X-Men: Magneto

A fine notion for a fan-edit, to restore X-Men: First Class to its original conception as "X-Men Origins: Magneto," however rather than deleting the right footage or restructuring the film into a properly Magneto-centric film, important scenes are merely delayed, so that when the X-Men show up, the overall feeling is one of confusion, as key characters and their relationships are introduced, and not explained until the third act via flashback or mere hints.

As a stylish film that succeeds in making an X-Men a true team film where nearly all others failed, XMFC is many folks' favourite in the franchise, but due to plenty of contradictions in the continuity of the franchise, it really works better depending on how fuzzy your recollection of those other films is (The Moira MacTaggert thing alone, still makes me crazy. And the far-too-pat origin of the name X-Men is everything wrong with prequels in one scene.) I had hoped that by this fan-edit drilling down onto a single character, this problem might be resolved, but unfortunately it just manages to underscore that no matter how good the performances or direction of a film, a half-baked screenplay will show through in the end, no matter what.