Official updates on Marvel's plans for the X-Men have been few and far between since Disney's acquisition of 20th Century Fox, and rumor has it that this is simply down to the studio playing the waiting game.
Apparently, if Marvel wanted to reboot the team using any of the same characters from Fox's franchise before 2025, the likes of Simon Kinberg, Bryan Singer and co. would be, at minimum, entitled to credits and compensation, and may even have some degree of creative control as well.
We have no idea if this is accurate, but it would explain why it's pretty much been radio silence on all things X-Men since 2019, and why the only established mutant characters we've seen in The MCU since is Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart) in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Beast (Kelsey Grammer) in The Marvels, and Hugh Jackman as Logan in Deadpool and Wolverine (which also featured the likes of Gambit. Pyro and X-23).
This wouldn't prohibit Marvel from debuting new mutant heroes and villains with no connection to the earlier films, however, which we saw when Kamala Khan was ret-conned as a mutant in the season finale of Ms. Marvel.
At any rate, progress is finally being made on introducing the Children of the Atom to the MCU, and Marvel Studios' Head of Streaming Brad Winderbaum has now confirmed that the X-Men movie is in active development, while also responding to (well, more side-stepping) a question about that recent X Academy/Academy X Disney+ series rumor.
"I think anybody could say anything online, and it hits the rumor mill and people get excited," Winderbaum tells Screen Rant. "Right now, we are still working on X-Men 97 season 2. It's coming together amazingly, and the scripts for season 3 are insane. That is certainly scratching the X-Men itch for me on television. And there is an X-Men feature in development right now, so that is the focus of X-Men currently."
No director is attached (that we know of), but the amount of casting rumors from various reliable sources doing the rounds would seem to indicate that the studio is quietly assembling its new line-up.
Previous rumors have claimed that Harris Dickinson (Babygirl, The Iron Claw, Triangle of Sadness) and Jack Champion (Avatar, Scream 6) are being eyed to play Cyclops, with Stranger Things alum Sadie Sink a likely pick for Jean Grey. We've also heard that The Bear's Ayo Edebiri and DeWanda Wise are on the studio's radar to play Storm. Kitty Pryde and Gambit (but will it be Channing Tatum?) are also expected to be on the team.
More recently, Hunter Schafer (Cuckoo, Euphoria) has been rumored to be up for Mystique, Julia Butters (The Gray Man, The Fablemans) is said to be in talks to play Pryde, and Margaret Qualley might be on the studio's radar for Rogue.
Earlier this month, we reported on a slightly more out-there rumor that Denzel Washington might be set to play the villain - possibly Magneto.
Michael Lesslie is currently working on the script.