Film Preview: Dark Phoenix (2019)

Page Revisions:

(September 30, 2018) Original
(March 3, 2019) New Trailer (#2) / New Posters (#1-#2)
(April 21, 2019) New Trailer (#3) / New Posters (#3-#4)
(June 2, 2019) New Posters (#5-#22)

Release Date:

June 7, 2019

Synopsis:

From IMDb: “Jean Grey begins to develop incredible powers that corrupt and turn her into a Dark Phoenix. Now the X-Men will have to decide if the life of a team member is worth more than all the people living in the world.”

Poster Rating: C+ / B- / C / C- / C+ / C- (10) / C- / C / B- / C / C / C- / C

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Review: (#1) In silhouette with a cheap “X” in the background are combined with little effect. (#2) The “X” references are fitting, though weakly executed and the imagery that goes with them isn’t the best, but isn’t bad from a visual and color balance perspective.

(#3) It’s chaotic, which feels appropriate, it’s fiery, which is also appropriate, but it’s also not as interesting as it wants to be. (#4) The fire in her eyes looks interesting, but that’s not enough to be a good design.

(#5) The cast is here, but the hamfisted way they are displayed and the cheap attempt at creativity don’t work. (#6-#15) This series of character posters doesn’t have much going for them as the colors are nice, but the details are too similar and there’s nothing genuinely interesting behind them. (#16) The X theme without a compelling detail to be found. (#17) The same motif as the previous (perhaps as a companion to it), this design is just slightly more interesting even if it’s only marginally so. (#18) This art piece is more interesting than all but one design we’ve so far seen thanks to its general balance and structure. The background is a bit dull. (#19) Can you see the X-Men in her eye. That’s clever, right? Right? (#20) The only aspect of this design that gives it any life is the smoky phoenix in the background. It might be a bit too subtle, though, and the rest of the design is too sparse to be interesting. (#21) This art piece looks terrible, perhaps something that might have graced the cover of one of the comics, but would be called out by fans as cheap looking. (#22) Maybe this has some symbolic importance in the territory it’s to be released in, but it otherwise lacks significance.

Trailer Rating: B+ / B- / B+

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Review: (#1) There are some very enticing moments in this trailer, but it also feels like a formula at this point, throwing too many images at the audience in hopes they pick up on something need, but otherwise assaulting their senses in a way that’s supposed to tell them this will be exciting, but which don’t look terribly different than anything we’ve seen before.

(#2) As big a fan as one can be of these X-Men films, this trailer looks a bit disappointing. While there are quite a few stunning moments visually, the whole thing looks a tad predictable and a bit less than appealing.

(#3) Plenty of action, lots of attention to our characters, and the suggestion that we have a compelling internal-conflict event going on that might just bring to an (unfortunate) end the entirety of the X-Men Universe.