Singer has actually loaded his film with a fascinating theological subtext, one that has nothing to do with this “God of the Old Testament” who demands “the order and the worship.” (That caricature is popular with people who haven’t really read the Old Testament, so it’s not Singer’s fault.)
In Apocalypse, Singer’s drawn a solid portrait not of an Old Testament God but of an Old Testament Satan, or maybe some parallel character: Lucifer, Baal, Beelzebub. (Significantly, Apocalypse’s origin story is in ancient Egypt.) Apocalypse’s main draw for the mutants is the offer of power, a neat parallel to the New Testament story recounted in three gospels, He wants to destroy human systems and institutions (structures that, when healthy, help distribute power), and instead hoards it to himself, doling it out to his Four Horsemen (get it?) when it suits his purposes. Like Satan, Apocalypse’s big problem is that he’s not God: specifically, he’s not omnipresent, and that gets in the way of his plans.
Typically in stories like this, when the Satan character needs smacking down, God shows up to do it. But there’s an interesting theological twist in X-Men: Apocalypse, and though it’s a bit tangled by the end, you can follow the thread if you’re paying attention.
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