X2: X-Men United: Critic Reviews

There's invigorating charm in X2's many scenes of unhurried playfulness and gentle puns on serious themes of tolerance.

It succeeds pretty well in rising to the challenge that most sequels face: how to give the audience more of what it responded to the first time while feeding its appetite for novelty.

Bigger, brasher, sexier but much, much more confusing.

The longer the movie goes, the more its 133 minutes prove wearing.

Moves with the lightning speed, raw power and athletic grace of, well, a genetically mutated superhero.

Of the many comic book superhero movies, this is by far the lamest, the loudest, the longest.

Like that issue of The Uncanny X-Men that you'd get every once in a while: the setup for a future episode in which the exciting stuff happens.

Funny, reasonably crazy, and unpretentiously faithful to its source.

A substantial improvement over X-Men, in many ways.

Sleek, smart and sophisticated for a far-fetched fantasy.

There's much to applaud in a superhero movie that takes aim at mortal problems -- from hate, prejudice and intolerance to hyper-surveillance and the corrupting influence of power -- and hits most of its targets.

The best new addition to the corp is Alan Cumming's Nightcrawler. His pointy ears, yellow eyes, and blue skin make him the most creepily beautiful presence in the pageant.

Dumb, but good.

X2 has an emotion the first film lacked, and, sometimes, the full-blooded intensity that the best pop myths tend to tap.

The special effects have definitely improved.

The best approach is to just kick back and enjoy the ride.

A slightly flawed film that will nevertheless give fans of the comic book and first film a plenty good buzz.

Clearly, this movie is designed to sell action figures rather than make sense.

Suffice to say that I was steadily engrossed and entertained and ultimately moved by a drama that is, in the end, more human than mutant.

Bigger and more ambitious in every respect, from its action and visceral qualities to its themes.

As irresistible as movie-theater popcorn -- a lavish, reasonably intelligent, well-acted sequel with kick-butt effects that outdoes its predecessor, 2000's X-Men, in almost every department.

The whole may be less than the sum of its parts, but some of those parts are nifty.

The movie makes up in dynamite what it loses in drama.

This may not be a grownup movie but -- unlike the Star Wars franchise or the Batman sequels -- it is a movie that grownups can watch minus the requisite bottle of Excedrin.

This snazzy sequel to Bryan Singer's comic-book smash X-Men is sleek and sexy, filled with delicious characters and effects. Just don't compare it to the original.