Better late than never
The New Mutants finally hits big screen following two years of curious setbacks
How long has the world been waiting for The New Mutants? Well, on its original release date in April of 2018, A Quiet Place was leading the Canadian box office, along with Ready Player One and Black Panther. But Mutants got bumped to avoid opening too close to Deadpool 2; by the time its second release date came around, a year later, we were watching Alita: Battle Angel and How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World.
That August, when it got bumped again, Hobbs and Shaw and The Lion King were lighting up screens.
The following April, COVID -19 was in the news, pushing the release yet again. Whatever else they may be, these Mutants ain’t new any more.
It’s doubtful any movie could live up to more than two years of pent-up anticipation, and this movie confirms that doubt. It’s a simple story, passably directed by Josh Boone (The Fault in Our Stars) and adequately acted, but that’s about it. Technically an
X-men movie and nominally a Marvel co-production, it takes place entirely within a sealed-off rural hospital, run by a single staff member (Alice Braga) and housing a mere five teenage mutant patients, none of them ninjas or turtles. Braga’s character, Dr. Reyes, says they’ve been incarcerated to keep them from harming themselves and others with their nascent powers, but I think they’re undergoing AART, or Atrocious Accent Reversion Therapy. How else to explain the fact that Illyana Rasputin (Anya Taylor-joy) is rocking a ra-ra-rasputin Russian voice? Or that Charlie Heaton’s Kentucky drawl occasionally wanders as far south as Nashville, and up into Ohio? Meanwhile, Henry Zaga, actually born in Brazil and playing a Brazilian, somehow sounds Californian.
The two most interesting characters are also those with the best voices. Games of Thrones’ Maisie Williams, born in England and sounding believably Irish, plays Rahne, whose mutant power is — well, to be honest the special effects weren’t clear enough to make it out. And Blu Hunt stars as Danielle Moonstar, an Indigenous woman and the newest addition to the hospital, after a tornado in the opening scene wipes out her reservation. She alone gets to sound like herself.
We’re meant to be invested in the twin mysteries of (A) what is Dani’s secret power and (B) is Dr. Reyes a good doctor or an evil one? If you need more, there’s also the question of which characters will fall in love.
And with the last-act reveal of these pressing quandaries, the 20-year, 20th Century Fox X-men saga comes to a close. It started with a bang in 2000 — X-men was No. 6 at the box office that year — and chugged along merrily enough, even if every second movie seemed to be a Wolverine origin story.