X-Men First Class, Why I am Leary



Fake First Class

 No, it isn't because the last two installments of the X-universe have been sub par and the first two only really par, trying to force more movie into the movie than they could possibly hold.  No, I am leary because the story isn't cannon.  I have heard the arguement that comics discard cannon at will and that no one really knows what is cannon anymore.  While that is somewhat true it is also a lie. 

Origin stories are generally well established and not ignored or rewritten (unless there Crisis is in the title somewhere).  People who read comics that tell an alternate universe version or retelling of a story, usually understand what is being undone and sometimes they even get why.  Movie audiences who, by the number of comics marvel sells every month, are not buying comics, may not know the "real" or "going" history of the characters.  The movie then becomes the established origin and the comics, in order to sell to the newly interested movie goers, have to change so that the new readers won't get confused.  We saw it when the original X-Men came out and all of a sudden Wolverine's claws started popping out at a different spot and all the costumes got changed (that happened to be one of the times that I threw down comics vowing never to read them again).

real first class

The Wolverine movie was an especially hard slap in the face.  Marvel had done the Wolverine Origin specifically so it wouldn't be done in movie form first.  The Origins story was excellent and lead into a history of both Wolverine and Sabretooth.  Then the Wolverine movie comes out and covers this awesome work, poorly, with a 5 minute montage.  The name of the movie by the way was X-Men Origins: Wolverine.  It could have been excused if the movie would have just been the origin of how he joined the X-Men, but that was done in the first movie and this was just a vehicle to introduce about a million additional mutants.

Let me put it to you this way.  Say they remade Superman (I know, a stretch).  In this remake they decided that Lex Luthor was also from Krypton and that no one knew Lana Lang so they made Lois his high school sweet heart.   It completely changes the story. 

Well, X-Men: First Class doesn't involve the first class as was written.  Although 20 some odd years younger than Superman, the X-Men origin is firmly grounded in the psyche of the comic reader.  Why do screen writers think that they need to rewrite this.  If you are going to rewrite the origin, why would you do it with seemingly random characters from all over the X-Men continuity.  Why not just make up mutants specifically for the movie.  Why not tell the classic stories in a way that does them honor. 

Yes, I am sceptical of first class.  It is getting positive reviews, but I don't know that these reviewers read comics.  It being a good movie is completely different than it being a good comic book movie based on a franchise that I grew up with and love.  I am not asking for a recreation of the source material, I only want it shown respect.  Stop irresponsibly milking my youth for money.