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Auch Superheldinnen scheitern

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In diesem Gastbeitrag von Sarah Wagner geht es heute um eine etwas andere Seite des Superheroines-Daseins …

Wenn Heldinnen scheitern

Sie legte sich ein gutes Stück von ihren Freunden entfernt auf den Boden und starrte in die Dunkelheit. So deutlich sah sie das Bild des weißen Hirsches vor sich, als hätten die Sterne selbst es an den Nachthimmel gemalt: So schön, so stolz, so tot. […]
Lautlos rannen ihr die Tränen über das Gesicht. Ohne sie wäre er noch am Leben. Es ist deine Schuld, nagte es in ihr. Das alles ist deine Schuld.

So ergeht es Xanna, der Heldin meines Romans. Dabei hatte alles darauf hingedeutet, dass sie es schaffen würde. Endlich hatte sie die magischen Fähigkeiten erworben, die sie brauchte. Mit ihnen würde sie es ganz sicher schaffen. Dachte sie.

Jetzt bleibt ihr nur die Dunkelheit und ihr eigenes Versagen. Früh am nächsten Morgen macht sie sich auf, um ihren Freunden, dem Wald und der Aufgabe, die dort auf sie wartet, für immer den Rücken zu kehren. Ziellos irrt sie durch die Wiesen und verflucht ihren eigenen Stolz, der sie so siegessicher gemacht hat.

Auch andere Heldinnen scheitern. So verschieden wie sie selbst sind auch ihre Wege, damit umzugehen. In dem folgenden kleinen Test kannst du herausfinden, welcher von ihnen du am ehesten gleichst und natürlich auch, wie Xannas Geschichte weitergeht.

Welche Superheldin bist du?

Wie funktioniert‘s? Einfach Fragen beantworten und zählen, welchen Buchstaben du am meisten hast.

1. Welche Eigenschaft trifft am meisten auf dich zu?

  • abenteuerlustig (a)
  • vorsichtig (d)
  • leidenschaftlich (b)
  • unabhängig (c)

2. Was ist für dich am schlimmsten?

  • Hilflosigkeit (b)
  • Langeweile (a)
  • Ungerechtigkeit (d)
  • Ablehnung (c)

3. Wenn mich jemand verletzt…

  • kann ich mich noch sehr lang daran erinnern (c)
  • klär ich das auf der Stelle (a)
  • zieh ich mich erstmal zurück und denke über eine Lösung nach (b)
  • tue ich, als ob es mir nichts ausmachen würde (d)

 

4. Wie verbringst du am liebsten deine Freizeit?

  • Hauptsache Action (a)
  • ich bin am liebsten allein draußen (d)
  • mit einer Dose Kekse und einem Stapel Comics (b)
  • Freizeit – was ist das? (c)

5. Welcher Herausforderung würdest du dich am liebsten stellen?

  • gegen böse Götter kämpfen (b)
  • einen verzauberten Wald befreien (d)
  • verschwundene Artefakte finden (a)
  • die Weltherrschaft gewinnen (c)

6. Welcher Satz trifft auf dich am meisten zu?

  • Man muss die Vergangenheit hinter sich lassen. (a)
  • Das Schicksal zieht die Fäden. (b)
  • Nur der Stärkere überlebt. (c)
  • Der erste Schritt ist immer der schwerste. (d)

7. Wenn ich so richtig versagt habe…

  • Wo ist mein Kissen? Ich muss mich mal so richtig ausheulen. (d)
  • Ich bete oder meditiere, das gibt mir wieder Kraft. (b)
  • Egal – aufstehen, weitermachen. (a)
  • Am besten nicht darüber nachdenken. (c)

8. Wie sieht für dich ein perfekter Tag aus?

  • etwas spannendes Neues entdecken (a)
  • einfach mal Zeit mit Freunden verbringen (b)
  • jemand hat mir ein tolles Kompliment gemacht (c)
  • endlich wieder auf einem Berg (d)

9. Welcher Satz trifft am ehesten auf dich zu?

  • Ich bin tough und erreiche fast immer meine Ziele. (a)
  • Manchmal würde ich mich am liebsten verstecken. (d)
  • Es gibt Seiten an mir, die ich nicht leiden kann. (c)
  • Ich entdecke gerade erst, wer ich wirklich bin. (b)

10. Was würden andere über dich sagen?

  • Harte Schale, weicher Kern (d)
  • Wow, was die alles kann! (c)
  • Wenn ich in der Klemme sitze, holt sie mich raus (a)
  • Sie ist ein totaler Freak – deshalb mag ich sie so. (b)

11. Was ist deine größte Angst?

  • Der Tod eines geliebten Menschen (b)
  • nicht akzeptiert zu werden (d)
  • zu viel Zeit zum Grübeln (a)
  • verletzlich zu sein (c)

12. Wen hättest du am liebsten an deiner Seite?

  • Eine plappernde Fee (d)
  • eine allwissende Göttin (b)
  • einen charismatischen Anführer (c)
  • niemand – allein schaff ich am meisten (a)

Auswertung

Am meisten a: Lara Croft

Abenteuerlustig, sexy und immer eine Waffe zur Hand. So kennen wir die Actionheldin Lara Croft, die als eine Art weiblicher Indiana Jones Schätzen vergangener Zeiten hinterherjagt. Doch wie wurde sie zu dieser außergewöhnlichen Frau? Über ihre Biografie gibt es verschiedene Varianten. In einer davon sterben ihre Eltern schon früh bei einem Flugzeugunglück. Lara lebt von da an allein als eine sehr unkonventionelle Adlige, die lieber Waffentraining statt Teestunden betreibt, auf dem riesigen Anwesen ihres Vaters. Um den Schmerz über den Verlust ihrer Eltern zu kompensieren, ist sie ständig auf der Suche nach einem Leben am Limit.

Lara Croft ist eine autarke, starke Persönlichkeit. Sie scheut weder Konflikte noch Herausforderungen. Das eigentlich negative Erlebnis des Verlustes, verwandelt sie in pure Energie, um sie für ein positives Ziel einzusetzen. Auf diese Art kann sie viel erreichen. Ob sie ihren Schmerz so überwinden oder ihn lediglich verdrängen kann, bleibt in ihrer Geschichte offen.

