Commentary by Brett Ratner and writers Zak Penn & Simon Kinberg; producers Lauren Shuler Donner, Ralph Winter,

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Although it couldn’t quite measure up to the standards of the two “X-Men” movies directed by Bryan Singer, Brett Ratner’s “X-Men: The Last Stand” provides a solid and fitting close to the trilogy of films about these mutant superheroes. In “X-Men : The Last Stand”. Ratner’s film seems to run too short given the complex story and subplots the heart of the original story. The Dark Phoenix saga has been adapted for the film jettisoning some of the background from the original comic book while adding some unusual twists and turns some of which enraged fans. While the screenwriters play fast and loose with many elements of the original saga the film works extremely well as a follow up to the previous two films and Ratner acquits quite nicely here. ***

There’s a cure for being a mutant and a pharmaceutical company will make it available to anyone that would like it. Magneto (Ian McKellan) sees this as an attempt by humanity to make “us” into “them”. ***

Meanwhile Cyclops is being tormented by a series of psychic visions that suggest that Jean Grey is still alive. In fact all of the X-Men are still tormented by the sacrificial death of Grey to save her colleagues at the conclusion of “X 2”. Is Jean alive or has she been transformed into something else? ---

Image & Sound: The studio screener provided is a BAD mutation. While it doesn’t look horrible there are problems with pixilation particularly during action sequences (which is the bulk of this film). I’m sure the consumer edition will look better. This studio screener is marred by a watermark that’s very intrusive. I can’t give this edition my top ranking because quite frankly every studio screener I’ve ever received with watermarks tend to be compromised. Overall the colors are as vivid as a gritty as a dark comic book could be. . Audio sounds terrific with nice use of the surround format. The 6.1 DTS soundtrack gets the edge here with explosive action bounced around almost as often as Wolverine gets thrown by one of the bad guys. The 5.1 is quite good as well with nice detail and imaging. ---

While the special features are lacking a bit (double dip anyone?) we do get two audio commentary tracks. One features director Ratner with the writers (Simon Kinberg and Zak Penn) discussing the evolution of the film and busting each other’s chops good naturedly. The second audio tracks features producers Lauren Shuler Donner, Ralph Winter (“Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country”, “Fantastic Four”) and Marvel’s Avi Arad. The second focuses much more on the nuts and bolts of production at the expensive of changes to the script, pre-production issues, etc. The subject of Bryan Singer’s defection to “Superman Returns” and his plans for th e film (director Ratner played checkers with Singer leaving “Superman Returns” for “X-Men III”. Overall the game of musical directors worked to both film’s advantage) is completely avoided. The second audio track is pretty weak by comparison and really a waste of time. I’d rather here from the visual effects guys or have Stan Lee or someone else involved in the X-Men comic book saga involved here event though they’re not involved in the production of the films beyond occasionally being consulted. ***

We also get deleted scenes with audio commentary by the trio. I had hoped that there might be more character development in the deleted scenes but it turns out that all of them are superfluous. We don’t get a gag reel nor do we get a featurette on the making of the film or any of the optical effects. We get a series of trailers for other Fox Marvel adaptations which is lame. ---

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