Ever since the first X-Men movie back in 2000, Stan Lee has made a regular habit of making cameos in movies featuring characters that he either helped create or contributed to in a major way. Part of the fun of watching Marvel movies over the last 13 years has been keeping an eye out for the comic book legend's moment in the spotlight, be it rescuing pedestrians from falling debris (Spider-Man), drinking gamma radiation infected soda (The Incredible Hulk) or getting mistaken for Hugh Hefner (Iron Man). Earlier this year we got to see him as a pageant judge in Shane Black's Iron Man 3 and there's a very good chance that he will be making an appearance later this year in Alan Taylor's Thor: The Dark World, but there is one upcoming comic book movie that he won't be a part of: Bryan Singer's X-Men: Days of Future Past.
Stan Lee started off the first day of Fan Expo in Toronto by letting all the fans at his panel know they’re the reason he won’t be doing one of his standard Marvel cameos in X-Men: Days of Future Past. Stan explained to a packed hall that he was scheduled to shoot his cameo this weekend in Montreal but couldn’t disappoint the fans so came out to Fan Expo instead and now won’t be showing up in the upcoming X-Men flick.
If you were also wondering why he didn’t pop up in The Wolverine, he explained that the film’s shooting location, way down in Australia, was just way too far to travel.
Stan also teased that his new made-for-movie superhero creation, The Annihilator, has an actor and a production company now attached but no director. Still no word on what exactly the Annihilator’s power may be either.
Finally, Stan let slip (though he said he wasn’t supposed to) that he’s working on a new reality show to find the best new comic book artists and writers that are out there, with contestants getting eliminated every week American Idol-style. Stan couldn’t say much else but promised he wouldn’t be a judge as he didn’t have the heart to boot anyone off the show.