Is “Rocketman” star Taron Egerton sizing himself up to fill the suit of one of Marvel Studios’ most prized commodities? The actor admits he met with the Top Brass and maybe slicing into the X-Men’s top-billing as Wolverine!
Everyone wants their piece of the Marvel Universe! There’s no doubt that with the way the cinematic landscape has been shaken up after the studio’s most recent blockbusters visited and in many cases upended the expansive multiverse, all bets are off and everyone is out to get into the action. Among the studio’s most honored and hottest properties, are the X-Men which yielded 13 big-screen adventures so far, the last introducing the “next generation” of the children of the atom in 2020s The New Mutants.
20th Century, The studio that has held the rights to the network of adaptations based on Marvel Comics’ best-selling band of outcasts, became part of the Disney empire in 2019 effectively bridging the worlds in a much more amicable fashion than the deal Disney has with Sony, who shares custody of Spider-Man and any characters related to the web-slinger like Venom and the recently introduced Morbius with Marvel Studios. Indeed it’s been much talked about that Ryan Reynolds’ next outing as Deadpool will likely provide the connective tissue to bring the X-Men into the MCU.
Several Hollywood names have been connected to reprising or reinventing the roles of the mutant heroes which were first introduced to multiplexes in 2000. Patrick Stewart most recently reprised his role as the leader of the X-Men, Charles Xavier aka Professor X as a member of the superhero secret society, the Illuminati in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness starring Benedict Cumberbatch. The last time Stewart appeared as Professor X, was in 2017’s Logan which also signaled the final act of Hugh Jackman’s iconic portrayal of X-Men's favorite son: the Wolverine.
Jackman has steadily played the part for newly two decades and appeared as Wolverine in a total of eight films. Even with its R-rating, Logan brought a startlingly different dimension to the character that had not been seen before and most appropriately aligned with his wild more violent nature, was a box-office hit and was critically received well, although by the film’s conclusion it was apparent that this was the be accepted as the final act for the hero, and that Hugh Jackman would be stepping down for the role, leaving a vacuum to be filled.
Now it appears that Marvel Studios is ready to move on with the character’s next evolution and has tapped a fan-favorite candidate to assume the role of the X-Men’s clawed frontman. Taron Egerton has been mentioned in the past as an actor that audiences would want to play Wolverine in the MCU, and it appears that the Rocketman star is in the running. Reports are running rampant that Egerton, who is no stranger to big franchise hits having stepped into The King’s Men series and swashbuckled his way as the latest Robin Hood, has taken meetings with Marvel’s Kevin Feige.
The Next Evolution?
Citing a story that was published in the British GQ and reported by The Hollywood Reporter Egerton was quoted: “That anyone thinks I would be good for the part is really flattering.” The actor admits to being a fan of the Marvel Studios films, but it’s all possible fan service for the moment. “I’d be excited but I’d be apprehensive,” Egerton added. “Hugh [Jackman] is so associated with the role that I’d wonder if it’d be very difficult for someone else to do it.” Only time will tell and from the trajectory of the recent arc of the MCU films, the X-Men can’t be too far in the line of site for reintroduction.
With Spider-Man having opened the gates of the Marvel multiverse, and now Doctor Strange confronted many of the alternate sides of himself and other familiar faces in his wild adventure, anything can happen in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The X-Men franchise along with the web-slinger are still among the most successful blockbusters, and Marvel is likely to revisit and reinterpret the imprint’s most popular characters in order to fit into the scheme of the evolving cinematic narrative continues to unwind.
The Fanzite thefanzite.com will continue to follow the story, as more announcements and details are released around all the new Marvel Studio content coming to Disney+ and theaters!
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