Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2014 June 8

= June 8 =

JFK in "Days of Future Past"
In the recent movie X-Men: Days of Future Past it was said by the character Magneto that John F. Kennedy was a mutant (mutants are characters with superhuman powers in the X-Men franchise). I have seen real presidents being used in superhero stories before, but this case sounds a bit too much. Has there been any reaction to this weird comment about JFK? We are talking about a real president, after all. Cambalachero (talk) 19:14, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Looking for Google references would probably be your best bet, as it's what we would do if we wanted to know (unless someone here has already investigated it). It's fair to say that whatever super-powers JFK might have had, they didn't protect him from severe back pain, nor from the ammunition of a mail-order rifle. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:22, 8 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Reminds me of the time in Angel when Cordelia Chase asked whether the Blue Man Group are demons and Angel said (iirc) only two of them. —Tamfang (talk) 19:35, 8 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Actually, I was thinking in real-world reactions from people related to the Kennedy family, or his government, or similar, who either approve or reject the plot twist; not in fan discussions of in-universe stuff from the plot of the movies (which is what I find when I use google). Cambalachero (talk) 20:27, 8 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Have a look at some of the entries here - especially the 'comedy' section. I think a depiction of Kennedy would have to be either unspeakably outrageous or make an unfounded claim of truthfulness in order to elicit even a visibly-raised eyebrow from official Kennedy sources. The government evidently doesn't care, and has no interest in appearing to care. AlexTiefling (talk) 22:17, 8 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Saw the movie two days ago. The quote was in a rather complex context which went way over the heads of the mainly teenage audience, but which fitted with the over the top representation of the 1973 setting of most of the story. Older folks like me who (vaguely) remember that year thought it was hilarious. Anyone taking that line seriously wasn't in the right mood for seeing such a film. It wasn't meant to be a documentary. HiLo48 (talk) 22:58, 8 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Don't forget the Men in Black franchise has made a regular point of suggesting that various famous people are "aliens" (like Michael Jackson, who was alive at the time) and it was suggested (in the third movie) that Andy Warhol was secretly a government agent, something those close to him might have found objectionable. It's just something writers do to give their films a bit of a real-world tie-in and to give a film some context. The first retro X-Men (First Class) centred on an alternate history of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Oh, and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter - the title says it all.  St ★ lwart 1 1 1 00:01, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * As far as I know, there was no significant reaction from the estates or friends of those people to those depictions though some historians shook their heads the idea of Lincoln hunting vampires, thinking it distasteful or silly.  St ★ lwart 1 1 1 00:10, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * And I'd forgotten, the original book (Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter (novel)) on which the film is based actually suggests that JFK might be a vampire hunter himself. I don't think that made it into the film.  St ★ lwart 1 1 1 00:16, 9 June 2014 (UTC)