1/5 Collector's Edition!!!!!
  by Richie Dee
The Collector's Edition was a let down to say the least. All they did was take a regular widescreen X-MEN THE LAST STAND in the regular DVD CASE and put it in some nicer packaging and throw in a COMIC BOOK and charge you about $10.00 DOLLARS MORE. You are better off just getting the regular version and save yourself about $10.00 DOLLARS. I would think if you are putting out a COLLECTOR'S EDITION you would think it would be a 2 DISC SET , especially for the price. I was not Impressed at all!!!!! 1 STAR for a BAD COLLECTOR'S EDITION , 3.5 STARS FOR THE MOVIE.

3/5 4 Stars for the movie--1 star for this DVD edition
  by Jem (MD, USA)
I couldn't figure out why this so called "Collector's Edition" only had one disc. Special editions usually have two discs, right? Was it a typo? No.

The ONLY difference between this edition and the regular edition (that is $8 cheaper!) is that there will be a reprinted comic and a special "collectible" comic included. So collectible that it will be included in the hundreds of thousands of these DVDs produced. No extra features, no additional content beyong what is in the regular DVD. The studio is obviously saving all that for another special edition to be released in 6 months (like X-Men 1.5).

Unless you're a huge fan of comics, get the regular release and save the money for Superman Returns on November 28th.

1/5 Low value product (not a movie review)
  by Steve Nguyen
Rather than review the movie, which I like quite a bit, I'm reviewing the Collector's Edition package. All the CE includes is a slip box case and a mini-comic book compilation. In the compilation, only one is new, the remainder being old stories. The CE package also includes the standard widescreen package, clamshell case and all. It is EXACTLY the same.

Why exactly does one pay for the extra junk? I did because I didn't read the description carefully enough. You shouldn't. Get the standard WS version and save $10. The movie is the same and so is the transfer. Great movie by the way.

