Variety at last confirms a rumor that began more than six months ago: Gossip Girl creator Josh Schwartz is writing X-Men: First Class for 20th Century Fox.
Although no plot details have been revealed, the trade paper notes that the studio has been leaning toward using younger characters introduced previously in the X-Men franchise. The three movies have earned a combined $1.2 billion worldwide.
The spinoff shares a title with the Marvel Comics series introduced in 2006 by Jeff Parker and Roger Cruz about the original X-Men: Angel, Beast, Cyclops, Iceman and Marvel Girl.
First Class joins a slate of X-Men films that includes next summer’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine, a planned Magneto prequel, and a possible Deadpool spinoff.
Schwartz, who also created the TV series The O.C. and Chuck, also could direct the movie.
November 19th, 2008 at 8:27 am
Sounds good – love to see more of Cyclops, Jean Grey, and the Beast when they were young. Shame they stuffed up continuty and showed Angel and Iceman already – the can’t be in the movie.
November 19th, 2008 at 10:46 am
Although I’m not really looking forward to this, I think in terms of the premise itself, it’s a brilliant person to have do this!
Only worry is this film will ignore the idea of young people growing in in a world rife with prejudice and will instead be the MU movie eqivalent of that ‘Sky High’ superhero school movie.
As long as this deals with what makes the X-Men franchise distinct, the central tenet of valour in the face of oppression, I’ll be pleased…
November 19th, 2008 at 12:41 pm
I have to wonder: Is this the same person Rich Johnston alluded to in his most recent Lying in the Gutters.
Knowing Rich, we won’t have to wait too long to find out.
November 19th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
Could be good, could suck… Hard to say at this point… Too bad the First Class comics weren’t out when the X-Men films started. This might’ve been a good way to kick off the franchise.
My question is this: What’s with all the X-prequels now? Wolverine, Magneto, and now First Class? Why not try to fix everything that went wrong in X3 (getting some good writers and a director on board would be the first step) and come up with a really great X4 that brings back Xavier (they had an “out” after the closing credits of X3) and Cyclops (hey, we never saw the body) and could get that franchise back on track? Regardless of the quality of X3, it feels like that film ended with a lot of stuff hanging. Stuff that apparently will not be addressed or resolved. Really, what was the point then? If that movie could make the bank it did, imagine what a really good X-Men 4 do.
Then again, this is FOX we’re talking about… I guess a lot of this rests on how good Wolverine ends up being. That could go either way too.
Will the First Class movie address how Hank McCoy was seen (very briefly, on a TV screen) looking like a normal guy in X2 but all blue and hairy in X3? As it is, I’m not enough of an X-fan to now how Hank’s look changed in the comics either.
November 19th, 2008 at 1:28 pm
As much as I liked the X-Men movies (I’m a huge X-Men fan), I’m hoping this is an indicator that they are rebooting the X-Men movie franchise to bring it in line with what they are doing with the other Marvel movies.
Here’s hoping they keep what worked (Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellan), and tighten up the story.
November 19th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
I wonder which characters are going to fill out the Class? Assuming it’s in the continuity of the movies so far, Cyclops, Jean and Beast seem certain. Maybe Storm. Iceman and Angel are no-nos.
I suspect we’ll see some cross-pollination from the Wolverine Origins movie if Gambit gets out of that alive…
Schwarz would seem to be a good choice for this – but who’ll be playing Xavier? Patrick Stewart again?
November 19th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
“the trade paper notes that the studio has been leaning toward using younger characters introduced previously in the X-Men”
Ugh. I’m a huge X-Men fan and for the most part i was disappointed by the movies, ESPECIALLY 3 (except Beast). If this is supposed to be a reboot, i can get behind it. But if they are using the younger characters from the previous movies, like Rogue (oh wait, can’t, hahahaLAME!), Iceman, or Kitty, that gets a big ol’ thumbs down.
