In 2011, director Matthew Vaughn ("Kick-Ass") revealed that Brazilian mutant, Sunspot, was initially in the script. He explained, "In the draft they gave me all of the characters were in there. We cut Sunspot because we didn’t have enough time or money. They couldn’t make him work, he was a pain the ass."
For those you not familiar with Sunspot (Roberto da Costa), he is associated with the X-Men via New Mutants and X-Force. The Brazilian mutant grew up in a wealthy environment and his powers manifested at a soccer game (football for everyone else). Those powers:
Able to absorb solar energy and metabolize it into physical strength, convert it into thrust to enable flight, or rechannel it as heat or infrared radiation. When doing so, DaCosta's features melt away into a black mass of crackling dark energy. In unlighted places, DaCosta suffers a slight drop in his power levels. - Marvel Wiki
Now as you can see below, Rhythm and Hues Studios' concept artist
Josh Kao, worked on pre-production Emma Frost and Sunspot designs. Although the character got cut, don't feel too bad, that image at the top is Mexican actor Adan Canto as Sunspot in Bryan Singer's
X-Men: Days of Future Past.
Concept Art by Josh Kao
Concept Art by Josh Kao
Concept Art by Sei Nakashima
X-Men: First Class charts the epic beginning of the X-Men saga, and reveals a secret history of famous global events. Before mutants had revealed themselves to the world, and before Charles Xavier and Erik Lensherr took the names Professor X and Magneto, they were two young men discovering their powers for the first time. Not archenemies, they were instead at first the closest of friends, working together with other Mutants (some familiar, some new), to stop Armageddon. In the process, a grave rift between them opened, which began the eternal war between Magneto’s Brotherhood and Professor X’s X-Men.
X-Men: First Class was directed by Matthew Vaughn ("Kick-Ass"), from a screenplay written by Ashley Edward Miller, Zack Stentz, Jane Goldman, and Matthew Vaughn. The cast included: James McAvoy as Charles Xavier/Professor X, Michael Fassbender as Erik Lensherr/Magneto, Kevin Bacon as Sebastian Shaw, Rose Byrne as Moira MacTaggert, Jennifer Lawrence as Raven Darkholme/Mystique, January Jones as Emma Frost, Nicholas Hoult as Dr. Henry "Hank" McCoy/Beast, Zoë Kravitz as Angel Salvadore, Caleb Landry Jones as Sean Cassidy/Banshee and Lucas Till as Alex Summers/Havok. It earned $353 million at the worldwide box office, on a budget of $150 million.