Back to the beginning of the X-Men and how they split to form the good and bad guys is what First Class is all about.
Film making 22/25
Video 23/25
Audio 23/25
Bonus Features 20/25
Total 88/100
Xavier played by James McAvoy leads the group of X-Men but he first needs to help them come to terms with what they are, starting with his assistant Raven. First we start with young Erik and his witnessing the death of his mother at the hands of Dr. Schmidt played by Kevin Bacon.
Dr. Schmidt brings Erik to his office after Erik displays his ability in the German camp when his parents are separated from Erik. Erik must perform a trick with his abilities, control of metal objects, or Dr. Schmidt will kill Erik’s mother.
When Dr. Schmidt does shoot her Erik retaliates and throws everything metal in the office and nearby lab around in a fit of anger. At the same time in England we see Raven sneak into the mansion where Charles Xavier displays to her his own talent of mind reading.
We skip a few years to find Xavier grown into a young man in college and CIA agent Moira MacTaggert needing the help of a specialist in mutations. We see how the group of mutants first gets together and then breaks up while fighting both Dr. Schmidt and the United States government.
X-Men: First Class is a great beginning to the franchise and really does a great job of using new actors to fill the roles of the well-established characters of the previous X-Men films. While the nitpicking comic book fans may find a few holes in the plot and story there is enough good action and X-Men character to make the film well worth a purchase.
X-Men: First Class has some outstanding video and audio as you would expect from a top ranking film and major release for Fox. Video is clear and crisp with really excellent shadows and darks along with overall great color and skin tone. Effects are highlighted by the great looking video and the tones of the film used do bring out the fact that several scenes are supposed to have been filmed in the 1940’s and 1960’s.
Audio is also excellent and as you would also expect almost perfect, great surround sound use and everything from the loud explosions to the clank an aluminum ladder makes in the sub sounds fantastic. Audio and video are about as you would expect, fantastic and bonus content is the only real disappointment here.
X marks the spot mode? This is a simple interactive, stop the film and pop-up the eight bonus features for your interruptive enjoyment. You can also view the bonus features from the menu and leave the interruptions for bathroom breaks and getting more refreshments.
Bonus content includes an interactive biography of mutants, an in depth look at the X-Men world and the full score of the film which is a nice addition. The dogfight addition is nice but the main content you are going to view is the hour plus documentary of the X-Men which is an overall making of feature with lots of content.
Bonus features are not as full as I would like but they did this probably to leave more content for future releases as they usually do for these top films. X-Men: First Class is a great film and even if the comic book fanatics don’t like the occasional break from the X-Men traditional tale there is enough background and main theme to interest everyone.
The X-Men Blu-ray edition I received also has the digital copy which allows you to install the film onto a mobile device or computer if you want. Simply insert the disc into your PC/Mac or for mobile devices like tablets and smartphones into a networked Blu-ray player to load the copy onto that device or a computer.
X-Men: First Class on Blu-ray is a definite must have for action fans and comic book lovers alike but is also a nice film to give some history or background story to the modern X-Men movies.