Hey, that was kinda fun!
Went with the spouse, who has no X-background (not that mine is so great either, I read the first Dark Phoenix saga and I've read Whedon's Astonishing and not much else), nor has he seen the first 2 X-Men movies and he was amused, although occasionally lost. Neither of us were looking for anything other than flash with our pitcher of movie-theater beer. All in all, it beat watching football or baseball....
I was surprised at the "X-Carnage" between the dead and depowered characters and didn't believe the first couple of "deaths" ("c'mon, where is he REALLY, he can't be dead....").
Some amusing lines, nothing particularly deep or philosophical, except the plot requiring Xavier to be a hypocrite not once but twice, which was wince-inducing. I understand why they felt the need to set upo so many subplots at the beginning but it felt astonishingly jump-heavy, to the point of distraction. Some of the scenes had me puzzling over why they bothered to put them in (although those scenes tended to be the ones with little to no special effects, so I guess the answer is obvious).
Kitty stole the show, definitely, though Juggernaut came close. Wolverine and Hank McCoy got some amusing lines, though the casting of Hank fell apart once they got to the action sequences. Madrox was also quite amusing. And wasn't Warren Worthington the III supposed to be cute? So NOT cute here, and the wings never looked particularly good, not like PinCushion Boy with the amusing chin tattoo (clearly he has an issue about not being able to grow facial hair...) and the spikey quills. Great special effects for Dark Phoenix, the neon-red hair and the inhuman-looking face.
Halle Berry can't act her way out of a wet loose straw bale, which is, not coincidentally, what her hair looked like. Although I think straw might have more texture and life.
Not bad, and there is no way I believe this is the end of the franchise, not with this kind of box office take.
