For brevity's sake, I shall refer to "X-Men: The Last Stand" as "X3." Anyone who has a problem with this arrangement should direct all angry letters to the marketing people at 20th Century Fox for taking the number out of the title.

Let's begin shall we:

If "X3" was a restaurant, it would serve:

a "Golden Corral" type buffet of fried goodness. There were a lot of mutants to choose from, but very few servings of anything that would leave you nutritionally satisfied. In this case, mutants like Angel and Multiple Man would be the fried green beans and fried corn, to Wolverine and Magneto's fried chicken and chicken fried steak. Since this restaurant also serves tortilla chips, the necessary cheese needed to make nachos would be the numerous one liners that more often than not fell flat onto the unmopped floor. Luckily this restaurant also serves dialogue nuts, which Wolverine deliciously served to the audience after kicking a mutant in his.

If "X3" was a politician, it would be:

Bill Clinton. The movie displayed a definite style, and at times could be very engaging, but when it was all said and done, both Clinton and "X3" left me wondering if there was any real substance behind what you just saw. And like Clinton, "X3" left me wondering "what could have been?" Greatness was in their grasp, yet they both made key decisions that let it slip away. Clinton's was a blowjob, X-Men's was it's almost flippant disposal of key characters.

If "X3" was a band, it'd be:

"Van Halen" as led by Sammy Hagar. I won't go so far as to call David Lee Roth an artist, yet there's a certain magic and panache that he brought to Van Halen in its early days. So with this example, Bryan Singer (director of "X-Men" and "X2") would be the David Lee Roth led Van Halen of "Jamie's Cryin'" and "Hot for Teacher," whereas Brett Ratner (director of "X3") would be the Sammy Hagar led Van Halen of "Right Now." Technically speaking, both Hagar and Ratner did a pretty good job at not disgracing the legacy of both Van Halen and the X-Men franchise, yet it is pretty evident that the better days of Van Halen and the X-Men are going to remain in the past.

If "X3" was a sex act, it would be:

A couple dating so long that they're kind of just going through the motions. It's still fun, and you'd rather do it than not, but it lacks all the zip and magic of screws past. Good movies and sexual acts should be similar to one another. Both should start with little teases that seem to come out of nowhere. There should be hints of things to come as things progress. Things should move with a deliberate speed, yet not so fast that it ends sooner than it should. And of course, the climax should be so good, that you spend the next few days thinking of nothing else.

Closing thoughts:

I liked this movie. I thought that the movie could have been better, but I had a pretty good time while I watched the movie. I usually don't ask for more than that, but the first two movies were so good, I wish that this one had been on that same level. I wish that the composer of the first two films had come along, because I thought the themes he created were sorely lacking in this movie. Captain Picard and Gandalf proved that great actors are capable of making shitty dialogue sound like Shakespeare.

Recommend worthy? Yes. Go see it. It's worth the price of admission. Just don't expect the same level of greatness as the first two films.

Peace, Love, and a Two Finger Salute