Dark Phoenix will mark nearly 20 years of X-Men films, and hopefully a proper attempt at the Jean Grey storyline. Twentieth Century Fox previously attempted it with the 2006’s X-Men: The Last Stand but was mowed down by fans and critics. The last time we saw an X-Men movie in theaters was the lukewarm X-Men: Apocalypse back in 2016 that reeled in more than $543 million at the box office. As Dark Phoenix approaches, it will likely bring in a nice chunk of change as well, but hopefully this X-Men film will be received with more praise.
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20th Century Fox
The Plot
The film focuses on Jean Grey (Sophie Turner) as she battles with her transformation into the Dark Phoenix—and also battles with her fellow X-Men as well. Based on the trailers and posters the metamorphism looks violent and involves some interstellar travel, which would be a first in an X-Men movie.
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Courtesy of 20th Century Fox / Jessica Chastain (Robert Kamau / Getty Images
The Cast
In addition to Turner, this flick will continue to build on the cast of the last three X-Men films, including Jennifer Lawerence (Mystique), James McAvoy (Professor X), Michael Fassbender (Magneto), Evan Peters (Quicksilver), and more.
The main new addition for the film is Jessica Chastain, whose character will most likely stay a mystery until you see the actual movie. However, she did confirm that she will be playing the antagonist. In the trailer you can see Chastain coaxing Grey to unleash her true power. There are tons of fan theories about this character, but nothing has been confirmed.
Although this is a new film, at the end of the day it’s still a bit of a remake, and the initial trailer that released months ago felt like a rehashing of X-Men: The Last Stand. However, the more recent trailer added some context and character moments that felt completely fresh. We also see that X-Men have been captured this time around, which didn’t happen in The Last Stand.
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Mystique May Die
Spoiler Alert: Inboth trailers it’s obvious that not all mutants are going to make it out of this one alive. If you piece together some of the images from the trailer, you’ll notice that Mystique and Quicksilver aren’t at the funeral. In Last Stand, both Cyclops and Professor X caught the stray bullets of Grey’s uncontrollable power.
It looks like Mystique will take the fall especially sinceLawrence was reportedly ready to move on from the franchise following 2016’s X-Men: Apocalypse. She ultimately returned to the franchise because of her friendship with Dark Phoenix writer and producer Simon Kinberg.
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Poster Child
For those who missed X-Men: Apocalypse, Jean Grey was extremely timid and unsure of her powers, which you’d expect any teenager to be, until the final scene. Judging by the film’s posters, she will probably be wreaking havoc all film long, and flexing her limitless powers.
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Things are Delayed
Although a summer date seems like a no-brainer for this type of comic book action flick, the original release date was November 2018, before it was pushed to February 14, and finally to the summer of 2019.
Kinberg said it was a combination of reasons for the film’s delay—pointing to visual effects not being ready, reshoots for the third act of the movie, and June providing a bigger opportunity globally—according to a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly (EW). “November was always a very ambitious release date for us, given how many visual effects and how complex the visual effects in this film were going to be,” said Kinberg in the EW interview. “When we felt like we weren’t going to be able to complete the movie to the level we wanted to complete it from a visual effects standpoint, we considered moving it from November to February.”
He added, “It’s very close to Captain Marvel. The studio started to feel that the movie was so massive in scale that it could compete in the most competitive time for films, which is summer. So we started looking at the potential for summer dates, and June 7 stood out as a date we could have for ourselves.”
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Michael Tran / Stringer / Getty
A Directorial Debut
Simon Kinberg will be making his directorial debut with Dark Phoenix. However he’s already racked up a bunch of Marvel producer credits with X-Men: First Class, both Deadpool movies, Logan, and more. He also has a few significant writer credits to his name since he’s penned xXx: State of the Union, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Sherlock Homes, and more.
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Roberto Machado Noa / LightRocket / Getty
Film Location
Montreal, Canada is the filming location of choice, according to IMDB.
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Courtesy of 20th Century Fox
Will X- Men and Deadpool Join MCU?
For those business-savvy movie goers, Disney will officially acquire 21st Century Fox on March 20. This transition could mean a possible Deadpool and X: Men in an Avengers movie, which has never happened prior due to character rights.
Last year, Avengers directors Joe and Anthony Russo said “I’m sure of it,” with regards to the X-Men joining the MCU. Obviously, this won’t be a simple task with the intertwining storyline of all of the current Marvel movies, but at least we have some hope.
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Summertime Release
Dark Phoenix will hit theaters June 7, and according to IMDB,the film is predicted to net between $300-450 worldwide.
