sucks is that we’re now going to get a slightly superior New Mutants film relegated to the dustbin of pop culture history. My final take: how do you botch the Dark Phoenix Saga?

The Blu-ray is quite impressive. I didn’t have a chance to see the 4K presentation, but this release packs it all together. You get a 2.39:1 1080p transfer and DTS-HD 7.1 master audio track that makes the film shine. Plus, you get all of these special features. Pick it up if you’re an overzealous X-fan.

X-Men: Dark Phoenix flies to Blu-ray on September 17th, 2019