To say that the
X-Men franchise has always been heavily focused on Wolverine would be an understatement, but the decision to utilize the fan-favorite mutant was taken out of 20th Century Fox's hands when Hugh Jackman officially retired his take on the character after James Mangold's
Logan.
Jackman did show up for a cameo as Weapon X in
X-Men: Apocalypse, so that version of Wolverine would still be at large in
Dark Phoenix's timeline. However, director Simon Kinberg has now revealed that even if Jackman was available, he wouldn't have included Logan in the script.
“There was an element of this being Jean’s story,” he told
Rolling Stone.
“And I was committing so fully to it that I didn’t want to run the risk of pulling away from Jean by going to the well of a fan-favorite character in these movies. I wanted this to be a very different experience of seeing an X-Men movie.”
There is also the slight problem that would emerge from Logan still being very much in love with Jean in the original story.
“If you know the Dark Phoenix story, you’d want to really service the love story between Logan and Jean,” Kinberg continued.
“And I think the notion of Hugh Jackman, as great as he looks for his age, and Sophie Turner — it didn’t sit well with me. Or anyone else!”
Jean and Scott are the central relationship of the comic arc so, really, Logan's feelings for his teammate could have been glossed over if they really wanted to feature the ol' canucklehead. Of course, it's moot now anyway.
Tell us, will yo be seeing
Dark Phoenix in theaters despite the critical drubbing its received? Sound off below.
ComicBookMovie.com, and/or the user who contributed this post, may earn commissions or revenue through clicks or purchases made through any third-party links contained within the content above.