Am meisten b: Gwen Frost (Mythos-Academy von Jennifer Estep)

Alles Freaks!, denkt sich Gwen als sie von ihrer normalen Highschool auf die MythosAcademy wechselt. Hier wimmelt es von Wikingern, Walküren, Spartanern, Amazonen und vielen anderen Typen, die sie bisher nur aus Geschichten und Sagen kannte. Ihre neuen Mitschüler sind superreiche, begabte Krieger mit außergewöhnlichen Fähigkeiten, die felsenfest davon überzeugt sind Teil des ewigen Kampfes zwischen den Göttern zu sein.
Zunächst hält Gwen das alles für Spinnerei, doch bald holt sie die neue Wirklichkeit ein. Nicht nur die Götter, die sie bisher für Blödsinn gehalten hat, erweisen sich als erschreckend real. Auch ihre eigene Rolle im Kampf der Götter ist alles andere als klein. Immer mehr wird sie zu einer tapferen Kriegerin und lernt, ihre Begabung für den Kampf zu nutzen, um den grausamen Gott Loki aufzuhalten.
Doch sie erlebt auch böse Überraschungen und muss heftige Niederlagen einstecken. Wenn das geschieht flüchtet sie sich zu der Person, die ihr ihre besonderen Fähigkeiten gegeben hat: Der griechischen Siegesgöttin Nike. Im Gespräch mit ihr wird ihr Blick wieder gerade gerückt. Sie bekommt Zuspruch, neue Hinweise und kann Wut und Zweifel an den göttlichen Plänen zum Ausdruck bringen.

Gwen Frost hat Mut und Verstand. Ihre Freunde und Familie bedeuten ihr mehr als alles andere. Nichts trifft sie so sehr wie der Tod von jemand, den sie liebt. Oft handelt sie im Alleingang, um ihre Freunde zu schützen – auch wenn sie selbst das in große Gefahr bringt. Um aber ihre schwersten Krisen überwinden zu können, braucht sie den Zuspruch einer stärkeren Existenz.

Am meisten c: Mystique

Die junge Raven Darkholme, genannt Mystique, wünscht sich nichts sehnlicher, als normal zu sein. Sie gehört zu den X-Men, außergewöhnlich begabten „Mutanten“, die von den „normalen“ Menschen mit viel Misstrauen und Ablehnung behandelt werden. Ravens Fähigkeiten ermöglichen es ihr, innerhalb von wenigen Sekunden Aussehen, Gang und Stimme jedes x-beliebigen Menschens anzunehmen. Unverwandelt bedeckt eine blaue fischähnliche Haut ihren Körper. Während viele Mutanten es mithilfe ihres Mentors Charles Xavier schaffen, ihr Anderssein zu überwinden und für die Zusammenarbeit zwischen Mensch und Mutant einzusetzen, schließt sich Raven der Gegenseite der Mutanten unter der Führung des skrupellosen Magneto an. Er ist von der Überlegenheit der Mutanten überzeugt und will die Menschheit als minder entwickelt unterwerfen. So wie Raven früher für ihr Mutantensein verachtet wurde, hat sie jetzt für die Menschheit nur noch Verachtung übrig. Nachdem sie jedoch ihre Fähigkeiten durch den Angriff mit einer speziell entwickelten Waffe verliert, wird sie von Magneto verstoßen. Dadurch begreift sie, dass sie für ihn nur ein Werkzeug seiner Sache war, ihm als Mensch jedoch gleichgültig ist. Genauso ambitioniert wie sie sich für Magneto engagiert hat, wendet sie sich nun gegen ihn. Sie verrät der amerikanischen Regierung seine Pläne, die dadurch vereitelt werden können.

Mystique ist eine schöne, begabte junge Frau. Ihr Dilemma besteht darin, sowohl ihre menschlichen wie auch ihre Mutantenseiten zu bejahen und sich somit als Ganzes anzunehmen. Das führt sie zunächst in die Selbstablehnung und später in die Radikalität. Doch auch wenn sie viele Rückschläge erlebt, gibt sie niemals auf. Egal auf welcher Seite sie steht, sie setzt sich ganz für sie ein und erreicht viel dabei.

Am meisten d: Xanna

Natürlich ist Xannas Scheitern nicht das Ende der Geschichte. Wie findet sie zurück und schafft es, zum zweiten Mal ihrer Aufgabe entgegenzutreten? Indem sie zunächst einmal sich selbst wiederfindet. Sie verlässt sich nicht länger auf ihre magischen Fähigkeiten und die Titel, die andere ihr verliehen haben. Im Gespräch mit anderen besteht sie ab jetzt darauf, „nur“ Xanna zu sein.
Sie hat weder einen Plan B noch einen Plan A im Gepäck, als sie sich erneut ihrer Herausforderung stellt. Im Gegensatz zum ersten Mal ist sie sich nicht sicher, ob sie siegen wird. Sie handelt spontan aus ihrem Herzen, riskiert alles und entdeckt dabei etwas, was sie nie erwartet hätte. So überwindet sie ihr Versagen und kann sogar noch etwas Besseres gewinnen.

Xanna ist etwas ganz Besonders – nur hat sie keine Ahnung davon. Erst im Lauf ihrer Reise entdeckt sie ihre Rolle und wird sich ihrer Stärke immer mehr bewusst. Trotzdem fühlt sie sich von den Aufgaben, vor denen sie steht, manchmal überfordert. Umso mehr verlässt sie sich auf ihre mächtig klingenden Hilfsmittel. Bis sie schließlich merkt: Was sie selbst ist, ist das Wichtigste, was sie geben kann.

So, ich hoffe ihr hattet ein bisschen Spaß, beim Superheldinnen und euch selbst entdecken 🙂

Die Autorin

Sarah Wagner wurde 1990 in Sachsen geboren. Angezogen vom Reich der Fantasie, begann sie schon früh, Geschichten zu schreiben. Nach der Schule studierte sie vier Jahre Theologie und schrieb im Bereich Philosophie ihre Abschlussarbeit.

Ihre ersten Kurzgeschichten wurden in Anthologien veröffentlicht. 2015 gewann sie den Nachwuchspreis der Berner Bücherwochen. Ihr Debütroman „Xanna: Magische Lieder“ wurde für sie zu mehr als nur dem Schreiben einer Geschichte. Sie entdeckte dabei eine ganz eigene, faszinierende Welt, in der sie auch zukünftig noch viel entdecken möchte.

Sie lebt mit ihrem Mann und ihrem kleinen Sohn in der Nähe von Gießen und liebt Farben, Kunst, andere Kulturen, Natur, Situationskomik und Abenteuer.

Wenn euch Xannas Geschichte ein bisschen neugierig gemacht hat, könnt ihr sie auf Amazon erwerben.

Facebook: Sarah Wagner

Morgen erfahrt ihr dann von Guddy Hoffmann-Schoenborn by Fried Phoenix ein bisschen was über Superhelden Teams.

