With Bryan Singer's triumphant return to the X-Men franchise, the future is once more rosey for the mutant movie series, and if First Class was the shock to the heart that was needed, Days Of Future Past was the blood transfusion that meant that longevity is again a possibility. Singer was clearly a man on a mission in Days Of Future Past, and when you think back to some of the missteps and flat out errors that have been committed in the name of the franchise that he created, and that for many he still owns as much as Fox, his intent was well-placed. But even despite those well-publicised problems, and even with the threat that The Last Stand might have killed the franchise entirely, the series remains impressive as a whole, and though the worst films and worst moments are obvious, picking out the best is a difficult prospect. It is far easier to rank the directors: Bryan Singer wins it by a few lengths, James Mangold takes second from Matthew Vaughn (just), and then Brett Ratner finishes second last, and Gavin Hood barely limps over the finish line to a round chorus of boos. Singer's vision for the X-Men universe is simply superior to Vaughn's and obviously also Ratner's (though his is closer to Singer's than the British director), and the director who has now made his trilogy feels fundamentally like the most tuned into the characters. You can probably guess which film comes top, but what of the others? How do the X-Men movies look ranked from best to worst?
