After praise from Disney CEO Bob Iger (on a company investor earnings call) for Jake Schreier‘s “Thunderbolts*” (“The New Avengers“) recent success, the director is now being eyed to helm Marvel Studios‘ reboot of the “X-Men” franchise.
Trades such as THR, Variety, and Deadline all report that Schreier is in the mix to direct “X-Men,” which already has a script from screenwriter Michael Lesslie (“Macbeth,” “The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes”).
However, all the reports are quick to point out it’s only the early days of his involvement as a contract hasn’t been finalized with Marvel/Disney. Yet, this is extremely promising that Marvel is looking internally for a director.
READ MORE: Ryan Reynolds Developing ‘Deadpool’ Team-Up Movie At Marvel Featuring ‘X-Men’ Members, Is It ‘X-Force’?
Schreier’s elevation at Marvel isn’t that shocking given that “Thunderbolts*” has been a huge critical, audience, and financial win for the studio as the summer approaches and their “Fantastic Four” reboot (helmed by “WandaVision” director Matt Shakman) hits screens in July. The filmmaker also recently dipped his toes into the world of “Star Wars,” working on “Skeleton Crew” at Disney+, and first hit many people’s radar with the cute sci-fi crime flick “Robot & Frank” along with his acclaimed Netflix series “Beef.”
The “X-Men” is very much a superhero project about government overreach, fascism, bigotry, human rights, unlawful detentions, work camps, human trafficking, and deep conflict based on hate within society. Given that, Schreier might be the perfect pick to tackle the dark subject matter (trauma and mental health being key elements of “Thunderbolts*”) of the franchise as Marvel enters a new phase and attempts a hard reboot of the team after the events of the next two “Avengers” films.
How exactly Marvel is going to tackle this new era of The Mutant Saga isn’t quite clear, as it has been well-established with “Deadpool & Wolverine“, those Foxverse characters are sort of off in their own universe, although connected to the greater MCU via the TVA from “Loki,” and we’ll see many of them (Professor X, Beast, Nightcrawler, and Mystique from the original films) including Channing Tatum‘s Gambit in “Avengers: Doomsday.”
There is an expectation that by the time the reboot comes around, they’ll have sorted all this out, and whether we’ll see legacy actors or completely new ones suiting up for the next 10 years. Either way, we’ll keep our fingers crossed that they end up using The Newton Brothers‘ updated theme song from the animated series “X-Men ’97.”
Interestingly enough, Ryan Reynolds is said to be writing a non-solo “Deadpool” crossover film with “X-Men characters” that may or may not be an “X-Force” revival.
During the Fox era of the franchise toward the end, Jon Hamm (“Fargo”) was once considered for the villainous role of Mister Sinister, who could be the perfect long-term bad guy for a new string of feature films, and Hamm is still game to do it.
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We can’t wait until Marvel starts casting for this new iteration of the “X-Men” and announces the direction they’re going with it.