© For the cover belongs to its rightful owner.
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Lies auf Deutsch

This guest post by Sarah Wagner is about a somewhat different side of the superheroine existence…

When heroines fail

A good distance away from her friends she lay down on the floor and stared into the darkness. So clearly she saw the picture of the white stag before her, as if the stars themselves had painted it on the night sky: so beautiful, so proud, so dead. […]
Tears were running silently down her face. Without her, he’d still be alive. It’s your fault, gnawed it in her. This is all your fault.

This how Xanna, the heroine of my novel, fares. All the indications showed that she would make it. Finally she had acquired the magical abilities she needed. With them, she’d certainly make it. She thought.
Now all she has left is the darkness and her own failure. Early the next morning she leaves to turn her back on her friends, the forest and the task that awaits her there, forever. She wanders aimlessly through the meadows and curses her own pride, which made her so certain of victory.

Other heroines also fail. As different as they are, are their ways of dealing with it. In the following little test you can find out which of them you most closely resemble and of course how Xanna’s story continues.

Which superheroine are you?

How does it work? Just answer the questions and count which letter you chose the most.

1. Which characteristic applies to you the most?

  • adventurous (a)
  • careful (d)
  • passionate (b)
  • independent (c)

2. What’s the worst for you?

  • helplessness (b)
  • Boredom (a)
  • Injustice (d)
  • Rejection (c)

3. If anyone hurts me…

  • I can remember it for a very long time (c)
  • I’ll settle it right now (a)
  • I withdraw and think about a solution (b)
  • I pretend I don’t mind (d)

4. How do you like to spend your free time?

  • As long as it’s action (a)
  • I prefer to be alone outside (d)
  • with a can of cookies and a stack of comics (b)
  • Leisure – what’s that? (c)

5. Which challenge would you like to take on the most?

  • fight against evil gods (b)
  • free an enchanted forest (d)
  • find lost artifacts (a)
  • win world domination (c)

6. Which sentence applies to you the most?

  • You have to put the past behind you. (a)
  • Fate is pulling the strings. (b)
  • Only the strongest survive. (c)
  • The first step is always the hardest. (d)

7. If I’ve really failed…

  • Where’s my pillow? I need a good cry. (d)
  • I pray or meditate, it gives me strength again. (b)
  • Never mind – get up, keep going. (a)
  • Don’t think about it. (c)

8. What does a perfect day look like for you?

  • discovering something excitingly new (a)
  • just spending time with friends (b)
  • someone gave me a great compliment (c)
  • finally back on a mountain (d)

9 Which sentence applies to you the most?

  • I am tough and almost always achieve my goals. (a)
  • Sometimes I want to hide. (d)
  • There are sides to me I don’t like. (c)
  • I’m just discovering who I really am. (b)

10. What would others say about you?

  • Hard shell, soft core (d)
  • Wow, all these things she can do! (c)
  • When I’m in trouble, she gets me out (a)
  • She’s a total freak – that’s why I like her so much. (b)

11. What is your greatest fear?

  • The death of a loved one (b)
  • not to be accepted (d)
  • too much time to ponder (a)
  • to be vulnerable (c)

12. Who would you like to have at your side?

  • A babbling fairy (d)
  • an omniscient goddess (b)
  • a charismatic leader (c)
  • nobody – I work best alone (a)

Most a: Lara Croft

Adventurous, sexy and always a weapon at hand. This is how we know the action heroine Lara Croft, who chases after the treasures of bygone times as some kind of female Indiana Jones. But how did she become this extraordinary woman? There are different variations on her biography. In one of them her parents die early in a plane crash. From then on Lara lives alone as a very unconventional noblewoman, who prefers weapon training instead of tea lessons, in her father’s huge estate. In order to compensate for the pain of losing her parents, she is constantly looking for a life at the limit.

Lara Croft is a self-sufficient, strong personality. She is not afraid of conflicts or challenges. She transforms the negative experience of loss into pure energy in order to use it for a positive goal. This way she can achieve a lot. Whether she can overcome her pain in this way or merely repress it remains untold in her story.

Most b: Gwen Frost (Mythos Academy by Jennifer Estep)

Freaks all of them!, Gwen thinks as she moves from her normal high school to the Mythos Academy. It is teeming with Vikings, Valkyries, Spartans, Amazons and many other people that she only knew from stories and legends. Her new classmates are super-rich, talented warriors with extraordinary abilities who are firmly convinced they are part of the eternal battle between the gods.
At first Gwen thinks it’s all make-believe, but soon the new reality catches up with her. It is not only the gods, which she has hitherto regarded as nonsense, that are proving to be frighteningly real. Also their own role in the battle of the gods is anything but small. She becomes more and more of a brave warrior and learns to use her talent for combat to stop the cruel god Loki.
But she also experiences nasty surprises and suffers severe defeats. When that happens, she flees to the person who gave her special abilities: The Greek goddess of victory, Nike. In conversation with her, her worldview is straightened again. She gets encouragement, new hints and can express anger and doubt about the divine plans.

Gwen Frost has courage and brains. Her friends and family mean more to her than anything else. Nothing hurts her more than the death of someone she loves. Often she acts alone to protect her friends – even if it puts her in great danger. But in order to overcome her most serious crises, she needs the encouragement of a stronger entity.

Most c: Mystique

The young Raven Darkholme, called Mystique, wishes nothing more than to be normal. She belongs to the X-Men, exceptionally gifted „mutants,“ who are treated with much suspicion and rejection by „normal“ people. Raven’s abilities allow her to take on the appearance, gait and voice of any person within seconds. Untransformed, a blue fish-like skin covers her body. While many mutants, with the help of their mentor Charles Xavier, manage to overcome their otherness and promote cooperation between humans and mutants, Raven joins the opposite side of the mutants under the leadership of unscrupulous Magneto. He is convinced of the superiority of mutants and wants to subjugate humanity as the less developed species. Just as Raven was once despised for her mutation, she now has nothing but contempt for humanity. After she loses her abilities in an attack with a specially developed weapon, however, she is rejected by Magneto. Through this she realizes that for him she was only an instrument of his cause, but doesn’t matter to him as a human being. Just as ambitious as she has committed herself to Magneto, she now turns against him. She reveals his plans to the American government, through which they can be thwarted.

Mystique is a beautiful, talented young woman. Her dilemma is to affirm both her human and her mutant side and thus to deal with them as a whole. But even if she experiences many setbacks, she never gives up. No matter on which side she stands, she stands up for herself and achieves a lot.

Most d: Xanna

Of course, Xanna’s failure is not the end of the story. How does she find her way back and manage to face her task for the second time? By first of all finding herself. She no longer relies on her magical abilities and the titles others have given her. In conversation with others, she now insists on being „only“ Xanna.
She has neither a plan B nor a plan A up her sleeves when she takes up her challenge again. Unlike the first time, she is not sure if she will win. She acts spontaneously from her heart, risks everything and discovers something she never expected. This way she overcomes her failure and can even win something better.

