Bryan Singer has been responsible for some of the best opening sequences of films I have ever seen, in The Usual Suspects, The X-Men, and now The X-Men 2.

Unlike the first in this series, which declined steeply from a beautifully directed and affecting first few minutes to a camp-a-thon between stagey Brit lead actors, the latest X-Men movie gripped me all the way through. At the risk of sounding like a movie nerd, in this one the special effects were set alongside arresting conventional cinematographic techniques and built on a sound and witty script. Writing a comic book screenplay for an ensemble cast must have been an absolute pig. This one was roasted to a turn.