X-Men: First Class Taking Form

Morning all,

As I’m sure lots of you have already heard/read/seen news on, the next X-Men feature film (X-Men: First Class) is in fact a prequel to the first three films. Behind the camera lenses will be Matthew Vaughn as director (Kick-Ass and Layer Cake), Josh Schwartz (The OC and Gossip Girl) as one of the writers and story consultant Bryan Singer (X-Men, X2, Superman and Usual Suspects). Not a bad staff, but they are taking on a rather hugely important origin story. Not only is X-Men one of the more successful Marvel franchises of all time, it is one of the more successful entertainment franchises of our era. I’m glad they are stepping up, but it’s not going to be easy.

In front of the camera you can expect to see James McAvoy playing a young Charles Xavier. Honestly, before the Scotsman was confirmed I had serious doubts about this flick, but knowing his work from Wanted, The Last King Of Scotland and Atonement I’ll admit, this is a pretty damn good choice on paper. Also confirmed as of, like today, is newcomer Benjamin Walker who will be playing Hank McCoy also known as Beast. Walker hasn’t done a ton in front of the camera save some small appearances in Flags of Our Fathers and All Saints Day, so this is a bit of a mystery. But come on… Anything is an improvement on Kelsey Grammer‘s rendition of Dr. McCoy in X-3.

The rumour mill is filled with other actors like Amber Heard possibly taking the role of Mystique and Michael Fassbender from Ingorious Basterds and Jonah Hex possibly coming aboard to play Eric Lensherr, but nothing is certain at this point. At least according to my single Google search. In any case, X-Men: First Class looks like it’s shaping into something interesting to say the least.