4/5 I Liked It; Not Great, But Good, And Much Better Than Some Are Saying
  by Andrew (Chicago, IL, USA)
At long last, we have the third, and possibly final, installment of Fox's X-Men movie franchise, and it's been no easy road getting here. There were a lot of behind-the-scenes troubles that plagued the film which led to many online fansites predicting the worst. After seeing it, I can say that despite the backstage drama, this ended up being a pretty good movie. It's no classic, but it's good for what it is. And while it's not the best superhero film ever (that honor either goes to Batman Begins or Spider-Man 2), or even the best of the series (X2: X-Men United), it's nowhere near bad.
After Jean Grey's (Famke Janssen) death at the end of the last film, the atomosphere at the X-Mansion hasn't been the same. Everyone misses her, but no one as much as Scott Summers/Cyclops (James Mardsen), her husband, who can barely pull himself together. Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart) has even resorted to having Logan/Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) substitute teach for him. Meanwhile, Magneto (Ian McKellan) is still at large along with Pyro (Aaron Stanford), his new lieutenant and Mystique (Rebecca Romijn), who has recently been incarcerated. The new president (Josef Sommer) is much more tolerant of mutants, going so far as to appoint Hank McCoy/Beast (Kelsey Grammer) as Secretary of Mutant Affairs, but he can't ignore the threat Magneto poses, and when a drug company develops a "cure" for mutation, he sees it as an answer to Magneto's terrorism.
Unfortunately, shortly after the X-Men learn of the cure, which completely catches them off-guard, Prof. X receives a psychic disturbance from Alkali Lake, the place where Jean died saving the rest of the team. As it would appear, Jean was able to save herself, but in doing so, she unleashed a part of her subconscious mind that Xavier worked very hard to suppress. Jean is a Level 5 mutant, meaning that she is off-the-charts powerful, and Xavier recognized that if he didn't find a way to keep some of her more "animal" emotions in check, she could very likely destroy everyone on Earth. When Xavier and the X-Men try to bring Jean back to the mansion with them, Magneto shows up with some of his new recruits, including Juggernaut (Vinnie Jones), who is an unstoppable brute and Callisto (Dania Ramirez), a speedy girl who can also sense other mutants. After a huge struggle against the nearly omnipotent Jean, now known as the Phoenix, Magneto's Brotherhood acquires Phoenix in order to use her against the humans in their campaign to "exterminate" mutantkind.
Now, the X-Men have to deal with the Phoenix, the Brotherhood, and the lure of the cure. While many mutants are appalled at the idea that they are a "disease", there are some who want to give up their gifts, either because they see them as a curse, or to end their persecution at the hands of humans. Rogue (Anna Paquin), for one, wants nothing more than to lose her powers. She can't ever touch another human without harming them; her touch sucks the lifeforce out of others. If the other person is a mutant, she temporarily acquires their powers, while she puts humans into comas. Fearing that her boyfriend Bobby Drake/Iceman (Shawn Ashmore) may be straying from her to be with Kitty Pryde/Shadowcat (Ellen Page), who he can actually kiss, she begins to wonder what life would be like as a human.
Eventually, the movie culminates in a huge battle on Alcatraz Island, which is definitely the most epic sequence in the entire series. While it is very good, there are a few times when I had to roll my eyes (though there were moments like that throughout the film). The ending of the movie seemed to wrap up most of the events and themes of the series, making an effective trilogy (though I can't urge you enough to wait until the end of the credits to see a scene that reopens the franchise for a fourth film, which many insiders say is a possibility should The Last Stand do well in theaters).
This film is directed by Brett Ratner as opposed to Bryan Singer who directed the first two. This was the source of all the controversy. Due to some complications between Fox and Singer, he left the project to direct Superman Returns for Warner Brothers. Fox then forced Ratner (who was not the first replacement) to get this film into theaters before Superman as a kind of "screw you" to Singer and Warner Brothers. This, along with a few pre-release photos of Grammer as Beast and Jones as Juggernaut caused a lot of fans to be skeptical of what the final project could be. Fortunately, in my opinion, the movie turned out well for everything that was standing in its way. It had problems (as I said, there was some dialogue that merited some eye rolls) including a somewhat poor explanation for the Phoenix. Cyclops is underused, but that is no different from Signer's installments. Unfortunately, he has always been glossed over, which is sad, seeing as how he is a really great character in the comics. Finally, there are just way too many characters. Many of them get very little to do, and this goes for both new and returning charactesr. Warren Worthington III/Angel (Ben Foster) does very little, Rogue doesn't even participate in the final fight, and many of the new Brotherhood mutants have one moment to shine then are forgotten. But all in all, the movie worked pretty well. The one thing I never understood is that Joss Whedon, the man who wrote the cure storyline in the comics and expressed a lot of interest for writing, and after Singer left, directing, was never even consdiered by Fox. Oh well, everything turned out well in the end.

3/5 X-Men in name only
  by A reviewer in Atlanta
You know, I'm just so tired of the movies that take a comic book franchise, create characters with the names and traits from the book, then completely rewrite everything else about it. I refrained from saying anything about the first 2 movies, but now it's just borderline ludicrous.

I saw one reviewer refer to Rogue as one of the weakest characters ever, yet in the comics she is one of the most powerful. My wife kept asking me to help provide some backstory for certain characters and I had to say, "Honey, I don't know. Other than the names and the powers, nothing else is the same." I saw characters killed that, to my knowledge, have never been killed off in the comic. It's been a few years since I read the books, but aren't Professor X and Juggernaut closely related? I was thinking they were brothers, yet there's no recognition when they come face to face. Some of the earliest X-Men in the books who were the mentors are the young students in the movies. And don't even get me started on the origin of the Dark Phoenix. In the comics, the Phoenix was an alien being but here it's the result of a split personality created by the manipulations of Professor X. In fact, the way things develop in the movie, Professor X is almost as evil in his actions as Magneto.

I continue to be disappointed in the screen development of Marvel comics. While the DC characters tend to be mostly true to the comics (Superman, Batman), Marvel seems to take great delight in discarding years of comic history and rewriting everything. The most successful movies are those where they left most of it intact, such as Spiderman. The dregs are those where they tampered too much, like Daredevil.

X-Men is visually stunning. Special effects are well done. If you don't know the comics, the storyline is acceptable. In fact, I think I would've enjoyed this movie much more if it had the same type of story and characters, but had not called them the X-Men. If you expect to see the characters from the comics on the big screen, you're in for a disappointing ride. Take me back to the Chris Claremont stories any day.