FEATURE: What The Future Holds For Marvel's 'X-Men' Reboot

FEATURE: How Marvel’s ‘X-Men’ Reboot Can Update & Separate Itself From The Fox-Era

With Marvel’s development on “X-Men” finally in full swing, we have some thoughts about the direction of the new project and how it could strive to establish itself as different from what happened in the 20th Century Fox era of feature films alongside fixing some longstanding grievances and limitations.

Last week saw the confirmation (via Deadline) that British screenwriter Michael Lesslie (“Now You See Me 3”) is indeed “in talks” with Marvel Studios to pen their upcoming “X-Men” reboot (previous reports suggest there were multiple contenders in the mix). Lesslie’s credits include “Macbeth,” “Assassin’s Creed,” the recent “Hunger Games” prequel, and wrote four episodes of the John Le Carre spy series “The Little Drummer Girl” that starred MCU actress Florence Pugh (“Thunderbolts,” “Black Widow”) and directed by Korean filmmaker Park Chan-wook (“Old Boy”).

A director has yet to be named for “X-Men,” however, we’ve been pushing the idea of recruiting from within and mentioned years ago about considering Ryan Coolger (“Black Panther”) for the gig after extending his deal with the studio as he’s involved with “Eyes of Wakanda” and has been long assumed to wrap up a trilogy with “Black Panther 3.”

MULTIVERSE MUTANT VARIANTS: While we are still a bit in the dark about the studio’s main plan for the X-Men, we’ve seen variants appear in various recent films with Charles Xavier/Professor X (Patrick Stewart) in “Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness” dying in Earth-838, in “The Marvels” we see a CGI variant of Dr. Hank McCoy/Beast (voiced by Kelsey Grammer) where he mentions another variant of Xavier, and “Deadpool & Wolverine” brings in the TVA from “Loki” alongside with the tease of Wade Wilson (Previously existed in his own universe outside of the Singerverse since he had variants of both Colossus and Juggernaut) and a mysterious Logan variant (We don’t know for sure if both are making the jump to Earth-616 the film until we see how it ends).

“Fantastic Four” is expected to take place in a retro-futuristic universe, but it remains to be seen how mutants will be joining the fold as Marvel has yet to telegraph what the plan actually is. However, the internet has plenty of theories, none of which have been confirmed, including the rumbling of an MCU reboot after “Avengers: Secret Wars.”

There is the obvious notion that “Deadpool & Wolverine” is simply saying goodbye to Fox’s era of Marvel films, hence why Jennifer Garner’s Elektra is set to appear in the project when she had zero connection to the “X-Men” movies and even less likely to join the MCU for the foreseeable future.

MCU MUTANTS ALREADY EXIST: King Ch’ah Toh Almehen/Namor (Tenoch Huerta) is referred to as a mutant in “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” it’s also worth mentioning that he’s part of an X-Men roster in more recent comics and is heralded as Marvel Comics’ first mutant. He’s not the only one either, Kamala Khan/Ms. Marvel (Iman Vellani) also had been teased in her Disney+ series as being a mutant while incorporating the “X-Men” animated theme, and Damage Control seemed to be developing an early version of the Sentinel Program (via Stark/Mysterio drones) as a government response to combat meta-human threats.

Having Namor or Kamala becoming a cohort of the X-Men wouldn’t be a bizarre notion.

FIX GLARING PROBLEMS OF THE SINGERVERSE: It’s hard to not be aware that Kevin Feige is precious about his time working on the original run of “X-Men” films, but they clearly weren’t great adaptations of the characters or their comic book adventures while they were still mostly entertaining installments.

Mutants like Cyclops, Rogue, Storm, Callisto, and a few others barely resembled their comic book counterparts during the Fox days. Hopefully, fans will finally get authentic versions, and we’ve already seen that Marvel is open to finally putting them in their iconic costumes. Hugh Jackman, of course, wearing a version of the Jim Lee-era suit (still waiting to see footage of the cowl) in the upcoming “Deadpool” sequel.

