Yeah, I thought it was kind of annoying how, for the second movie in a row, Cyclops’ only function seems to be to serve as an uptight foil for Wolverine. I have to wonder if people unfamiliar with the comic book source material even realize that he’s supposed to be the leader of the X-Men, instead of just the guy who pushes Xavier around. He really has nothing to do in this movie except to provide some vaguely defined sexual tension, and then get captured. He’s becoming the Daphne of the X-Men.
On second viewing, I noticed a little detail in the movie which tends to confirm my theory that the filmmakers hate Cyclops for some reason. When Wolverine and the others escape the mansion in Cyclops’ car, Pyro reaches up to turn the CD player on and accidentally reveals the X-cellphone. But listen carefully: when the music comes on, is that or is that not a *Backstreet Boys *song playing at maximum volume? So, now the filmmakers have directly implied that Scott Summers, aka Cyclops, fearless leader of the X-Men, is really a huge fan of the Backstreet Boys and drives around town playing their CD’s really loud. What do these people have against Cyclops?! For God’s sake, leave the man some dignity.
Any predictions on how Cyclops will be further humiliated in X3? I’m guessing that Wolverine breaks his collection of Precious Moments figurines.
Oh, N’Sync; well that’s a completely different story. Of course, N’Sync is entirely appropriate music for a superhero to groove to. Thanks for the help, you guys; I stand corrected. Sometimes I just can’t distinguish between the Backstreet Boys and N’Sync, due to interference from my Y chromosome.
And I thought he hit a radio button, not the CD player. Of course, that means Cyclops has a radio preset for a station that plays N’Sync, but that’s marginally better.
I caught that bit with the N’Sync song (but thought it was Backstreet Boys, too) and I couldn’t tell if it was a dig at Cyclops, or genuine product placement, or both. In any case, I thought it was hilarious. I get the impression that the makers of the movie (screenwriters or whoever) were of the “Wolverine rules, Cyclops drools!” school of X-Men fandom. IANAXMF, but I can see where they’re coming from – Wolverine is just a much more bad-ass character than a WASP with laser eyes.
They’re really stuck with how to play Cyclops’ character. He’s not the cool one. He’s not really the leader (the distinction between his job and Professor X’s job is too subtle to get across in the short span of a movie). And he doesn’t have a particularly interesting background that they can exploit for movie drama. He just loves Jean and shoots laser beams. I think they took the right route for the movies – it’s got the love triangle thing going, it emphasizes 2 characters at once (Wolverine is the lone wolf, Cyclops is the authority-minded one), and it provides a lot of comic relief. You could say that Cyclops gets the raw end of the deal, but he’s the one who gets the girl in the end, so it evens out. (Well, until she kills herself.)
Of course it’s not bad, and I certainly didn’t mean to imply otherwise. There’s no need to be defensive; I’m sure no one here doubts that you prefer “rock and metal stations,” even though you were able to distinguish between two bubblegum boy-bands on the basis of a 1 1/2 second sound clip. But that fact says nothing at all about you as a person, and we’re not here to judge anyone.
I’m not defensive… the reason I knew it was N’Sync was because I recognized the song but forgot which one it was between then and now.
I have strange taste in music; I like Michelle Branch, the Monkees, No Doubt, and various other poppy bands in addition to Tool, RHCP, Bush, Clutch, and Metallica.
Hit enter too soon… I meant to add: being made fun of for the music I listen to is nothing new. Before becoming a fan of rock, my favorite artist was Garth Brooks. I listen to what I like regardless of genre.
http://www.jeangrey.isgreat.tv/jean1.html
Could someone tell me the names of the artists on this site? I’m the most interested in the pictures at the top, in “X-Men”, and “Phoenix” on page one and the ones in "Like a Phoenix " (with the red and yellow costume), the Phoenix head in the “X-Factor”, the one on the left in “The Return Home” and the one in “The Return of the Phoenix” that’s right under “return” on page two.
[sub]Rrrrgggggg… For the eighth time… rassin’ frassin’ blinkin’ hamsters keep eating my bandwidth…[/sub]
Okay, for Rilch:
The nod to Silence of the Lambs
The scene in Magneto’s cell, after Mystique has slipped the guard a Mickey Finn laced with iron, at the bar.
The prisoner, a bad guy that we the audience have come to like despite what an evil bastard we know him to be, dressed all in white, sits in his special, custom made cell. He is regarded by his jailers as a very dangerous man, and special, extreme cautions are taken when entering or leaving his cell, for any reason.
Bach’s Goldberg Variations is playing softly in the background, not as soundtrack, but as the music the prisoner is listening to at the time.
A guard enters, with the prisoner’s dinner. He places the tray on a table, while the prisoner sits a few feet away.
A moment later, the guard dies quite violently, and ugly looking to boot, as the prisoner makes his stylish escape.
Sound familiar?
It wasn’t quite “hit you over the head” blatent, but it was pretty obviously an homage to SotL, if you’re familiar with the movie.
And I thought the bullet was deformed when it was expelled from Logan’s head, too. Have to look for that next time around.
Full disclosure: I’d never seen or read anything about the X-Men before the first movie. All that I"ve read about them since then has been various plot synopses here or elsewhere.
Given that, I haven’t really had much impression of Cyclops. I don’t think he was so stiff as simply not there much. His moments with Wolverine were great (esp. in X1).
I also think they’d be brilliant to make X3 focus on Cyclops. Wolverine is cool and all, but Cyclops should be the emotional center, so we can get to know him and see his character react when the Phoenix Force makes its appearance.
It was also clear that Jean saw her abilities growing, and it seemed to be linked to every use of her telekinetic abilities. After she cracked the dam, I thought she simply realized that the next use would be catestrophic in some way. Hence she left the plane to avoid hurting everyone else. It seems in character to me.
Skeezix: Okay, thank you. I only saw SotL once. I think I sublimated the basic similarities between Magneto and Lecter, and didn’t examine them further.
To be honest, I never really put much thought into the similarities of the characters, m’self.
But when the guard set down the dinner tray, with the same exact passage from Goldberg Variations playing, I had a moment of deja vu, then realized where I’d seen all that before.
Just struck me as a nifty little easter egg thrown into the flick.
Okay, so in an interview with Famke Jansen (who’s my girlfriend, by the way), she said that there was a hint of her rising Phoenix powers at the end of X-Men 1. I just re-watched the whole end sequence of the first movie on DVD, and didn’t see a whiff of it.
I caught that bit with the N’Sync song (but thought it was Backstreet Boys, too) and I couldn’t tell if it was a dig at Cyclops, or genuine product placement, or both. In any case, I thought it was hilarious. I get the impression that the makers of the movie (screenwriters or whoever) were of the “Wolverine rules, Cyclops drools!” school of X-Men fandom. IANAXMF, but I can see where they’re coming from – Wolverine is just a much more bad-ass character than a WASP with laser eyes.