Xanna is something very special – only she has no idea about it. Only in the course of her journey she discovers her role and becomes more and more aware of her strength. Nevertheless, she sometimes feels overwhelmed by the tasks she faces. All the more reason she relies on her powerful sounding tools. Until she finally realizes: What she is herself is the most important thing she can give.

So, I hope you had a little fun with the superheroes and discover yourselves 🙂

The authoress

Sarah Wagner was born in Saxony in 1990. Attracted by the realm of fantasy, she began writing stories early on. After school she studied theology for four years and wrote her final thesis in the field of philosophy.

Her first short stories were published in anthologies. In 2015 she won the Young Talent Award of the Berner Bücherwochen (Bern Book Weeks). Her debut novel „Xanna: Magische Lieder“ (Xanna: Magical Songs) became more than just writing a story. She discovered a fascinating world of her own, in which she would like to discover a lot more in the future.

She lives near Gießen with her husband and their little son and loves colours, art, other cultures, nature, situation comedy and adventure.

If Xanna’s story has made you a little curious, you can buy the e-book on Amazon.

Facebook: Sarah Wagner

Tomorrow Guddy Hoffmann-Schoenborn from Fried Phoenix will tell you a little bit about superhero teams.

© For the cover belongs to its rightful owner.

What’cha Watching Wednesday #10.2

As I told you did I split the last WWW, as it was just too much to write about, so here you have the second part of the tenth instalment as special edition, just for the movies.

WWWWhat is this about?

Every fourth Wednesday evening I will publish a post in which I collected the thoughts I had throughout the week(s) while watching the latest or any episode of a series or maybe even a movie.

Depending on how my time allows it, the comment will also be for those that I watched that day.

You’re warned: There will be Spoilers.

Let’s start

Different movies

These are the different movies I’ve seen before part one that I’m now covering in this part.

When I grew up Jim Carrey was in every other movie I saw and one of my favourite actors at the time, so it’s not surprising that I watched pretty much every re-run of The Mask that I could get my hands on. Until recently it’s been years since I last saw it and after a certain episode of Supernatural (namely Tall Tales) reminded me of Milo, the dog of main character Stanley Ipkiss I just felt the need to watch it again. I have to say I was slightly afraid it’d lag the spark I saw back when I grew up, but it’s just such a ridiculous movie that that fear was uncalled for. Sure it has some very questionable scenes, but they fit into the narration about this totally chaotic character of the mask. I didn’t bother with the sequel though, as I remember it being horrible.
Speaking of old movies, I’m not entirely sure what made me re-watch Space Jam after all these years, but I do believe it might have been the fact that I saw it on Netflix and felt like it. 😉 While it is – and was – blunt in a few places the overall charme was not lost and it was just as quirky and fun as I remembered. So I kind of feel like that we had a different cut in Germany as I missed a few scenes (I think The Mask had the same problem). Are they really going to make a sequel? o.O

This time around there were a couple of movies I actually went to see in the cinema. The first of them was Deadpool. A lot of people already made great reviews about it, so I’m not going into too much detail here. Even if I enjoyed Marvel’s heroes – especially the X-Men and Spider-Man – in their cartoon versions back in the day, I never really knew about Deadpool. But with a Tumblr comes knowledge and I soon grew curious about the actual Merc with a Mouth that I had only seen in his failed iteration in the Wolverine movie we’re not talking about. So I read up on him, got hooked and subsequently excited for the movie and I was not disappointed. Deadpool comes with a refreshing twist to everything you know from watching superhero movies.
The movie doesn’t take itself serious (Credits, 4th-Wall-breaking, …) and is pretty realistic – except for the part where Deadpool goes on a killing spree because he wants to look pretty again for his girl. Yeah, that and the kiss-and-fade-out ending was what bugged me most about it, but I can overlook that for the sake of the overall humour and fact that it’s filled with tons of references. The latter probably made it hard for people not familiar with the Marvel franchise to watch it – and therefore less enjoyable, which is a pity as this one is just a lot of fun.

Let’s stay with Marvel and skip a few movies times wise: X-Men: Apocalypse. As I’ve seen the cartoon version of the Apocalypse story line I was kind of expecting something different. It was strange already that the cast fighting him would be so young – and I think by now I’m pretty much lost as to when something in the new time line takes place anyway – even if they brought back one of my favourite X-Men: Nightcrawler. Well, his introduction was strange, fighting with Angel in a cage fight? I’ve never heard of that version before… and why was Mystique there? Did she want to stop the mutant-cage-fights? Did she just want to protect her son? Is Kurt even her son in this universe? o.O
The most confusing part, however, was Magneto in Poland(?) with a six year old (?) daughter and wife and then there is Peter/Quicksilver not looking a day older than the last time they met, suddenly knowing he is his father, but unable to tell him, while every one else knows from Mystique? I’m getting confused again just writing this down … as I said, I’m totally lost at the time line, so if anyone can point me to a proper graph about it, be my guest! Additionally to that the titular antagonist was kind of a wimp. How did Black Kat put it? „All he could do was enhance peoples abilities and move sand around“
What was that about? They introduced him as character that accumulated the mutants powers whose bodies he took over (power #3?), but they never showed any of the others – not even the regeneration ability of the last one he became. That was seriously a let down.
It was interesting to see a different iteration of the known cast, but the overall story dragged on and was quite full of strange moments.

One more Mavel movie to go: Captain America: Civil War – or actually Nearly all of the Avengers and three new guys. Fight and story wise was it impressive, I still couldn’t say if I’d be #TeamCap or #TeamIronMan both have valid points in the whole political issue their facing, so I decided to be #TeamAvengers, where everyone just sits down, seriously discusses their points and starts working together again. But yeah, that’s probably just me wanting to find a compromise between both sides. The movie itself was a good mixture of action and character development, even if some stuff felt a bit rushed. Especially weird was the whole thing with Captain America and Shannon Carter shortly after Peggy Carters funeral ( 🙁 ) that never even really been hinted at before (except maybe a few-seconds-long scene in Winter Soldier). An unnecessary addition to an otherwise great movie.

