The X-Men universe is vast and definitely has come a long way. From the spectacular X1 and X2 to terrible X3, from a dream reboot X-Men: First Class to sloppy X-Men: Apocalypse, there have been ups and downs in the X-Men movie franchise. The horrible portrayal of cult supervillain Apocalypse shattered the confidence of the fans, in fact, writer/producer Simon Kinberg accepted that the movie failed to meet audience expectations. He said:
“I think we took our eye off what has always been the bedrock of the franchise which is these characters. It became about global destruction and visual effects over emotion and character.”
He added:
“It’s always dangerous if your script is evolving while you’re shooting, Certainly, in hindsight, we all feel like the genre has been evolving aesthetically and tonally and that the film didn’t. There’s a lot that I think is very good in the film but, as a whole, it was struggling to find ways to coalesce, narratively emotionally and in terms of plot. Aesthetically, it felt sort of dated relative to an evolution you were seeing play out everywhere else. We learned a lot from that.”
But let’s give the studio a fair chance; despite the fact that they produced blunders like the Fantastic Four reboot, the old fantastic four sequels and the Holy Grail of mess ups X-Men Origins: Wolverine have provided us with hits like ‘Deadpool’ and more recently ‘Logan’. And Kitty Pryde is not a bad choice for a standalone movie.
The mutant is young and her powers are intriguing. More intriguing will be the way she’s allowed to be creative with those powers. Phasing through matter has some crazy combat applications and is certainly a handy move for stealth.
Kitty pride joined the X-Men family in the silver age of comic in the Uncanny X-Men #129 and in the hands of a director like Tim Miller we may have a fun ride to look forward to.
The source at Collider is reporting that the director of the movie will be Tim Miller. He was the man behind Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool who earned over $800 million at the worldwide box-office while the cost of production was just $60 million. It became the highest-grossing R-rated movie and best X-Men movie ever.
He is a grounded man who acknowledges the love and affection of fans. Here’s what he said in an interview after Deadpool broke box-office records:
“I thought opening at $50 million would be great. If we could open at fifty, I would be happy. Because at the budget we were, I felt if we could open at fifty, I would get a chance to make another movie. If it didn’t, then maybe not so much. Or maybe I’d have to wait another ten years or something like that”.
But then he opted out of Deadpool sequel which is coming this year due to ‘creative differences’ with actor Ryan Reynolds and the studio. But then he landed a major sci-fi gig “Terminator 6” where he will be collaborating with legendary James Cameron. Here’s what he said about the entire episode:
“I mean, I wanted to make Deadpool 2. I was going to do that, until I wasn’t. So, there was that, which took up about seven months of my time. But even then, David Ellison, who has the rights to the Terminator franchise and I were talking, like after Deadpool 2, it was going to be this Terminator.”
He added:
“I felt like there was more stories for Deadpool to tell there, but I’m happy that somebody else is telling them. There was a sense of relief in that I get to do something new versus Deadpool 2. I think it would’ve been a great movie, but it was also going to be a continuation of what we had done. This really gave me a chance to do something new.”
Tim Miller is exactly the kind of guy X-Men universe needs. He has got amazing cinematic sensibilities and deeper understanding of the comic-book characters. He is a turnaround specialist who gauges the fans’ inclinations and matches that with his overall vision. He will make a terrific Kitty Pryde movie should he agree to do it.
The News
The dust finally settled on the Fox-Disney merger in December. Although the deal is months if not years from over, much of fox now belongs to Disney for an amount of $52.4 Billion. This fact dictates that the X-Men, Deadpool, and Fantastic Four will be joining the rest of their Marvel family in the post-Avengers 4 MCU.
Be that as it may, Fox will still not stop flailing until it’s dying day, the studio announced perhaps the last comic movie they’ll ever get to make. And their homage? The headliner of Fox’ Legacy? None other the youngest mutant of Charles Xavier’s group, little Kitty Pryde.
The famous Canadian actress Ellen Page played Kitty Pryde in the X-Men franchise. She was pretty solid in her performances and served the mutant character well in all X-Men movies, while she was excellent in ‘Days of Future Past’.
Although Kitty Pryde was never a major X-Men character in the franchise, fans have always had a soft spot for her and they would want to see more of her. She had a vital part in Bryan Singer’s X-Men: Days of Future Past.
She made sure that Wolverine would remain stable while he is time-traveling to prevent future catastrophe. She displayed great poise and kept everyone together even when things looked hopeless as Sentinels are about to exterminate the entire X-Men species. Despite being one of the youngest mutants, she was very mature and courageous throughout.
The Consequence
Analyzing the available data it’s safe to say that fox has pretty much put all it’s egg in this final basket to push their brand value up. And who’s steering this ship? Well, Tim Miller would be my guess. The Deadpool director has a big job on his hands, he must create a masterpiece to end Fox’s reign(tyrannical ?) on these Marvel characters.
Kitty Pryde met us in the 80s with funky hair and was essentially what anime fans call a Lolicon or an American version of that. But some peculiar powers and great writing helped her make a place for herself in Charles Xavier’s school and slowly but surely in our hearts.
The story of X-Men is one of constant struggle, to not stray away from society but to be accepted by it. For a mutant like Kitty Pryde, who can undetectable when she wants to, this storyline applies all the more.
Besides, this might be a better alternative for X-Men fans as they are yearning for something new and different. Sources also say that even though fox is mostly Disney’s for all intents and purposes, the higher-ups still want to zealously move forward with the Marvel character movies.
My guess would be to advance the characters storylines to point that they are easily shifted to the MCU, so the audience gets characters that they are better familiar with. Regardless, we shall wait patiently for Fox’s final breaths. Deadpool 2, Venom and now Dark Phoenix and Kitty Pryde in the pipeline.
P.s. With the ending and set of Logan, it is highly likely that, whoever Fox picks to write the script, may she had some light on the circumstances leading to Logan. This may mean that the Kitty Pryde movie is an excuse to cover up Fox’s franchise’s long-standing continuity issues.
The movie may also address Charles Xavier’s problems with regards to control over his power and she had some light on the events preceding Logan. If not that, the final product may foreshadow the said circumstances. Of course, this is all pure speculation but the possibility exists nonetheless.
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