I finally saw the Days of Future Past film tonight. Originally, I wasn’t going to see any of the X-Men films until Lorna showed up in one of them in an official, named capacity. The last one I saw before now was X-Men II.

For a little more background, what pushed me to see it before that point was Disney and Marvel retconning Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver out of being Magneto’s kids recently, instantly throwing away a gold mine of potential stories to be told involving the whole Magnus family as well as decades of family and character development. They did this entirely as part of their little pissy slap fight with Fox because Disney doesn’t own the film rights, meaning Disney wants to diminish and dismantle the X-Men franchise as thoroughly as they possible can. Including in the comics. As a consequence, I’ve opted to withhold my money from most Disney and Marvel stuff, and start buying and watching the Fox films for X-Men, Fantastic Four and anything else Fox might own in that regard.

With that out of the way, I have to say: Days of Future Past was MUCH better than I expected it would be. I expected nothing but pure and unadulterated action sequences lacking much substance because honestly, that’s what I consider X-Men and X-Men II to have been. I considered those to be summer popcorn flicks.

Days of Future Past was not. There was a lot of incredibly interesting and meaningful story and character development in DoFP. The story was not merely there to fill a void for endless action sequences, it served a real purpose. In fact, I’d say the story vastly outshines the action.

Without a doubt, Quicksilver was the most impressive character powers-wise. I think that’s because he had such limited on-screen time, and Bryan Singer wanted to make the most of him. Magneto was also very forceful, commanding, everything you expect from the Master of Magnetism. But above all others, the dynamic between young Xavier and young Mystique was excellent. There was a real emotional struggle taking place there, and Xavier made great use of his powers. I’d say Singer knew just the right way to approach him.

All in all, and I say this with absolutely no spin or padding whatsoever, Days of Future Past is better than all of Marvel’s films. Marvel’s films do have themes and struggles and development in them, but they’re much more hollow by comparison, and there’s a very real impression with Marvel’s films that your main draws are for laughs and seeing things get punched and blown up. DoFP is much different, and the action lends to a powerful story, not the other way around.

Comparing how Marvel and how Fox do their films, I’m glad Fox owns the X-Men franchise. I can’t see Disney and Marvel coming anywhere close to treat the X-Men franchise as well as Fox did with DoFP. And in a weird way, I do have to begrudgingly thank Disney for being awful and going out of their way to screw over the comics. If they hadn’t done that, I might never have seen this film.