One grandiose superhero movie is out of the way with “Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice” opening this weekend, but another is coming in just a couple of short months with “X-Men: Apocalypse.” The big ensemble movie has graced the cover of Empire in the U.K., so that means lots of details from the magazine are trickling out. Of course it’s a massive good-guys-versus-bad-guys war, with Magneto (Michael Fassbender) and several X-Men like Storm, Angel and Psylocke being used as puppets by the evil mutant god Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac). And on the other side is Professor Xavier (James McAvoy) and his mutant team lead by Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence).
READ MORE: The Best & Worst Of ‘X-Men: Days Of Future Past’
But there’s one character featured in the last film prominently that won’t be around much. "As a central character, [Wolverine] didn’t fit into this particular story," director Bryan Singer told Empire. But Hugh Jackman’s been rumored for an appearance for a long time, and William Stryker and Weapon X — the clandestine government genetic research facility project that is part of Wolverine’s origin — is in the film, so we suspect you’ll probably see some kind of cameo there.
Singer already has his next film lined up, “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea,” but to hear it from the director, he is taking a mutant pause and not moving on for good. “Abandoning the franchise is not something I think about. But I could not roll into another X-Men movie tomorrow. And I hope not to. I hope to take a break."
In fact, the filmmaker is already looking ahead to possible villains for if/when he returns. "I’d love to use Proteus somehow," the filmmaker teased [via CBM]. "There’s a lot visually you could do with a character like that."
READ MORE: Ranked: All The ‘X-Men’ Movie Mutant Characters From Best To Worst
“X-Men: Apocalypse” co-stars Nicholas Hoult, Rose Byrne, Tye Sheridan, Sophie Turner, Olivia Munn, Lucas Till, Evan Peters, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Alexandra Shipp, Josh Helman, Lana Condor, and Ben Hardy. The film opens on May 27th, but it already has some stiff competition from another 20th Century Fox Mutant project: “Deadpool” has overtaken the entire X-Men series domestically ($349.4 million making it the highest grossing picture of the larger XCU at home) and will become the top grossing X-Men related film in a matter of days. It’s $1.9 million shy of surpassing the $747.9 million worldwide, the record currently held by “X-Men: Days Of Future Past.” Food for thought for Fox when a supporting character overtakes the mothership franchise. Meanwhile, new photos from ‘Apocalypse’ below.
