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EW: The New Mutants details revealed: X-Men franchise goes horror

L

LordOfLore

Banned
Link.

The New Mutants, the long anticipated X-Men spinoff movie, is going to be a comic book film that goes in an unusual direction. “We are making a full-fledged horror movie set within the X-Men universe,” director Josh Boone says. “There are no costumes. There are no supervillains. We’re trying to do something very, very different.”

Game of Thrones‘ Maisie Williams has been cast in the role of Wolfsbane and Split actress Anya Taylor-Joy as Magik. Sources close to the production say that Henry Zaga, seen most recently in 13 Reasons Why (where he played Tony’s boyfriend, Brad), will soon be announced in the role of Sunspot. (Unconfirmed chatter has it that Rosario Dawson is currently in talks as well.)

The New Mutants, which was created by Chris Claremont in the early ’80s, is about a group of teenage mutants, a kind of superheroes-in-training, who must learn to control their powers. When artist Bill Sienkiewicz — whom Boone calls “one of the most amazing comic book artists ever” — came aboard for No. 18 in 1984, the series took a turn for what Boone describes as, “a darker and more surreal and impressionistic X-Men series than we’d ever seen before. It felt like Stephen King meets John Hughes.”

It’s this run of the comic that inspired what we’ll see in The New Mutants which is currently scheduled for a spring 2018 release (and shooting for a PG-13 rating). Boone is keeping mum on actual plot details, but a source close to the project explained how mutants are at their most dangerous (both to themselves and others) when their powers are new. (Like, say, their teenage years!) Says the source: “Held in a secret facility against their will, five new mutants have to battle the dangers of their powers, as well as the sins of their past. They aren’t out to save the world — they’re just trying to save themselves.”

As for Boone, whose steady hand guided 2012’s The Fault in Our Stars to $307 million worldwide (on a budget of about $12 million), this project holds deep personal ties. For starters, he’s doing it with his lifelong best friend, fellow Virginia Beach native, and fellow filmmaker, Knate Lee.

“I was raised by very religious parents,” says Boone. “They were Evangelical Southern Baptists and they believed in the rapture; they believed the devil was real; they believed in demons. Knate grew up in a similar environment and our entire lives we sort of hung on to each other as tight as we could. That’s how we got through the craziness we grew up in.”

When Boone and Lee were 12 years old, they were obsessed with Stephen King and with Marvel Comics. (Boone hid a copy of The Stand under his mattress the way some teens stash pornography. He later struck up a pen-pal relationship with King and is currently attached to adapt The Stand in the future.) Boone and Lee even started their own comic book company, which they would (with parental help) bind and sell to relatives.

It proved handy when the duo went to Fox to pitch their idea for The New Mutants. “We made a comic book with what our vision of the series would be,” says Boone. “We love that Fox wants to make all these different X-Men spinoffs as drastically different as they can.”

Boone wants to assure fellow fans that he’s one of them and that he’s taking this responsibility very, very seriously. “You can’t have a bigger nerd or fan making this. It’s so important to me. I’m not the 12-year-old who decided to write Stephen King a letter and loved Marvel Comics anymore, but I try to hold myself accountable to that kid. Because that kid is what keeps me from becoming a Hollywood whore,” he says with a laugh. “I look back and think: Would he think this would be cool? Would he proud of me? Did I fulfill the dream we had when we were kids?”

Boone lets out another chuckle. “So yeah, you can definitely say I’m excited.”

The New Mutants is scheduled to go into production in July.
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Lock if old.

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M

MatthewMungall

Member
I'm excited to see what they come up with for this. Never read into the New Mutants but cautious to see what they do with the material after Fox allowed Deadpool and Logan to be made.
 
S

Sgt. Kabukiman

Banned
”We are making a full-fledged horror movie set within the X-Men universe," director Josh Boone says.
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That quote + Anya Taylor-Joy as Magik makes it my most anticipated Marvel film.

excelsiorlef said:
Well on one hand yay maybe Demon Bear

But on the other none of the rest sounds like New Mutants at all.
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I don't think Demon Bear is a maybe, it sounds like that's 100% what they're going for.

Also, this is funny:
Unconfirmed chatter has it that Rosario Dawson is currently in talks as well.
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How many universes can she appear in?
 
C

Cheshire_Buddha

Member
The first thing that popped in to my head was Trank talking about how Fan4stic was inspired by body horror movies. So, yeah, I don't know how I feel.
 
Grizzlyjin

Grizzlyjin

Supersonic, idiotic, disconnecting, not respecting, who would really ever wanna go and top that
Sounds fun. Personally, I like the idea of filmmakers taking cues from other genres for these superhero films. A horror comic movie, a heist comic movie, a political thriller comic movie, etc. And this sounds like a solid take on adapting The Demon Bear arc. Especially since it sounds like this will be smaller, more intimate film. NO MORE CITY BEING DESTROYED/SKY LASER 3RD ACTS!
 
T

The Broken Ska Record

Member
Grizzlyjin said:
Sounds fun. Personally, I like the idea of filmmakers taking cues from other genres for these superhero films. A horror comic movie, a heist comic movie, a political thriller comic movie, etc. And this sounds like a solid take on adapting The Demon Bear arc. Especially since it sounds like this will be smaller, more intimate film. NO MORE CITY BEING DESTROYED/SKY LASER 3RD ACTS!
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That's why I liked Logan. It's fine to have the big world-ending movies, but sometimes you just need something smaller scale.

Everything I've heard about this movie has been great so far.
 
E

excelsiorlef

Member
Sgt. Kabukiman said:
That quote + Anya Taylor-Joy as Magik makes it my most anticipated Marvel film.

I don't think Demon Bear is a maybe, it sounds like that's 100% what they're going for.
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Nah it's a maybe... with Magik it could just be Limbo demons... or something completely different...It probably is though
 
Grizzlyjin

Grizzlyjin

Supersonic, idiotic, disconnecting, not respecting, who would really ever wanna go and top that
The Broken Ska Record said:
That's why I liked Logan. It's fine to have the big world-ending movies, but sometimes you just need something smaller scale.

Everything I've heard about this movie has been great so far.
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Yes! Same for Deadpool. I know that one was smaller scale because of its budget, but my favorite thing about it wasn't even the humor. It was that it's just a revenge flick. My eyes glaze over when these movies do Save the World plots. It's a big part of the genre, I get it. But we get like 10 of these things a year
 
S

Sho_Nuff82

Member
Just read up on Demon Bear. Sounds a lot like what FX did with Legion and *Massive Spoiler for Legion do NOT read without watching S1*
The Shadow King
.

Could make for a dope movie. Rosario Dawson as Dani Moonstar?
 
I

Inferno313

Banned
Sounds fucking rad. There's enough of these things now that playing with genre is not only welcome, but almost necessary to stand out. Logan's flirtation with Western tropes is something that helped make it stand above the rest.
 
J

jph139

Member
BoogieWoogie said:
I'm not too bothered by this. It's not like the New Mutants' costumes were anything to write home about anyway.
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I was really hoping they'd use Negasonic Teenage Warhead's costume here. Felt very appropriate as a modernized New Mutants uniform, down to earth but with that nice yellow pop.
 
G

geomon

Member
We're going to make a comic book movie with no superheroes or supervillains. What's the fucking point then?
 
S

Slayven

Member
Know what would seprate New Mutants fromt he X-men?

A movie about a group of mutants coming together as a team to save the world
 
M

MHWilliams

Member
I mean, they're adapting The Demon Bear Saga, which was drawn by Bill Sienkiewicz.

They can't do a faithful adaptation of that without horror.
 
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