Alan Cumming played Nightcrawler in 2003's X2: X-Men United, though the role ended up being a one-and-done for the actor. He didn't return for X-Men: The Last Stand and was also absent from X-Men: Days of Future Past.
Later, Kodi Smit-McPhee replaced Cumming as a younger version of Kurt Wagner, portraying the teleporting mutant in X-Men: Apocalypse and Dark Phoenix. Unfortunately, we never got anything quite as memorable as the original Nightcrawler's attack on the White House.
Talking to Entertainment Weekly about his status as a queer actor, Cumming reflected on his superhero movie debut and explained why he believes the X-Men sequel is by far his "gayest film."
"Oh, I think the X-Men film I'm in [2003’s X2: X-Men United,] is the gayest film that I've ever done. It's got a queer director, lots of queer actors in it," he tells the site. "I love the fact that something so mainstream and so in the comic book world is so queer. In a way, those sorts of films really help people understand queerness, because you can address it in an artistic way, and everyone is less scared of the concept."
"It's an allegory about queerness, about people having these great gifts and really great, powerful things that they have to hide to exist. Queer people understand what that's all about," Cumming concluded.
While several actors from previous X-Men movies will appear in Deadpool & Wolverine, there's been nothing to suggest that Cumming's Nightcrawler will be among them. It still feels like we haven't seen the definitive version of the character on screen, so here's hoping that changes in the MCU.
"It was funny that film because I really like it and everyone really responded to Nightcrawler and enough time has elapsed that I would like to go back to it," Cumming said in 2013. "Although then when I did that film it was sort of the start of this spate of superhero and comic books made into films so it felt a little more special then it does now."
"X2 was a really great film, not just as a comic book film. I think it’s one of the films I’d been in that I think of as really good."
X2: X-Men United was directed by Bryan Singer and revolved around an attack on the President of the United States by Nightcrawler, which heightens anti-mutant sentiment and prompts military scientist Colonel William Stryker to launch an assault on Professor Xavier's school.
Stryker's vendetta against mutants leads him to kidnap Professor X and plan an attack to eradicate all mutants using Xavier's telepathic abilities. The X-Men and Magneto join forces to stop Stryker and save their kind.
Do you agree with Cummings' X2 assessment?