The Fox ‘X-Men’ franchise is now over. And thank the lord! No, I don’t say that as someone who hates superhero movies and wishes they’d all go away. The opposite, actually. I’m a huge superhero fan and adore many of the ‘X-Men’ films, but if “The New Mutants” (and last year’s “Dark Phoenix”) is the direction the studio was going, consider a Marvel Studios reboot of the franchise a mercy killing. All that to say, reviews of “The New Mutants” are trickling out (Disney didn’t offer private critics screenings, so those of us that wanted to see the film had to watch it along with everyone else in a “safe” theater) and they’re not good.
Before we hop into what other outlets are saying, I have to say that I was one of the unlucky people that went out to watch the film last night at a theater (no concessions, N95 mask, and no one around me for 10 feet in any direction), and I shocked myself when I was two-thirds of the way through the film thinking, “Am I watching the very worst ‘X-Men’ film in the entire 20-year franchise?” The answer as I quickly fled the theater (partially for fear of the pandemic and partially because I was embarrassed for paying money to see Josh Boone’s film) was a resounding “YES!” It’s that bad.
While a better writer than me will have our official Playlist review of the film forthcoming, I can sum up my thoughts by saying there are so many problems with “The New Mutants” that it’s difficult to really pinpoint exactly what went wrong (though the extensive behind-the-scenes drama didn’t help): from the performances from the cast (most are wooden and three actors have laughably bad accents) to the pacing (who knew you could make a film without a second act?) to the fact that this hybrid “John Huges meets horror” tone was neither well-written enough to be a John Hughes film nor scary (at all) enough to be considered even a bad Blumhouse knockoff. Overall, the film just lacks heart. It’s as if Josh Boone had all these grand ideas for a version of “The Breakfast Club” featuring misfit mutants in a hospital of horrors but got bored halfway through writing the script. There are all these decent enough ideas, but the execution is just terrible.
Honestly, it’s the worst ‘X-Men’ movie yet to be released. And yes, I’m including “X-Men Origins: Wolverine.” (At least that film had a clear plot, a good actor at the center, and the feeling that everyone involved was trying.)
But if you don’t want to believe me (or feel that maybe I’m being a bit harsh), here’s what some other folks thought:
At Forbes, Scott Mendelson called the film “a monotonous, redundant and irrelevant fantasy flick that fails to commit to being a teen melodrama, a YA fantasy or a horror movie, instead offering half-assed components of all three.”
Jordan Mintzer at THR offered up this caveat when offering the littlest bit of positivity, “If you’ve never seen a teen movie, a superhero movie, an asylum-set psychological thriller, ‘Nightmare on Elm Street’ or a single episode of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer,’ then perhaps ‘The New Mutants’ will be something of an eye-opening experience.”
Peter Debruge at Variety was a bit more kind and said, “What it doesn’t achieve is a memorable personality of its own. The project’s so committed to being a 1980s-style teen- and horror-movie homage that it never distinguishes itself.”
Perhaps Jason Gorber’s review at /Film is the best example of putting a positive spin on a bad movie. He said, “In a world where normal seems very abnormal indeed, to experience something middling feels surprisingly refreshing, and while its road to the screen has been fraught, the end result is a decent, entertaining film that is worth seeking out when time and circumstances allow.”
Overall, the film (as of this writing) sits at 24% on Rotten Tomatoes. Though, again, this is based on a very small number of entries. But if you’re still holding out hope that Boone and the ‘X-Men’ franchise has one last gasp left in it with “The New Mutants,” definitely take these reviews into consideration and temper those expectations. Even if you’re not as down on the film as I am, you probably won’t leave the theater feeling good about risking your health for this subpar feature.