Some of the problems weren’t just improper takes on various mutants. Shoehorning them in the movies without much of an introduction, exploration of their origins, or much character development without an impact on the story. A good amount ended up being included just to kill off, used in the background, or simply added as an Easter Egg/cameo for the die-hards.

When director Bryan Singer returned to tackle two more movies, “X-Men: Days of Future Past” and “X-Men: Apocalypse,” a big issue started to materialize and conflict with the canon of the previous movies. ALL MUTANTS now, suddenly, without explanation, had a slow-aging power set when that was once relegated to a handful of specific mutants. It was a lazy method by producers to keep the “X-Men: First Class” cast together while the movies jumped decades spanning four different decades (starting in the 1960s and ending in the 1990s with “Dark Phoenix”) while the actors never really actually aged, which was frustrating for fans. Since the MCU is already filled with characters that don’t age normally, if the reboot decided to only make this a characteristic for a few like Wolverine, Magneto, Mystique, Mister Sinister, Apocalypse, and Sabretooth, we’d be all for it.

In the end, consistency or continuing established franchise canon wasn’t a prime concern, adding to the habitual confusion audiences experienced over two decades. There is the optimism that the team over at Marvel Studios would be way more dedicated to make sure everything clicks and fits together.

Christopher Marc on X: "I am not saying that Marvel needs to be competing  with STAR WARS or DUNE, but they have a chance to do their own big space  opera via

EXPAND THE COSMIC SIDE OF THE MUTANT SAGA: Another thing that the Singerverse really never got right was the X-Men’s connection to space opera elements via The Shi’ar Empire and The Imperial Guard. Allowing them to take pages from “Star Wars” and “Dune” without having to strictly rely on The Guardians of The Galaxy for future cosmic adventures. Cyclops’ father/brother are members of the space pirate team The Starjammers. Marvel even has their own take on the Xenomorph with the deadly invasive alien species, The Brood, and the other big space invaders, The Phalanx.

An expansion could also mean exploring a heap of other mutant-related teams on Earth, such as Alpha Flight, X-Force, X-Factor, Excalibur, The Morlocks, and Exiles.

RECASTING FOR A NEW GENERATION: Recasting Wolverine would certainly be Marvel’s main priority as the character, thanks in part to Hugh Jackman’s run as the Canadian mutant, is easily as popular/well-known as Spider-Man or anyone on the Avengers roster. Despite all the teases from “Deadpool & Wolverine” of Jackman’s variant making the jump to the mainline MCU in Earth-616, there is a strong common sense expectation he’s not going to be playing the role for Marvel over the next 10-plus years.

There have been plenty of fan-castings online featuring a laundry list of genre-friendly actors such as Daniel Radcliffe (“Harry Potter”), Taron Egerton (“The Kingsman”), Karl Urban (“Dredd,” “The Boys”), Zac Efron (“The Iron Claw”), and even one that had Jackman’s public endorsement, Tom Hardy (after director Matthew Vaughn attempted to cast him as Young Wolverine during his time making “X-Men” films). My own opinion is that folks on the rise like Jeremy Allen White (“The Bear,” “The Iron Claw”) and Austin Butler (“The Bikeriders,” “Dune: Part Two”) might be more in-tune with the kind of actor that Marvel should be seeking out.

I’m not too worried about Marvel recasting the X-Men lineup, mainly, from seeing how they’ve handled “Fantastic Four.”

X-Men '97 - Official Trailer (Marvel)

Many fans enjoying “X-Men ’97” feel that Marvel should simply move forward with a live-action incarnation of the animated show and place that version within the mainline MCU. But the problem with that idea is that they’ve killed off characters and explored storylines that could still be reworked for the big screen. Even with the show’s popularity, I don’t see a huge reason to start this new era of the X-Men by having to adhere to a 30-year-old pre-existing canon when this should be a true REBOOT. It’s exactly why I think a reset from the Singerverse is a must, too. Then again, there are some neat character choices that could be carried over.

We’re sure to get some more updates on “X-Men” in the coming months as Marvel Studios looking to make a presentation this summer at the D23 event.

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