Director Jake Schreier has dropped a few intriguing hints about his upcoming X-Men reboot, including some of the ways in which his experience making Thunderbolts* is helping him bring Marvel’s mutant team back to the big screen. After the 20th Century Fox version of the X-Men appears in Avengers: Doomsday, Marvel is set to bring a brand new version of the superhero squad into the MCU for Phase 7 and what many fans are calling the Mutant Saga.
Speaking with Empire, Schreier — who was hired to direct X-Men following the enthusiastic critical reaction that greeted Thunderbolts* — teased fans about the project. He’s still keeping specific details close to the vest, only saying, “I can’t say anything about it, but we’ve started work on X-Men, and that’s obviously very, very exciting.” He went on to discuss how his time working on Thunderbolts* is influencing and informing his approach, saying:
“There are so many things that I didn’t know about before I started [Thunderbolts*]. The biggest learning curve for me was the proportion of the action to the more emotional, character-driven scenes, and how, even though it’s more shooting days than I’ve ever had, they get eaten up quite quickly by the action stuff. By the time we got to the end of it, it felt like, ‘Oh, now I feel like we get how to do this a little bit better.'”
The X-Men’s Long-Awaited Arrival in the MCU
Ever since Marvel Studios acquired 20th Century Fox, fans have been eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Fantastic Four and the X-Men. While the Fantastic Four have now headlined their own MCU feature film, elements of the X-Men have slowly been teased through various MCU titles. The Falcon and the Winter Soldier introduced Madripoor, a staple of the X-Men comics. Ms. Marvel and Namor have been classified as mutants in the MCU. Captain America: Brave New World introduced adamantium, the indestructible metal that covers Wolverine’s skeleton. This also doesn’t include the multiverse X-Men teases in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, The Marvels, and Deadpool & Wolverine, all culminating in Avengers: Doomsday.
The X-Men film isn’t expected to hit theaters until 2028, the year that — perhaps not coincidentally — marks the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s 20th anniversary. The team’s long-awaited arrival will offer a full-fledged introduction for fans following what’s expected to be an epic team-up in Avengers: Secret Wars. Because of that, it might be some time until casting news for X-Men begins to emerge. However, that certainly hasn’t stopped numerous rumors about actors like Margaret Qualley or Harris Dickinson being eyed to play key roles.
Due to the X-Men being one of Marvel’s most prolific comics series for decades, the MCU has plenty of stories to pull from. Reasonably, X-Men storylines and characters alone could support their own three-phase saga, and it would barely scratch the surface of what the franchise has to offer. Even though the box office performance of films like The Fantastic Four: First Steps and Thunderbolts* might be below what Marvel fans expected, the word of mouth has been strong enough to rebuild audience trust after a few disappointing entries in the blockbuster franchise. With Spider-Man: Brand New Day and the two Avengers films likely set to be big box office hits, the stage will be set for the X-Men to lead the MCU into a bright new future.
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
