X-Men 2 (2003) - 50 trivia entries

During the scene in the bar with Mystique and the prison guard the person on the TV is called Dr. Hank McCoy, this is the real name of X-Man The Beast.

The young girl who runs through walls and soldiers when the mansion is attacked is Kitty Pride, aka Shadowcat from the comics. She is also referenced in the first movie, as "a girl in Illinois who can walk through walls."

Magneto is reading 'The Once and Future King' by T H White. In the novel Merlin is trapped in a crystal cave - Magneto in a similar plastic/glass cave.

When Kelly Hu first read script for the role of Lady Deathstrike, she was told that her character's name was Anne Reynolds. Brian Singer used this technique for every role, to prevent information leaking out on which characters were to be in this film.

This is revealed on the bonus disc of the DVD. Ronnie Drake (Iceman's brother) is the one who alerts the police of the fact that there are mutants in his house when Wolverine, Rogue and Pyro are there with Bobby. On the DVD, there is a section called 'Galleries' which has a shot of Ronnie's bedroom. On his wall, there is a big poster with 'Mutants Suck.' written on it, and another which says 'Is he one of them?'

In the bar scene where Hank McCoy is shown on the TV he is in some kind of debate and are speaking to a person who he calls Mr Shaw. In the comics Sebastian Shaw is the real name of Black King, the leader of the Hellfire club and a deadly enemy of the X-Men.

One of the files on Stryker's computer is labeled "Project Wideawake," which is the codename of the project to build the Sentinels, giant mutant-hunting robots that the X-Men have fought on numerous occasions.

In the scene where Mystique is printing the files on the security guard and she spots the Cerebro folder, there are 2 more folders there as well, Omega Red (one of Wolverine's enemies) and Muir Island (Banshee's home in Scotland).

The entire computer list that Mystique is looking at on Stryker's computer are mutants from the Marvel universe: Guthrie (2) are brother and sister Sam and Paige, Cannonball and Husk, Keniucho Harada is The Silver Samurai; Garrison Kane is Kane from the Weapon X program; Remy LeBeau is Gambit; Eric Lansherr is Magneto, though it is supposed to be spelt Erik Lehnsherr; Artie Maddicks is Big Eyes; Jamie Madrox is Multiple Man; Xi'an Coy Mahn is Karma; Maximoff (2) are the brother and sister Pietro and Wanda, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch of the Avengers, both are the children of Magneto; Kevin McTaggart is Proteus, Son of Moira McTaggart; Danielle Moonstar is Mirage, Psyche; Ororo Munroe is obviously Storm; Franklin Richards (You only see the "Lin Richards" ), the son of Reed Richards (Mr Fantastic) and the Invisible Woman (Sue Richards).

One of the security guards listed in Stryker's files was Tom DeSanto, the executive producer.

When you first see Magneto, he is reading a book named "The Once and Future King." Near the ending, Professor Xavier is teaching his class while the sound is fading out but he says, "Have any of you read a novel by T.H. White named 'The Once and Future King?...'"

The little mutant boy, Artie, (the one with the green forked tongue) is indeed an actual character. Anyone who has read the comics knows of the "infamous" Artie and Leech.

Many of the attack moves that Wolverine does during the film, especially during the mansion invasion, are the exact same special finishing maneuvers used in the video game 'X2: Wolverine's Revenge' which was released shortly after the film.

When Stryker enters the code to enter Cerebro 2, listen carefully - it's the 5 note sequence from Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

When we see Magneto for the first time in his plastic prison, the music that is playing in the background is the same classical piece that plays in Hannibal Lecter's cell in The Silence of the Lambs.

Magneto's line 'When will these people learn to fly?' is a reference to the fact that Rogue and Storm can both fly in the comics.

The foreshadowing of Jean Grey becoming Phoenix occurs throughout the movie. Whenever Jean Grey focuses on her abilities you see a flame in her eyes. eg. during the attack on the jet, in the dam spill way, and during the sacrifice.

In the scene where Mystique is going through the files on Lady Deathstrike's computer to find the guard's profiles, one of the guards is director Bryan Singer (he's listed as "Singer, B").

In the Museum scene, the Chinese girl with the yellow pouch is Jubilee. She can also be seen in the scene where Storm and Nightcrawler save the children, when Storm gets to where the children are trapped, she says "Jubilee!"

In the first scene where we see Stryker, where he is fingering the stab mark on the President's desk, he appears to have on a ring with the Hellfire Club's (from the comics) trident symbol.

In his plastic cell, Magneto is reading "The Once and Future King," a book about King Arthur. Arthur's supposed final resting place is called Avalon. Avalon is also the name of one of Magneto's earth-orbiting bases in the comics.

There is a sign outside of Magneto's prison, in the metal detector room, which describes the prisoner and the secure environment. At the end of the sign it reads "Do not taunt inmate. Do not feed sweets."

Not a mistake, as it's a comic/movie difference, but interesting to note. In the comics, Mystique is Nightcrawler's mother.

The soldier that was stabbed in the foot by Wolverine also played the contender in the first film.

In the first movie Rebecca Romjin-Stamos had to wear yellow contacts. In X2, they were added digitally, that's why they look a different shade of yellow.

