Eventually, one of these days, Fox will find a filmmaker for X-Force that will stick.
Deadline is reporting that Drew Goddard has signed on to write and direct Fox’s planned X-Force film. The team film will spin-off from June’s Deadpool 2 and feature Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool and Josh Brolin’s Cable prominently.
Jeff Wadlow and Joe Carnahan were previously attached to write the script for the mutant black-ops team. Whether Goddard will use any of the scripts that came before or start from scratch has not been revealed.
Goddard is a protégé of Joss Whedon and J.J. Abrams, having written for the former’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel TV series, and the latter’s Alias and Lost. Abrams produced Goddard his first film script, Cloverfield, which was directed by Matt Reeves. Whedon co-wrote Goddard’s directorial debut, The Cabin in the Woods, with him. Goddard was nominated for an Academy Award for his adapted screenplay for The Martian.
He is no stranger to comic book adaptations either. He was briefly the showrunner for Netflix’s Daredevil, before having to step down to take on other Marvel Comics’ characters in the aborted The Sinister Six film. That film was intended to spin-off from the Andrew Garfield Spider-Man film, but was apparently cancelled when Sony and Marvel rebooted the character once more.
No word on what other characters will be in the team. As with many other Marvel Comic’ teams, X-Force has had many different incarnations and line-ups over the years.
The article also reveals that filming has ended on X-Men: New Mutants and Deadpool 2. The former will be arriving in theaters on April 13, 2018. The latter has a June 1, 2018 release date. No word when X-Force will hit theaters, but it will most likely arrive after November 2, 2018’s X-Men: Dark Phoenix. That gives Goddard plenty of time to wrap up his next directorial job, Bad Times at the El Royale with Chris Hemsworth and Jeff Bridges. That project is also at Fox.
