It be rantin' time

[croik]

inception_bang is having a round 2!! I'm really excited since I missed round 1 and I have a TON of ideas for longfic. Ideas that someone will want to do with me, however... I've narrowed it down to three choices, two of which I've already talked about in here, one that would be *shock!* gen. HEISTFIC. Inception needs more Bone gen hesitfic, right!? Plenty of time before sign-ups start so I'll make up my mind before then, I'm sure. I'M SURE.

And then there's xmenbigbang, which I just impulse-signed-up for, despite having said that I wasn't going to write any more X-men. I feel a little awkward about it because it's not for sheer love of the source material that I'm doing it. IN FACT IT IS THE OPPOSITE AND I CAN'T HOLD IT IN ANYMORE, IT'S TIME FOR A CROIK!RANT!!!!

IT'S UNPOPULAR OPINION TIME, FOLKS:

I thought First Class was pretty meh :\

I mean yeah, it was flashy and actiony and I enjoyed everything that Charles had anything to do with, but there were just so many things that didn't jive with me. And it is driving me NUTS that whenever I try to find someone who feels the same way, all I can find are comic fans raging over the canon changes. Canon changes don't bother me. Sebastian Shaw bothers me.

Because for me the movie might as well have ended with "Radiation gave birth to mutants. What will kill the humans, will only make us stronger," or however it was he said it. Because seriously...wut??

Shaw was a grown man during WWII, which means that he would have been born in the early 1900s at the latest, when nuclear technology was still very new. I guess he could have been the son of an affected researcher but he is not the first mutant by far (his friend Azazel claims to be thousands of years old I think? Even if you don't consider that canon to the movie there's Wolverine to consider) so what makes him think that radiation, specifically the kind of radiation given off by a modern nuclear bomb (that wouldn't have existed when he was born) had anything to do with his powers manifesting the way they did? Or that all--or even a decent portion--of mutants would be immune to its poisonous effects? Immunity to radiation is not a stock mutant ability, is it?

Okay Magneto tried it in the original X-Men but that machine was created specifically to create the kind of radiation that would trigger an x gene type mutation, and it still didn't work.

But even assuming that nuke radiation is cool with mutants, what about nuclear winter!? USA and Russia firing nukes off could change earth's climate for decades or longer. That's not just humans you're killing off, but the cows you get your steaks from, the grapes you stomp into wine, the palm leaves Emma fans you with! Where is the caviar going to come from, the leather for Azazel's hidden thigh highs!? I'm sorry Shaw but you haven't thought this through AT ALL. It's literally the dumbest plan you could have, to rule a pile of radioactive rubble. I don't care how awesome your four-handed-power-stealing CGI looked, it's nonsensical.

I know, comic book movie, the villain motivation...doesn't have to make sense...?? Aughhgnbhble.

It doesn't help that the movie also survives by way of "the government is always big and dumb." Shaw attacks a CIA base, leaving it a pile of rubble (Shaw/Rubble OTP), killing over a dozen trained and armed men, all to get to Team Mutant, and as soon as the dust clears... the CIA allows Charles and the gang to disappear without asking where they're going or what they'll be doing?? No one checks in on their progress, no one takes notes on what they're capable of, when the enemy is exploding buildings and teleporting through security!? They obviously sanctioned Moira's ragtag team insomuch as they're able to fly the CIA's super jet into a potential war zone, but the CIA knows and cares nothing about ANYTHING Charles & Co are doing while they're off grid. Does that make any sense??

This is, of course, so that when Erik lifts a sub out of the ocean everyone can act shocked. So that when the X-men do everything the CIA asked them to do, the government is so in the dark that they're able to make a panicked "BOMB THEM" decision. Which, seriously, why would the US give Russia permission to shoot MISSILES of ANY kind in the direction of the US after what just happened? I know it's a "we can team up against a common enemy" thing but to go from possible nuclear war between two countries to "these mutants who are on our side are too powerful to let live!" within a matter of minutes or even an hour is just so...ugh. And yeah not everyone knew about the X-men but clearly Havok and Beast were in uniform when they crashed onto the US ship. Did no one think to maybe put an American flag on that sucker?

And not a lick of that would have mattered if Charles had just done the smart thing and mind controlled the captain of the ship, like he did only a few minutes earlier.

Followed by the silliest part of all, Charles wipes Moira's memory of where they're hiding: the giant mansion in his family's name--the giant mansion which will eventually be a school, bearing his name. Because apparently no one at the CIA asked where they were going ahead of time, and Charles will never pay property tax on that mansion again, and Google doesn't exist yet.

And okay yeah, I had to overlook a lot of plot holes to enjoy Inception, but I could do that because the concept was original and the characters were fun and full of potential. But First Class is full of place-holder mutants with only semi-interesting powers, and... super unpopular opinion time... I thought Fassbender overacted Magneto to death. I'm glad they were able to touch some manner of vulnerability with him but his faces, his seething vengeance, it was just so predictable and nyeh. I felt like we saw a side of Charles we hadn't before, and it was quirky and dickish and interesting, but the side we saw of Magneto didn't interest me in the slightest. Sorry fandom :(

That's not even covering the pickier complaints I had, like Magneto and Mystique leaving Charles on the beach when he's just been shot and could easily have died right there, or the misogyny that fandom has already horse-beat, or the ham-fisted winks at the queer and African American communities without allowing either into the final Hero Team makeup, or the horrible makeup on Beast, or the continuity errors between it and the other movies...

And holy shit time to stop before I forget I've already signed up to bigbang. 8U

Of course, it was after coming to terms with all that when I was struck by inspiration at work, and so now I'm planning to write a crossover, which is another thing I'm normally not keen on. Fuck my brain. It's the sort of thing people will look at and go, "Wait, what?" and then their friend who's already sped through the fic will go, "Don't worry, Charles doesn't get eaten," which in turn may cause anyone reading this to go, "Wait, what?" We just time traveled. Did you see it?

In other news I'm writing for ae_angst and fighting the urge to post in 500 word increments, because that would be cheap of me, but that's how the game goes, isn't it??

And lastly, an image I did for tumblr: