Hi guys and welcome to my latest 2020 movie review! This time I will be talking about a movie that has had quite the journey to being released, Fox’s X-Men spin off, The New Mutants. For those who may not know, to put things briefly this film was originally slated for an April 2018 release with the first trailer being released in late 2017, yet due to proposed re shoots to make the movie scarier it got delayed to 2019. Alas those re shoots never happened and then thanks to the Disney acquisition of Fox, the project got pushed back again to 2020 and then the world shut down due to the pandemic and it was indefinitely delayed. Not wanting to hold onto the film any longer, Disney then dumped the film right when theaters were re opening and it understandably didn’t make much noise at the box office while also not being very well received. It became the punch line of many jokes thanks to its many delays and now that I’ve seen the movie do I think it’s as bad as one would assume based off of the behind the scenes troubles? Well not quite, but it still sadly failed to leave much of an impact on me and is among my least favorites of the X-Men series. That being said let’s dive straight right into this alleged horror story set in the world of mutants.
We are immediately introduced to one Danielle “Dani” Moonstar, a young girl who ends up being the sole survivor of what she believes to be a tornado storm that destroyed her reservation killing her father in the process. She then wakes up laying on a bed in a mysterious location where someone named Dr. Reyes tells her that she was brought here because she has special abilities that need to be controlled before she can go back to the outside world. Dani is not alone in this facility as Dr. Reyes introduces her to four other teenagers, Sam, Illyana, Bobby, and Rahne, each of whom are there due to experiencing a horrible tragedy and each have a special ability. Despite wanting to leave Dani has no choice but to remain with the other teens some of whom are nicer to her than others. But strange things occur as everyone starts having these visions/nightmares of their past that come to life and they soon come to realize that there’s more going on than meets the eye in this hospital.
At it’s core the movie is attempting to be teenage drama in the style of The Breakfast Club and a horror movie that just so happens to have super powered mutants at the center of it. I think this a really neat idea in concept as it has a lot of potential to stand out from the slew comic book movies being released and tell a compelling story with a lot of strong character work while also having effective scare to boot and admittedly there are hints of that potential in this movie. It is mostly stands on it’s own, with only a couple of references to the X-Men and I appreciated the more character focused angle to it as there are some effective moments involving our teenage heroes interacting with one another and what it’s trying to say regarding the hardships, and trauma our main leads are going through and whether or not things well get better for them is admirable and kept me somewhat interested in seeing what would happen. That being said it doesn’t really explore these themes and ideas too deeply, opting for a more surface level approach and it ends up being mostly unengaging throughout it’s runtime. Most of the movie just consists of these scary visions taking place with a couple of character moments throughout and a lot of exposition which just gets repetitive after a while. Biggest issue that hurts the movie though is that for a horror movie I didn’t really find it that scary at all as it mostly just relies on jump scares that didn’t do anything for me and it just failed to deliver on it’s premise for the most part. While not a total trainwreck per se as there’s nothing unbearable or annoying about it and it doesn’t overstay it’s welcome thanks to it’s 94 minute runtime (though one could argue it could have used that time better), I just couldn’t help but be disappointed in how it failed to tap into the potential it had. Not helping is that the film seems intent on starting a series that we know we will never happen leaving certain plot threads making it yet another franchise starter that will never be which is unfortunate.
One thing I will give the movie though is that it’s not a poorly made film at the very least. Fault in Our Stars director, Josh Boone, is able to do a nice job in creating an appropriately creepy atmosphere using the isolated setting and he does a good job handling some of the nightmare sequences. The production designers also help in making this location look and feel claustrophobic when needed. In terms of the VFX work that is also quite good as well as they look convincing and the artists do a nice job in showing off the teen’s powers making the scenes where they do use their abilities to fight some of the highlights of the movie, with Illyana’s ability to travel to another dimension being one of the more prominent and coolest. There are also plenty of cool looking visuals throughout like with the genuinely creepy “Smiling Men” and the Demon Bear, the manifestation of Dani’s fears come to life. Still though as competently done some of the action sequences are none of them truly stand out all that much and there really isn’t much in the way of actual scares despite the best efforts of Boone and the rest of the production team.
For the characters themselves well once again I like the idea of them being a breakfast club like group who bond with one another, but I just wish there was more to them beyond the surface. Dani is a pretty standard protagonist who is afraid of her newfound situation and learns to overcome her fears as the movie goes on which is a solid idea for an arc but I just didn’t find her to the most interesting or developed. Blu Hunt is fine in the role and I like how she does form a romance with the shy Rahne (Maisie Williams, also doing solid work with what she’s given) who is haunted by her religious upbringing, but even that doesn’t feel completely earned. When it comes to the other members of the group though I will admit I found myself invested in some of them. Though I do wish Henry Zaga got more to do as Bobby, a mostly laidback, former rich kid who can manipulate solar energy as the idea of his character reminded me of the X-Men’s Angel and it’s a shame he ends up getting the short end of the stick, I did really like Anya Taylor-Joy as Illyana and Charlie Heaton as Sam. The former just has the most personality and is the most interesting of the bunch thanks to her sarcastic “bad girl” personality that creates an interesting dynamic between her and the others and Anya Taylor-Joy of course gives a great performance and seems to be having a lot of fun in this role. As for the latter I think Heaton really elevates what he’s given and is able to convey the tragedy of this character nicely and he is among the most sympathetic of the bunch. Again I think the movie can be at it’s best when the characters are just interacting and hanging out with each other even if individually I think most could have been much more fleshed out. Rounding out the cast is Alice Braga as Dr. Reyes who is convincing as the seemingly caring facility head who may have some secrets she’s not telling the kids, but the character herself merely serves to spout exposition and occasionally move the plot forward. Each actor here is giving it their all despite the material they’re given not being quite up to par.
On the whole even with all that’s going for it I just don’t think The New Mutants lives up to it’s full potential. I certainly didn’t hate it as it has it’s share of intriguing ideas, a really cool central premise with tons of promise, solid craftsmanship, some visual imagination, a couple of interesting characters, and good performances all around, yet I still found it to be pretty mediocre as the execution of it’s story isn’t nearly as good as it could be, it doesn’t work as a horror feature, there isn’t any sequence that completely wowed me, and most of the characters aren’t anything to write home about. While I am happy that Boone’s project was able to be released and see the light of day and I do legitimately feel bad for him and the people who worked on it that they had to wait this long for that to happen, I personally found a lot to be desired from this one. It’s not my least favorite movie in the X-Men series (that “honor” still goes to X-Men Origins: Wolverine) but it is certainly a strange way to end this long lasting series and to be honest, even if I was not a fan of this one I can at least appreciate the direction it was trying to go in and who knows if Disney hadn’t bought 20th Century Fox, the series could have done more stand alone genre blending projects like it.
Rating: C
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