Granted, it was Bryan Singer's first foray into the X-Men franchise that helped to make modern comic book adaptations a "thing," but it was far from a perfect movie. Though the casting proved inspired, the script was fairly formulaic and lightweight, and the action scenes lacked a punch. So it wasn't until the sequel, X-Men 2 (marketed as "X2," because that's cool, apparently), where Singer upped his game and produced what is still one of the most thrilling and satisfying comic book movie ever. Inspired by the X-Men graphic novel "God Loves, Man Kills," X2 picks up soon after the events of the original movie with a brilliant and memorable sequence that sees mutant Nightcrawler attempting to assassinate the President of the United States. Though it's arguably the best sequence in the film, the remaining two hours of X2 are nothing short of spectacular, as countless characters are juggled with brilliant efficiently, and the series takes its first steps into "epic" territory - at once thematic, serious and fun.
Sam Hill is an ardent cinephile and has been writing about film professionally since 2008. He harbours a particular fondness for western and sci-fi movies.