One of the new additions, even if we’ve seen him before was Paul Rudd’s Ant Man. Usually movies he’s in are feel-good romcoms and somehow I just felt like watching some of them. So I followed Netflix’s recommendations and watched  Our Idiot Brother and I love you, Man. Both very different movies, that still work well thanks to Rudd’s charm. In the first one he plays a hippy that stumbles from one faux pas into the next. The character seems simple minded, but it buries a certain anger and determination behind it. There is an incredible outburst from the otherwise happy character that just gets to you. In the beginning I always say I’m using spoilers, but here I don’t want to say what brings up this reaction, for people who still want to experience it. 🙂
I love you, Man has not just a weird title (I prefer the German one „Trauzeuge gesucht!“/Best Man Wanted!) but also a very strange story line. For most part of the movie I kind of waited for the moment where Rudd’s friendless character without a best man for his wedding, calls off the wedding to get together with his new best friend. This wasn’t improved as the ending pretty much showed them declaring their love for each other (as the title would suggest) directly in front of the actual couple taking their vows. It’s just weird … letting those two guys end up as an actual couple might have improved the whole thing.

Speaking of strange movies. While I was in London with Janzy we used the possibility to watch a few movies „for free“ (I’ll explain, whenever I get to writing that travel logue) and ended up watching Hail Caesar! and Youth. Both movies offered a plethora (sorry, couldn’t resist this word is just as much fun as flabbergasted) of great and well known actors (George Clooney, Ralph Fiennes, Scarlett Johansson, Tilda Swinton and Jeff Lewis from The Guild! 😀 for Ceasar and Michael Caine, Harvey Keitel, Jane Fonda and Rachel Weisz for Youth), but were story-wise totally confusing. Youth jumped through hallucinations, while Caesar added a very weird communistic „plot“. I mean one of the characters was picked up by a Russian submarine from the beach. o.O
Just very strange movies that we’re glad, we didn’t had to pay for directly…

When we got back from the trip we decided to watch Notting Hill while relaxing from the flight as we had spent more than an hour trying to find the book store used in the filming of this flick…it was Janzy’s idea/wish… Anyway, I had actually never seen the movie before, so I was surprised to find well rounded comedy in a movie that’s praised for being oh-so-romantic. Sure it had the obligatory silly, predictable and partly unrealistic love story, but the antics and humour of the characters made up for it.

As I mentioned in part one did I enjoy Matt Ryan as an actor, so I took a look at two movies he had stared in: Miss Pettigrew lives for a Day and Flypaper. I was certainly confused that he was listed for the former when he made an appearance of maybe 3 seconds. Again these movies couldn’t be more different and I can certainly recommend the first one. It’s funny, it’s witty, it’s all over the place and still lovely. And it’s certainly impressive how much you can do in the time of a day and a bit if you’ve gotten yourself mixed in with the right/wrong people … it’s hectic, but in a good way, just go and watch it! 😀
Flypaper on the other hand was … strange … I’m not entirely sure I understood it. It was complex and confusing and suddenly everyone was dead, well almost everyone. The concept and the character-interactions were interesting though.

After I finished reading The Restaurant at the end of the Universe I decided to watch The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy again, just to see how different the whole thing was from the original. Not knowing the books it was enjoyable, but now that I know what actually was supposed to happen I was a bit disappointed at all the good stuff they left out and all the strange stuff they instead focused on. It was still fun to watch, but it could have been better – though the fly swatter field was something I would have enjoyed in the books as well…

I don’t think I have anything more to say for Mara und der Feuerbringer than what I did with the review. I just felt like watching it again, it’s such a great movie…

A not so great movie on the other hand was Warcraft. I admit I never played the games (too easily bored to commit to something so expensive) or cared much about it’s lore. But when I saw the trailer on the big screen, before X-Men, I believe, I got curious. It looked incredible. When our local cinema included the movie in their discount week (only 8€ instead of ~12€ for the ticket) I asked around if someone wanted to see it as well and in the end we were a group of five; the other four getting the discount and I got the ticket for free. For the record: From the five of us only one had ever played it.
Let me quote my comment from Geekritique’s review again:

Even without knowledge it at least is a movie that’s nice to watch without having to think too much – at least you shouldn’t think, because if you do, you get awfully frustrated. The graphics are amazing, but the plot was horrible and even if we kind of expected that from the get go [from reviews that Black Kat had read ahead of the screening] there still was a slight hope that it would not be this awful.

That pretty much says it all. It could have been something really amazing, but no, they made something filled with tropes, blunt and weird at times. I admit the portrayal of the main Orc characters was interesting, but I didn’t get why they put the focus on them whereas the whole game is on the humans story (at least that’s what I know, please correct me if I’m wrong here). They kind of poured pretty much all of what little characterization they had into the Orcs. This made me want to see more of Durotan story line and as usual then he just died…

But that wasn’t the strangest thing: What’s up with Orcs breaking off their dead parents tusks? o.O
Why would anyone gift anyone the dusk of their dead relative as a token of affection? o.O
What the hell? o.O
Needless to say this was the subject of a few jokes afterwards, the ones about false teeth were the best…

I was also quite confused about Anduin Lothar. For the first part of the movie everyone calls him Lothar  – which is an interesting choice of name by the way, as that is an Old High German name and a variation of the Germanic Clothar  and basically means „loud Warrior“ – and then suddenly the King refers to him as Anduin. At first I thought this was just a word for friend – you know, like LotRs „Mellon“ – or brother-in-law, but as it turns out that is his first name … the only character to have a first name or a last name at least.

Long story short:

There are way more interesting Fantasy/Gaming flicks than this. Zombie Orpheus’/Dead Gentlemen’s The Gamers, Journey Quest or their other projects or The Guild or Mara and the Firebringer as a Fantasy movie.
Even Knights of Badassdom has more substance than this at times…

You can find another great review – if your German is good enough – here at What’s best in Life?: Warcraft: The Beginning.

What were you watching?

What episodes (or movies) did you enjoy/dislike throughout the week/month?
Anything you’d recommend checking out?
Let me know in the comments below!

Final Words

I hope you enjoyed this little look into the different stuff I watched throughout the last months.
The next instalment will probably feature both series and movies again and will be published at the 6th July.

PoiSonPaiNter

Lost in Translation

For a couple of years now I watch series primarily in English. At first it was Anime with English subtitles, later there were many different shows that I wanted to check out.
Though I do believe I decided that I should watch more in English because I utterly failed at understanding Sherlock in A Study in Pink. He just talked way too fast for me.
Now several series later, I can understand him quite well and my next goal is Vicky Pollard from Little Britain. >_<
Anyway, what I discovered is that some shows like to include German elements into their plots – be it names, characters or other things – and as a German native that really likes the German language I consider these moments to be quite interesting.
Though in most cases they are also quite frustrating.

Let’s add some German things!

We Germans are fully aware of our past and as I mentioned in the post linked above, is it often still shoved into our faces, even though we are three or four generations after those who fought in the war. So it is not surprising that the most characters with German backgrounds that are included in shows and movies are Nazis or somehow involved with them.

