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At the end of X-Men: Dark Phoenix, Charles Xavier is seen in France, having retired from the headmaster/X-Men life. Magneto finds him there, and they play a game of chess, for old time's sake.

The Phoenix is seen flying in the sky.

As the movie is supposed to be the last installment in the "main" X-Men cinematic continuity (barring the upcoming New Mutants movie), I was wondering if there was any kind of nod to that, something more than meets the eye, to conclude the saga?

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  • Note: this is a self-answered question. Actually, I first noticed the stuff I put in my answer, then wanted to provide it as a question here, but... It's hard to "show research" when you're phrasing your question based on your knowledge of the answer. Sorry for that apparent "no research", then.
    – Jenayah
    Jun 9, 2019 at 23:16

1 Answer 1

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When watching that scene, three things stood out to me in that regard:

  • The café where Charles Xavier and Magneto​ meet is called "Les Vieux Copains", which translates into "The Old Friends". This is an obvious callback to Xavier repeatedly calling Magneto his "old friend", and wrapping their friendship nicely, when Erik had told him to "cut the old friend shit" earlier in the movie;

  • When the camera zooms out, the street seen at the bottom right is the "Rue de la Paix", literally "Peace Street". This, I think, is a way of showing Erik and Charles themselves reached peace, as well as the world towards mutants. This seems a bit too obvious to have been a generic French street name some prop guy had to choose at random;

  • Also, when the camera zooms out, I'm pretty sure the building with a domed roof seen on the left is the Panthéon, which is a monument honoring very specific people who impacted History in a great way. While there might not be a specific X-Men connection there1, I saw it as a final homage to the fallen heroes, who tried their best to protect the world.2


1 For the record, while all the people currently in the Panthéon are French, it's not actually mandatory. As such, a foreign mutant could possibly be buried there.

2 Yes, it's also a way to throw in an easily recognizable Paris monument, but that very building carries more significance relevant to the plot than, say, the Sacré-Cœur or the Eiffel Tower, though the latter is also to be seen.

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  • For what it is worth, rue de la paix is not near the Pantheon, so it is probably intentional (though it is not uncommon that movies get the geography of Paris, or any other cities, wrong).
    – Taladris
    Jun 10, 2019 at 4:44
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    Funny fact : "Les Vieux Copains" translates into "The Old Friends" but on every X-Men movie where they call each other "my old friend" they translated it to "mon vieil ami" (= "Les Vieux Amis") which is way more natural in french. "Mon vieux copain" is interpreted "My old/ex boyfriend" in french. As a French, a café named "les vieux copains" would be odd when a café named "les vieux amis" would be OK. So the name of the café is intentional too, as no café would be named like this in France
    – LP154
    Jun 10, 2019 at 8:03
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    @LP154 oh, do they? I'm French as well (which is probably why I picked the three bits of trivia above) but I don't like French dubbings, so I only heard the original version. Might be where I grew up, but I often use "copain" for either friend or boyfriend. Your comment is completely valid though! :)
    – Jenayah
    Jun 10, 2019 at 8:13
  • Yes they always said "Mon vieil ami", I think Xavier saying "Mon vieux copain" to Magneto could me misunderstood (maybe even more when Magneto was portrayed by Ian McKellen)
    – LP154
    Jun 10, 2019 at 8:17
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    @LP154: actually, "copain/copine" and "ami/amie" are quite ambiguous (see here french.stackexchange.com/questions/1512/…) and can mean friendship or amourous relationship. For example, I don't think Brassens was thinking about a (poly)amourous relationship when writing "Les Copains d'abord". I couldn't find any cafe called "les Vieux Copains" but there is "le Bistrot des Copains" in Strasbourg.
    – Taladris
    Jun 10, 2019 at 9:24

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