First pulled from the depths of the rumour murk into the development zone by Fox last year, X-Men spin-off The New Mutants has The Fault In Our Stars director Josh Boone working on bringing the younger characters to the screen. And if Hitfix's report pans out, we could see Game Of Thrones' Maisie Williams, The Witch's Anya Taylor-Joy and X-Men: Apocalypse's new Storm, Alexandra Shipp, as the first recruits for the squad.
Shipp we can see as a virtual shoo-in for this new iteration of the mutant story – she's already got her X-Men stripes thanks to this year's outing for the main team and is playing a popular character. And while Williams and Taylor-Joy are both still unconfirmed by Fox or producer Simon Kinberg, it's not difficult to see them both as candidates. Williams has proved herself capable on Thrones as Arya, did good work on Doctor Who recently and seems primed for a big screen breakthrough. According to Hitfix's Drew McWeeny (a man with proven sources on such things), she's attached to play Wolfsbane, AKA Rahne Sinclair, a Scottish werewolf who arrives at Xavier's School For Gifted Youngsters. And similarly drawing kudos for her work, Taylor-Joy is being considered as Illya Rasputin, who goes by the pseudonym Magik. She's a powerful sorceress that can teleport between great distances and even travel in time.
In addition to those three, it seems likely that we'll see Cannonball, Sunspot (played in Days Of Future Past by Adan Canto, but with no word on whether he'll return, given that his take on the character was seen in the future sections) and Mirage, plus a certain Professor Charles Xavier in the shape of James McAvoy, assuming the studio can have him return with a new contract following Apocalypse.
Kinberg has also been talking up the movie to IGN, and seems to confirm the idea that Storm or at least one of the new, younger versions of the mutants could pop up: “Traditionally, The New Mutants have some characters that cross over from the mainline X-Men movies," he says. "As we are going, I would say it's likely that you will see some familiar faces.”
“Josh and his writing partner [Knate Gwaltney] are working on the script," he adds. "They're doing a really nice job of it, and it's a really cool one, because in many ways, like Deadpool was so different from the mainline X-Men movies, New Mutants… It’s maybe not as different as Deadpool, but it has its own unique, original voice to it."
The New Mutants doesn't yet have a confirmed release date, but X-Men: Apocalypse will be out on May 19.