Personally I think this is really annoying and whenever a show had this plot point I considered turning it off and lost a little respect for it. I mean in shows that cover historic elements it is good – and necessary – that they also deal with that part of the worlds history as it should not be forgotten, but in shows that focus more on entertainment than on, well, teaching, it just subtracts from its credibility if they have to use Nazis to fill episodes.

If that wasn’t enough are the actors portraying the supposed German people rarely even native speakers.
Whenever I notice that the language spoken isn’t English and sounds remotely like German, I listen again to understand it better. On the one hand is it difficult to switch between the languages, on the other hand is the pronunciation often really weird and hard to understand. Especially if they simply choose native English speaking actors, give them some German words to learn and let them play a German character.

So far – if I remember correctly – I only came across three (!) German native speakers that portrayed characters with German background (all Nazis, but, well, I can’t be that picky …): Thomas Kretschmann  in Dracula (the series) and Avengers: Age of Ultron and Ludger Pistor and Wilfried Hochholdinger in X-Men: First Class. With Daniel Brühl there will be a forth when Captain America: Civil War airs (Basically: Marvel does a good job at casting the right people).

Still, not all English native speakers are bad at portraying a German accent.
Reed Diamond’s German accent as Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Daniel Whitehall, for example, was so well done that I had to look him up, to check if he was German and I’m still highly impressed by it – and I don’t give this complement often.
But even if they do it well, what is said does not always need to be correct …

They don’t talk like we do?

Apparently, beside not wanting to cast actual German native speakers are those responsible for the dialogues fans of literal translations and don’t really care about using actual German grammar for the things the characters have to say.
Though you don’t really hear complains about this from the actors or people involved.
But after having to order someone to

Schieß dem Fenster! (grammatically totally wrong: Shoot the window)

in Die Hard and being informed about its wrongness afterwards, Alan Rickman, for example, decided to never again take up a role of someone speaking German.

It is way easier to translate things word by word and not use the actual meaning of it – and we German’s aren’t spared from that as most people’s English is not the yellow from the egg – but I believe that in a show/movie viewed by thousands of people there would be time and effort put into properly translating phrases in a different language.

Besides German; Spanish and Russian – just as Japanese and Chinese – are used as foreign languages, but my Russian has become too bad for me to notice mistakes and my Japanese was never that good to begin with and I never learned the other two, so I can not say how well/bad they are doing with those languages.

(If anyone is interested: Mr. Rickman should have ordered the other guy to „Schieß auf’s Fenster“ to make it understandable)

It is also interesting how English native speakers seem to think German’s talk. I for one can’t watch a certain scene in Sherlock’s The Blind Banker without getting utterly annoyed and being really disappointed in the show …

Still, this gives me stuff to rant about.

Lost in Translation

For a long time I have contemplated how and if I should do this, but I have decided that I just want to get this out of my mind. I really like the German language, so it pains me if it is used poorly.
Starting with this one I will publish posts about the portrayal of the German language or culture in series and movies. I’m not sure how entertaining this will be for English native speakers, but I do believe those of you that want to learn a bit German (culture) might find it an interesting view on what writers actually throw at their audiences.

Definitely covered in this post-series will be:

  • The Wesen of Grimm and other words that are barely German
  • The infuriating tourist from The Blind Banker
  • The court scene from Sherlock’s Many Happy Returns
  • The repeated appearance of a certain historic figure (e.g. Doctor Who – Let’s kill Hitler; Grimm – The Three Coins)
  • The polite Daleks in Doctor Who’s Stolen Earth (thanks to hexenadia for reminding me of this one!)
  • …

If you watch/ed a series or movie where German was/is involved, let me know and I will check out if they have done it justice.

PoiSonPaiNter

Liebster Award

About a month ago DarkFairy nominated me for the Liebster Award, but back then I didn’t really have the time to accept it. Regardless of that: Thank you!

The Award

Now let’s have a look as to what I have to do for this:

  1. Write a Blog post with this award, add the award picture and link to the person who awarded you.
  2. Answer the 10 questions.
  3. Think up 10 new questions.
  4. Nominate 10 Bloggers with less than 200 readers (occasionally it is said below 1000, so you can nominate whomever you like). You are not allowed to nominate your nominator.
  5. Tell the Bloggers that you nominated them.

This sounds pretty similar to the simple tag-thing Fairy gave me last year and it is also used for getting out the word for unknown Blogs. Still, the name of the award, Liebster, turns this into something different.

Liebster is the German word for beloved partner or darling, in the Blogging sense, to me, it means a Blog you hold dear and greatly enjoy reading. So for me it is an honour to be granted this award and be able to give it to other Blogs I like.

Fairys Questions*

*(as translated from her Blog.)

  1.  Have you been at a festival before? If so, which one?
    Those who follow me for some time now know that I have been at several Festivals, including: the Wacken Open Air (5 times), the Metalfest Loreley (twice) and the Wave Gotik Treffen with already some finished reviews and the M’era Luna (twice), Out&Loud and Rockharz where I still have to write them.
  2. What is your worst trait?
    I think my worst trait is my pessimism. My thoughts can get pretty gloomy and dark at times and you can call yourself lucky that I refrain from Blogging when I’m in a digging mood (meaning: I’m already in a dark pit and manage to dig myself even deeper).
  3. And your best?
    I like to believe it is my sense of humour, as I do indeed make people laugh on occasion. If that doesn’t count, maybe my readiness to help others.
  4. Which book is exactly in the middle of your lowest book shelve?
    When I was first nominated I was at home and as there is stuff in front of the book shelf I couldn’t have answered the question. In my flat the lowest shelve doesn’t really contain books, so I move one up and that one is full of Manga.
    The ones in the middle are Nurarihyon No Mago’s volume 3 and 4, with more volumes and some of Ao No Excorcist on top of them. But they are currently blocked by several comics I acquired on Free Comic Book Day, some other Manga (Deathnote and Bleach) and a book I won at the Expedition Grimm. My book shelve is too small…
  5. What is the ring tone of your mobile phone? .oO(I hope not everyone has a standard ring tone..)
    For a couple of years now I’m stuck with a snippet from Edguy’s Speedhoven. When I first heard the song I just knew I wanted it as that, as it has a fast and abrupt start and is therefore quite recognizable. Just so you know: I also have Alestorm’s Heavy Metal Pirates; Happy People from the Bleach soundtrack and a standard called Rogue as alarm tones and the aptly called „message signal 3“ that sounds like someone pulling a few guitar strings, tells me about new messages.
  6. PC-, console- or better yet boardgames?
    As the last consoles I had were N64 and a Gameboy Color and I usually only play short games on the laptop, do I go for boardgames with this one. It’s much more fun to see whom you can blame for losing anyway. 😉
  7. Which movie was the last you’ve seen in the cinema?
    When I got the nomination it was X-Men: Days of Future Past, as I had just re-watched it with Fairy. By now I’ve also seen Wacken 3D, a semi-documentation on the festival that I still have to review.
  8. I had to occupy myself with so much art, now its your turn: Who is your favourite artist and why?
    As I am horrible with names anyway I can’t even think of that many. I just know I prefer art that is more like a picture than a painting, like the way Da Vinci drew. As Whovian do I also have a connection to Van Gogh, but I wouldn’t call him one of my favourites. Well, and as the inspiration for some of his most famous paintings is just a short ride away from were I live/grew up, I have to also name Caspar David Friedrich, but I really don’t have a favourite artist.
  9. Would you choose your job again or if you don’t have one yet, which did you decide to take? For both: Why?
    I have a job/profession I’ve been working in for a couple of years now. I’m not sure if I would make the same decision again to take up this job, I just know I would not partake in a dual-mode course of studying again…
    I chose it, because I had similar lessons in grammar school and thought I would have something more substantial with Computer Science and Business Management than by studying English and/or German language and literature studies… Yeah, I know it’s quite a jump from one to the other.
    Still, I enjoy programming, creating algorithms and finding out about different techniques and technologies, so my choice wasn’t that bad. 🙂
  10. What is the answer to Everything? 😉
    42 😀 And it’s only a matter of time until I finally start with The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy…

