X-Men 2 (Blu-ray) (2003)

"...it may be the best super-hero movie yet made.  Jeffrey M. Anderson, San Francisco Examiner
"It's a relief to see a sequel that measures up to the original.  Kevin Carr, Film Threat
"A follow-up with as much artistic integrity, complexity, humor and well-designed action as the original.  Lawrence Toppman, Charlotte Observer
"The fantastic and at times deliciously nihilistic world of X2 is fully, believably three-dimensional.  Michael O'Sullivan, The Washington Post

Editor's Note X2: X-MEN UNITED, the remarkable sequel to X-MEN, picks up shortly after the first film's finale. At the White House, a would-be assassin--the acrobatic, teleporting blue mutant Nightcrawler (Alan Cumming)--menaces the president. Meanwhile, in the Canadian Rockies, Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) searches for answers to his mysterious past at the top-secret facility where he received his metallic skeleton and claws. Back at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, Jean Grey (Famke Janssen) and Storm (Halle Berry) instruct students Rogue (Anna Paquin), Iceman (Shawn Ashmore), and Pyro (Aaron Stanford), while Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and Cyclops (James Marsden) pay a visit to the imprisoned Magneto (Ian McKellen). However, Magneto has a secret weapon in the shape-shifting Mystique (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos). Soon allies and enemies alike will unite to defeat the hate-filled military scientist William Stryker (Brian Cox), who wants to rid the world of mutants. When Stryker launches a ruthless two-pronged attack that leaves the school under siege and Xavier and Cyclops captured, Wolverine and the remaining X-Men must spring to action to save their friends and prevent all-out genocide. Even better than its excellent precursor, X2 delves deeper into the X-Men mythology, introducing new characters and touching on essential storylines from the decades-long run of the Marvel comic book series. Providing larger action-packed set pieces and more advanced special effects, director Bryan Singer further develops the characters of Jean Grey, Storm, Nightcrawler, Rogue, Iceman, Pyro, and Mystique. Each member of the cast breathes vitality into their mutant characters with Wolverine, perfectly portrayed by Jackman, once again the wild heart at the center. A love letter to longtime fans of the comic and an amazingly entertaining movie for everyone else, X2: X-MEN UNITED is that rare breed of sequel that manages to improve on the original in every way.

	Famke Janssen
	Anna Paquin
	Ian McKellen
	Rebecca Romijn-Stamos
	Alan Cumming
	Michael Reid MacKay
	Halle Berry
	Hugh Jackman
	Daniel Cudmore
	James Marsden
	Bruce Davison
	Kelly Hu
	Shawn Ashmore
	Patrick Stewart
	Aaron Stanford
	Brian Cox
	Tom DeSanto - Executive Producer
	Bryan Singer - Executive Producer
	Stan Lee - Executive Producer
	Newton Thomas Sigel - Director of Photography
	Daniel Harris - Screenwriter
	Lauren Shuler Donner - Producer
	Ralph Winter - Producer
	John Ottman - Composer
	Zak Penn - Story
	David Hayter - Story
	Bryan Singer - Story
	Avi Arad - Executive Producer
	Michael Dougherty - Screenwriter
	Bryan Singer - Director

New York Times
"...A symphony of crescendos and pauses, orchestrated toward a big seat-rattling climax, during which an enormous dam breaks, veins bulge on both villainous and heroic brows, and a lot of computer-generated images pop, wiggle and shimmy to the throb and roar of John Ottman's music..." 05/02/2003 p.E1

USA Today
"...The cast is full of actors who are fun to watch..." 05/02/2003 p.11D

Chicago Sun-Times
"...It lives in the present, providing one amazing spectacle after another..." 05/02/2003 p.29

Rolling Stone
"...Hugh Jackman is again in fierce, lupine form as Wolverine..." 05/29/2003 p.70

Sight and Sound
...No other film-maker has better dramatised superpowers in action and yet remembered the human cost of all the trickery. X2 is full of double-edged power fantasies that manage a frisson of awe amid the excitement..." 06/01/2003 p.59-60

Los Angeles Times
"...X2 is 2 good to be 4-gotten. Brisk and involving with a streamlined forward propulsion....One of the unexpected aspects of X2 is the way its concerns seem to be uncannily relevant today..." 05/02/2003 p.C1

Movieline's Hollywood Life
"...It's shiny pop art with an arch, cultured heart underneath..." 11/01/2003 p.120

Total Film
"...It's in the quieter, more dramatic moments that the sequel really gets under the skin..." 12/01/2003 p.110

Uncut
"Full of incident..." 12/01/2003 p.160

Chicago Sun-Times 8 of 10
"X2: X-Men United" is the kind of movie you enjoy for its moments, even though they never add up. Made for (and possibly by) those with short attention spans, it lives in the present, providing one amazing spectacle after another, and not even trying to develop a story arc. Having trained on the original "X-Men" (2000), i tried to experience the film entirely in the present, and the fact is, i had a good time...Like the comic books that inspired it, "X2" begins with the premise that mutant heroes with specialized superpowers exist among us. Name the heroes, assign the powers, and you're ready for perfunctory dialogue leading up to a big two-page spread in which sleek and muscular beings hurtle through dramatic showdowns...Since the earliest days of "Spider-Man," Marvel heroes have had personal problems to deal with, and there's a classic Stan Lee moment here in the scene where Iceman breaks the dvds to his parents that he is a mutant. The movie treats the dialogue as a coming out scene, half-seriously, as if providing inspiration for real-life parents and their children with secrets...There's a romance in the movie between Rogue and Iceman, but it doesn't exploit the possibilities of love between mutants with incompatible powers. How inconvenient if during sex your partner was accidentally teleported, frozen, slashed, etc. Does Cyclops wear his dark glasses to bed? "X2: X-Men United" lacks a beginning, a middle and an end, and exists more as a self-redvding loop. In that it is faithful to comic books themselves, which month after month and year after year seem frozen in the same fictional universe. Yes, there are comics in which the characters age and their worlds change, but the X-Men seem likely to continue forever, demonstrating their superpowers in one showcase scene after another. Perhaps in the next generation a mutant will appear named Scribbler, who can write a better screenplay for them. - Roger Ebert