Ok, those who held out some blind hope that Bryan Singer might direct “Wolverine 2,” get over it. It’s not going to happen.
The sequel to “X-Men Origins: Wolverine,” looks — despite our internal skepticism — that it will indeed shoot next year (though likely not in January) and thus Jackman has dropped out of Kevin Lima’s “Avon Man” comedy (which was supposed to shoot earlier this spring and then was delayed until the fall so Jackman could do “Butter” with Jennifer Garner). We’ve heard “Wolverine 2” in early 2011 for a while now, but for whatever reason doubted it.
Deadline reports that Jackman could still star in Lee Daniels’ civil rights drama “Selma” which is said to possibly shoot this fall (though it still needs financing), but Jackman’s had to put on and lose weight once already this year and he may not want to do it again (he packed it on for Daniels’ film and when it didn’t happen, shed his weight for “Real Steel”).
But maybe we shouldn’t be completely surprised to hear “Wolverine 2” news, as just recently we heard rumors of Tony Scott and Matt Reeves being possible contenders to direct, but with Scott taking on Mark Millar’s “Nemesis” it seems doubtful that he’d helm two comic-book films (other names that came up in relation to the gig include Kathryn Bigelow, Timur Bekmambetov and Daniel Espinosa, but it appears that none of them bit). Reeves is probably still up in the air, but out of all these potential directors, he seems to be the best fit. Our guess is that intel was what Fox wanted rather than true-blue reality, but we’ll see. No director is currently attached to the X-Men sequel, but that will change in the upcoming months. “Wolverine” is seemingly damaged goods, but the storyline of the follow-up film, might be too hard to pass up for some filmmakers. The script, written by Christopher McQuarrie (“The Usual Suspects,” “Valkyrie”), will center around the fan-favorite storyline of Logan in Japan, battling ninjas, falling in love and fighting for his honor (the original Marvel four-part “Wolverine” mini-series was pretty great at the time).
As for Bryan Singer, he’ll be busy with “Jack The Giant Killer” (he still hasn’t cast a lead yet and the picture was originally scheduled to shoot this summer; the 1st quarter of next year is a direct conflict). And Jackman will still remain a producer on “Avon Man” which will look for a new male lead and hopes to shoot in October.