In the scene just after Pyro has attacked the cops at Iceman's house and Jean & Storm have come to save them (Woverine, Pyro, Rouge and Iceman) if you look at the cop car on the left side of the screen, after Iceman looks back to see his family, the word 'police' is blackened exept for the letters 'ice'

The girl in the mansion who lets out a super-sonic scream when the Marines attack her is Siryn, daughter of Banshee.

When Mystique is morphing into Yuriko and back the sound she makes is exactly the same sound the T-1000 makes when morphing in Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

When the soldiers first enter the mansion, and the little kid who doesn't sleep goes to investigate - listen to the commentary on the nature documentary he's watching - it fits with events quite nicely for a while, along the lines of "With the mother away, the children are left defenseless..." It goes a bit awry once it starts with "the centipede is deadly", but you get the idea.

Among the many easter eggs in the movie referencing other mutants, Singer placed an homage to popular X-man Archangel, who had been scrapped in early drafts of both X-Men and X-Men 2. Notice in the fight scene between Lady Deathstrike and Wolverine...up on the wall there are schematics and prototype sketches of Archangel's metal wings.

In this movie and its sequel, Hank McCoy (the Beast) is introduced. In X2, in the sequence where Xavier inadvertently attacks the mutants around the world, it was originally decided that McCoy should be shown mutating into the blue-furred form in which he appears in X3. The idea was dropped from the final cut, however.

Bryan Singer was the guard who initially rolled Xavier into the guard room in the glass wheelchair before passing him off to the other guards.

When Jean and Storm are in the church, and Nightcrawler is lying down, watch very closely for the back of Jean's leather coat. We catch a brief glimpse of it - a bird that looks remarkably like a Phoenix.

In the French version of the movie, Night crawler's nickname is "Diablo" (little devil).

In the scene where Jean and Ororo track Nightcrawler down, he speaks a few sentences in German, but no translation is provided. The sentences mean: "Get out. I am the messenger of Satan (the Germans usually call Satan "the Devil", just as Nightcrawler does). I am a spawn of evil."

In the museum scene, Siryn (the screaming red-haired girl) is wearing a yellow t-shirt with an orange and black striped letter "x", which resembles the "wings"/cape on her comic costume.

While at the museum in the beginning, you can see the animated short film "The Edifice" playing in the back over Jean Grey's shoulder as she talks with Cyclops. The film shows the progress of human evolution as a tower being built from the ground up.

The X-Men graphic novel, "God Loves, Man Kills" (some of the plot for the movie X2) the mutant hater's name is William Stryker, the same name as the militant mutant hater in the movie.

If you look at Bobby's bedroom in the scene where he and Rogue kiss, you'll see that he has several snowboarding posters on his wall and skis in the corner against the wall - all connecting to his icy abilities.

What is it with Rogue and seat belts? First she can't get out of Logan's truck in X-Men, and in this new film she can't get either restraint buckled and is sucked out of the Blackbird...

Bobby's brother has a flaming-bird symbol on his shirt - Phoenix reference.

The actress who plays Kitty Pride aka Shadowcat co-starred with Patrick Stewart in 'Masterminds', where he took over the school.

Watch the 20th Century Fox logo closely at the start - the X stays illuminated for a short time after the main logo fades out.

Something about Bond movies. Both Famke Janssen and Alan Cumming were bad guys in Goldeneye, while Halle Berry was a Bond girl in Die Another Day.

In the deleted scene Mystique in Stryker's files from the DVD two-disc special. Mystique read Kurt Wagner's notes. On all the X-rays, we can read "X-ray c13957", and they were all taken in May 22 1984, but they show a full grown man.

May be obvious to some people, but I missed it the first time around. Towards the end, when Jean Gray's outside, Nightcrawler says that she's stopping him going out there. When he tries to teleport, you can briefly see the smoke appear round him then disappear as he gets blocked.

Mystique transforms into a blonde woman to seduce the security guard. This blonde woman is actually Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, a.k.a... the very Mystique herself. The only time we see her without the blue makeup...

Two random similarities to "Edward Scissorhands" in this movie. At the start, Nightcrawler looks almost identical to Edward when he's robbing the house - pale, marks on his face, blue baseball cap. Also when Edwards emerges from the house, he's holding his scissors out towards the police, who think they're weapons he's using to threaten them - exactly the same thing happens in this with Wolverine. Deliberate, or just coincidence?

The ending is very reminiscent of Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan. The person with the closest relationship to the leader of the group sacrifices him/herself to save the rest of the group, and just before the closing credits we hear the dead person's voice recite a speech previously spoken at the beginning of a previous film/episode ("Space the final frontier..."/"Mutation..." from the first film). They even left a way for Jean Grey to come back in the next film (apparently in the cartoons she came back from the dead as a phoenix - look at the water and you can see the shadow of a phoenix).

In the comic, Xavier had a son named David Haller who became known as Legion. He was mentally disturbed, suffering from multiple personality disorder. He had several different psychic powers, and each personality controlled a different power. One of them was a young girl. His left eye was green, and his right eye was blue. In the movie, Stryker has a son named Jason. He is mentally disturbed or catatonic. He has psychic powers. In the illusion he creates for Xavier, he appears as a young girl. His left eye is green. His right eye is blue. It would seem that this is supposed to be the movie's version of Legion. Some people also say that Jason is Mastermind aka Jason WyneGarn (or Jason Stryker, I guess in the movie) who has the telepathic ability to create illusion that are completely believable in every way, sight smell, sound.