X1 was the better movie. More emotion, more heart. Even with having to wade through the origins of the characters, they still showed great bonding between Wolverine and Rogue (but didn't expand on it)... the sparring between W and Cyclops.. and there was a little more focus on the Professor.
This time the only good characters were Pyro, Mystique and maybe Nightcrawler because he had so much screen time. Even Magneto was better in the first when he hit the train station. Contrast Pyro's screen time with Iceman's. He's not on long, never mentions his family, but we can see he's uncomfortable with the Academy and envies Bobby his family. In contrast, Iceman's just flat.
Overall they expected that you'd seen X1 but didn't build on it enough. Even the opening CGI sequence was a poor rehash of the first one.
BTW Jubilee only had 2 words in the movie, she was one of the 6 kids kidnapped... Gambit (Remy LeBoeuf) was the name above Magneto's (Eric Lenscher) when Mystique was searching the computer files, he didn't appear in the movie. Hank McCoy (Beast) was the scientist interviewed on TV.