I heard it stunk and didn't see it. But I also heard X-Men 3 stunk and when I finally got around to watching it... it wasn't really THAT bad.
I think the main criticism (which i agree with) of X-3 is that stuff just happens with no build-up to cram alot of popular parts of the comic in. It really could have done with being longer or being another movie.
Instead it's somewhat jarring to have it go:
Jean's alive!
uh...she's evil now! bye scott
retcon of her alternate personality to explain her powers instead of the actual Phoenix story
kill's off professor
Joins magneto for some ill defined reason (most jarring for me, why would she submit to magneto, even for show as is implied later?)
becomes good again i guess?
Without the build up steps in between. Still, overall i felt it was good.
I really don't blame it though, 2 hours is not alot of time to fit in:
The Phoenix saga
A showdown with magneto
3 new mutants
The dark phoenix saga
The death of cyclops and Prof. X.
so it ended up being a big jumbled mess. Honestly i thought they backed themselves into a corner by trying to do both Phoenix saga's in one movie.
The phoenix saga, and dark Phoenix was a huge defining moment for the xmen franchise, it took one of their top hero's, made her a unconscionable villain who killed 6 billion people because she could, and gave her god powers. Not really something i would have just tossed in.
I'm guessing the studio forced that in, knowing that fans would want to see jean as phoenix. But by glossing over the entire back story with the retcon that the phoenix force was just some alternate, ultra powerful version of jean's personality that was locked away, they ripped away the actual phoenix story.
Plus, they gave jean her daughter's freaking powers for some reason.....weren't the original phoenix's massive telepathic and telekinetic powers enough without tossing on racheal's matter control for no reason?
that /rant aside, as i said, I really can't blame x-3 for trying to do to much in to little time. At least it was a fun and interesting movie.
now, back on wolverine, I liked the main story, but i didn;t like how gambit and deadpool were just kinda thrown in for the heck of it. I felt that wolverine suffered from spiderman 3's problem of "far to many villans/ heroic foils in one movie." disease. They would have done better focusing on one or two foils, instead of throwing them at him from everywhere.
But i still enjoyed it, was a good wolvie and action movie in general.