My Questions

When you receive the award from me you have to answer to the following questions:

  1. What is the best experience you ever had on a concert/at a festival/convention or an other social gathering?
  2. What is the strangest decoration you have at home?
  3. Are you collecting something? If so: What and why?
  4. What was your favourite plushy when you were a kid and what happened to it?
  5. If you had the choice: Would you start Blogging again and about the same topics you cover/ed?
  6. What do you prefer: A handwritten letter, a long e-mail or a short message on the phone/a social network?
  7. Which of your post/categories you write in is dearest to you?
  8. Which movie/book/series/etc. would you like to read/watch/etc. again for the first time?
  9. What is the place you’ve always wanted to travel to, but so far hadn’t had the chance to do so?
  10. How much time could you spent without using any kind of digital formats/mediums? (Internet, mp3s, e-books, etc.)

My nominees

The Blogs I am nominating have most likely already managed to get their 200 readers, if not even the 1000th, but I still enjoy reading them and want them to know that – and again I didn’t manage to find 10 Blogs, but I might add them later.
In alphabetical order:

#1 BiblioSmiles:
A Blog for book reviews, tips on reading and other interesting essays and posts, like their Summerbook Challenge, that I am participating in.
It’s a really interesting page and I still can’t believe that’s only been online for a couple of months…

#2 Ed Mooney Photography:
You might remember me talking about Ed’s Blog on Halloween or during my Re-Wri-Day’s. His posts are an incredible mix of history, ruin photography (pay attention to the clouds, they are awesome!) and storytelling that even caused me to buy a book.
Warning: If you are as easily suffering from Fernweh as I am, you might start planning a trip to Ireland after reading some of his Blog…(I am still wavering between using my remaining vacation days to get over there for Halloween or doing something different with them…)

#5 Geekritique:
This Blog provides you with reviews on books, movies and series, but also grants you a good overview on what is currently going on in the geek-verse and gives you inspiration on what to tackle next on your list.

#4 Piccadilly 1819:
Stephanie writes really interesting posts about series and movies regarding the portrayal of women in them. We already had quite some interesting discussions on some of her posts and I’m sure there will be more to follow them.

#5 WriteTheWhite:
Sherri tries to help her readers to lose the fear of the white page and she does so in an incredible way. I have participated in one of her activities and another one is already drafted. I currently don’t dare to look into more of her posts as it would probably animate me to write about stuff I am not supposed to write about, instead of the stuff I already need to finish…

Well, that’s it for my nominees and questions.
Try having a look at those Blogs, maybe you find something you like as well. 🙂

As for those five: Thanks for many great posts to enjoy, I hope you don’t mind the questions. 🙂

PoiSonPaiNter

X-Men: Days of Future Past

So much for me not writing anything until June…
I am really good at keeping up with my own predictions…
But after spontaneously attending the advanced showing of X-Men: Days of Future Past yesterday, I can’t help myself giving an on time review for it – and yes it will contain Spoilers.

What is it about?

Official Poster


DoFP is a continuation of both X-Men: First Class and X-Men: The Last Stand and starts off in a dystopian future where specifically programmed robots hunt down mutants and humans who are helping them (or are capable of one day having a mutant offspring). In their hunt the so-called Sentinels have destroyed the Earth quite thoroughly and to stop this war from ever happening the remaining X-Men think up a clever plan: Stop the whole thing from ever getting started.
To accomplish this the prominently featured Wolverine‘s mind is sent back in time into his younger self’s body to help a lost Charles Xavier to find shape-shifter Mystique and stop her from killing Bolivar Trask, the mastermind behind the Sentinels.

The watching experience

As I hadn’t decided on going to the cinema until Tuesday I wasn’t sure if I’d actually be able to get a ticket, but I wasn’t surprised to find the cinema hall only half empty either. Though I did expect the people attending an advanced viewing to look a bit more nerdy – though there were a few examples of that. Some of them seemed more like they just wanted to see the next movie of the franchise and picked the date out of schedule reasons, but I digress.
The good thing about watching something in the cinema is that you can see the reaction of other viewers straight away and there were a couple quite interesting ones.
Two of them were due to the mutant Quicksilver.
When they had shown how his fast movements seem to him and how he could defeat their enemies in mere seconds nearly the whole hall was laughing at the scurrility of the slow/fast motion sequence and his slight editions to the movement of certain objects and persons.
The second reaction was way before that scene when his mother announced him as „Peter“. Several murmurs rose up as those who know the franchise from outside the cinema noticed the wrongness of the name. Though I do have to admit that while I was confused at the name I simply couldn’t remember what it truly was. It is by the way „Pietro“ as I now know again. I am not sure if this „mistake“ will be the same in the English version of the movie, as again I’ve only seen the dubbed version. If you know more, let me know in the comments below. (Apparently as Wikipedia has been changed now, the English version is also „Peter“.)
The third reaction was towards the end of the movie at the conclusion of the time travel and the imminent annihilation of the future mutants. When it was finally concluded you could hear a deep exhale in the hall as someone had indeed been holding their breath.
Like with so many movies recently was this one in 3D again.
Apart from quite interesting glass-destructions and some other good scenes, the thing I remembered most was a 3D close up of – I believe it was his – Wolverine’s nose and the utter confusion of why someone would want a nose sticking out of the screen like that…
And again you could see who has watched a couple of Marvel movies in the past, as not that many people left the hall before the post-credit scene.

