Marvel Studios has unveiled the first members of its next superhero team – the X-Men.
At the D23 Disney fan event this evening, Christopher Abbott has been announced as playing the team’s leader Professor Xavier, while Inde Navarrette, break out star from this year’s Obsession, will be joining the film as the young mutant Rogue and Maya Boyd will be appearing as the weather-controlling hero Storm.
Taking on the role of the villain of the film, Mr. Sinister, will be Star Wars‘ Adam Driver.
They will be joining the previously cast Sadie Sink, who appeared as Jean Grey in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, Samara Weaving as Emma Frost, and Kit Connor as Scott Summers / Cyclops. Weaving and Connor had been reported by the trades as being part of the cast but Marvel withheld confirmation.
Jack Shreier is set to direct.
Born Nathaniel Essex sometime in the 19th Century, Mr. Sinister is obsessed with engineering humanity into a perfect race of superhumans. An encounter with the X-Men villain and mutant Apocalypse, who augmented Essex into a long-lived scientist, manipulating the lives of several mutant heroes and villains for his own ends. Some of the later installments in the 20th Century Fox X-Men film franchise referenced Mr. Sinister, but Fox’s acquisition of Disney and the subsequent shuttering of the franchise in that incarnation put an end to any plans that there may have been for the character.
One of the core group of characters in the Marvel Comics universe, the X-Men were created in 1963 by writer/editor Stan Lee and artist/co-plotter Jack Kirby. The series grew in popularity as readers saw its superpowered mutant heroes and villains equally despised by the general human population as an allegory for the civil rights struggle. The 1970s and `80s saw the popularity of the group grow thanks to the addition of new characters and epic storylines such as the “The Phoenix Saga.” The characters have also transitioned into other media appearing or starring a number of animated projects and a live action film series from 20th Century Fox.
The X-Men will be in theaters on May 5, 2028.