I’m more looking forward to seeing X-Men Origins: Wolverine, for Gambit (who i believe will get out alive), Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds, yes!) and Blob.
November 19th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
I think that the 1st class title is misleading. I don’t think the film will relate to the comic of the same name in any way. Hence the blurb in the article stating
“Although no plot details have been revealed, the trade paper notes that the studio has been leaning toward using younger characters introduced previously in the X-Men franchise.”
I think ‘franchise’ here refers to the film franchise, not the comics. This makes me think that the film will be more of a ‘Young X-Men’ influenced film, with the first class in the title referring to a team/house-club within the school… like the ‘Hellions’ et al names were used in the New X-Men comics to place the school-students into groups.
I can’t imagine a 1st class film that will ret-cot the whole series of films as I kind of think, due to the quality and impact the X-films have had, that Fox would take the risk of losing audiences through superhero-movie fatigue. Associating it with an established franchise would make more sense, at least in my opinion.
As the other X spin-off movies seem to be presented as part of this movieverse, I cannot see the logic in making this the one and only movie NOT within that universe.
My thinking is that 1st class may refer either to the older X chars who featured in the films, and will be some sort of prequel, or it will be a generic reference to a young team of mutants who reside and are taught at the school.
The idea that it might be a ‘Sky High’ with mutants fills me with ‘Generation x’ the movie inspired dread…
November 19th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
The Variety article is poorly written. As Spectropoetics said, it is not clear whether we are dealing with the grown X-Men as teens or with the students. I think it seems like they are using Iceman and Kitty and friends, but I could read it the other way.
So who would the roster include? Iceman, Kitty (Josh should recruit his friend Leighton Meester if Ellen Page is uninterested), Colossus (yum), and who else? Rogue is powerless and has always been a drain on the movies. Jubilee, Angel? I wonder which older X-Men would be around as teachers.
I hope they go up against the Hellions, maybe led by Emma Frost.
November 19th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
I think that if this movie actually gets off the ground, it should basically reboot the franchise. X1 and 2 were awesome, but i feel that X3 made it so that they need to reboot it if they really want to continue the franchise.
Also, it would be awesome if they would officially establish an ‘X-Men team’ that wouldn’t just be background characters.
November 19th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
I have never heard of this before.
I am wary for a couple reasons, including the fact that I have no idea what this is about.
I wish they had started the X-Franchise with the original five in some capacity.
In any case, if this movie winds up starring Iceman in some way, I’ll go see it.
November 19th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
I agree with t3 they backed themselves into a corner. Starting out with the core group as teens is a cool idea. Way back when you had the 3 way triangle with angel hitting on jean while scott fawned over her. You had iceman and beast clowning around. Jean really was not developed well till new x-men so hopefully they do some retconing. Also I don’t want to see anything phoenix related in the movies ever again.
November 19th, 2008 at 9:01 pm
Can Anyone say “New Mutants Baby” here comes Cannonball!!!!!!!!!!!!!! F%$# Yeah……..Sunspot He!! yeah!!!
November 20th, 2008 at 12:34 am
This is a bad idea, first of all continuity is screwed up that even non-fanboy movie goers will say WTF…second a teeny bopper writer? uhhh maybe he can write one liners but his take would seen to pander to teens….finally an X-Men movie without Wolverine will never work…while it maybe a good film without him the general movie goer will feel like somethings missing… I’d rather see an X-Men 4 than a prequel….
November 20th, 2008 at 8:05 am
Although I would rather see it mirror the comic it takes it’s name from, I suspect it will stick to the continuity of the previous films and really it should. Otherwise it will just turn off too many non-comic book fans. There are a lot of folks who are just fans of the X-movies and not the comics.
November 20th, 2008 at 10:44 am
I also think it sounds like it’s leaning more towards a NewMutants rather than First Class (i.e. X-Men the Early Years).
So it will probably be Iceman; Kitty; Rogue; Collossus; maybe Siryn, Jubilee etc. which could work if the script is good.