The characters

As is the case with all the X-Men movies this one again had a great ensemble cast of different mutants and humans. With the past and future present throughout the story we also have the chance to not just see Sir Ian McKellen and Sir Patrick Stewart reprise their roles as Magneto and Professor X respectively, but also see Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy continue the younger portrayal of the characters.
Ever since the „original“ X-Men triology – especially The Last Stand, even though a lot of fans despise it – and X-Men: Evolutions did Magneto become one of my favourite characters of the franchise. Despite his silly hat and his very, very dark views on things is he one of the most incredibly portrayed mutants. I mean: He ripped out the friggin‘ Golden Gate Bridge to build a passage to an island…
In this one his younger self is tearing out a football stadium to create a wall to close them off from spectators. But his powers aren’t the only thing I find fascinating about him. Even if it is a dark and twisted view on things he follows his own path and motivates others to follow in his way. I guess he is just one of those characters that I like because they kind of live in a grey area (a bit like Mephisto, but different as Magneto at least tries to change things for his kind for the better, though he uses some rather unfriendly methods). Needless to say both McKellen and Fassbender again did a great jobs at bringing across the arrogance, determination and vulnerability that are so…Magneto.
Xavier in the originals – and in this one too – is mostly the mentor figure that seems like he just knows everything – maybe he does or at least knows which mind to look into for the information -, while his younger self already has this know-it-all air about him he is far less self-confident. The events of First Class leave him crippled, not just physically, but also mentally as one student after the other left his school and  his childhood friend turned her back on him. When we meet him in DoFP he is broken and resorted to alcohol and a medicament that keeps him walking but blocks his abilities and it is Wolverines task to show him that there is still hope. As much as I like Fassbenders outbursts and McKellens speeches, do I have to admit that McAvoy did a great job at portraying this shattered version of a otherwise powerful character, even if he looks like he is about to cry in most of the close ups.
With actress Jennifer Lawrence‘ rising fame Mystique seems to become the new Wolverine. More screen time, more incredibly choreographed fights and I also heard rumours of a spin-off. As clear as it is from the beginning that her actions are what causes the Sentinel program to be launched, as unclear is it why she actually wants to do just that. We see that she finds autopsy files of the mutants she and Magneto went off with after First Class (which was ten years before the current storyline! I still can’t get my head around that) and you assume that they became quite close in the time before they were used as lap rats by Bolivar Trask, but why she sets out for a personal vendetta still isn’t said openly. Assuming they go by comic book history and she had a thing with Azazel (*cough*aka baby aka Kurt Wagner aka Nightcrawler *cough*) it would make a little more sense why a formerly good natured person becomes a cold blooded murderer, but I kind of doubt that. She still had some highly impressive stunts and I am just stunned by the abilities of Lawrence and her stunt double.
Originally it was Kitty Pryde/Shadowcat who was sent back in time to change it, for movie reasons they however changed this to her being the one with the abilities to sent back Wolverine/Logan who’s mind would be the only one strong enough to endure such a long journey. In a way he does he not do much to change things and seems to be more of a tag-along than anything else. This might be due to restraints of the time travel, but I guess also because of his claws that are still bones instead of Adamantium and you could really see how he enjoyed that Magneto wasn’t able to Metal-bend him. 😀 As I said Logan did not really feel like a main character this time, which was quite a nice change.
Another tag-along was Beast or Hank McCoy who seems like he isn’t good for anything beside providing meds for Xavier, quarrelling with Magneto and looking longingly at Raven. The young version is such a sweet guy that it is quite a pity he struggles so much with what he is, but as we all know he will turn out to be quite a badass blue ape thing. 😀
The mutant I was most curious about seeing was Quicksilver or Pietro Maximoff, as he is not just portrayed in this movie, but will also have a role in Avengers: Age of Ultron (not the same actor mind you). Even though he was funny, he was a bid too childish for my liking and of course there was his strange hair and outfit that looked like a wig and and terrible fashion sense. As it is known to X-Men fans Pietro is the son of Magneto and even if the mention of his sister (Scarlet Witch) was cut out we still get a comment that his „Mum knew a mutant who also could manipulate metal“. 😀 In short: He wasn’t as bad as I expected he’d be.
Honorary mentions go to the X-Men from the future as they kind of died a lot in the few scenes we had with them. While the first time was a „No!“-moment (in regards to Shawn Ashmores‚ Bobby Drake/Iceman, whom we have known from two movies, being decapitated) for me, the second time was more of a „Shit now it’s final“-moment as I roughly remembered that even though Kitty could change the events in the past, the future was still unchanged.

General Opinion

X-Men: Days of Future Past has a thrilling music score that accompanies visually interesting/stunning scenes and offers a great/incredible cast. It also includes well made nods to the other movies and does something pretty cool with the conclusion – and this is probably a major spoiler: With Wolverines return to his actual time line and the actual success of the whole time travel thing the events of The Last Stand are retconned and the characters who had died in that Sequel are alive again. Meaning: We get cameos from Famke Janssen and James Marsden (Jean Grey and Cyclops), but also a view on Rogue (Anna Paquin) and the „old“ Beast (Kelsey Grammer) at the end of the movie.
Already when the credits rolled down I would have liked to watch it again, though not for the price they made me pay…

Stuff I’d like to add

The German additional name of the movie is by the way „Zukunft ist Vergangenheit„, which roughly translates to „Future is Past“ and I think it has as much of a different ring to it as „The Dark World“ and „The Dark Kingdom“ had for Thor.
The post-credit scene was rather cryptic and I believe it hinted at X-Men: Apocalypse (seeing as a worshipped being just build a pyramid without moving that much of a muscle), but the person who did that looked more like a woman that the rather masculine version I remember from the Cartoons. If the next piece in the franchise is indeed Apocalypse than I guess it will be interesting if they will continue with the new cast (McAvoy and Fassbender) or the renewed cast (Stewart and McKellen).
When I got the link from Wikipedia for the poster, the plot was quite interestingly phrased:

„In the dystopian future of 2023, The X-Men go back in time to save the world from the abomination that is X-men: Origins Wolverine.“

Why it did indeed have some major issues, I wouldn’t call the first Wolverine spinn-off an abomination and not that much had been changed with Wolverine’s Origin as the stuff portrayed in that movie was still about to happen to his younger self (see bone claws). If it saved us from anything then from the awful deaths and de-mutations from The Last Stand.
PoiSonPaiNter
© For the poster belongs to its rightful owner.