It's official, First Class sequel will be known as X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST

We’ve been hearing the rumours for months now already, with all the comic book fanboys drooling in anticipation like bulldogs in front of a juicy steak, and now we finally have official confirmation.

The First Class sequel will be titled X-Men: Days of Future Past. Not only that, but we may just be in for a crossover with the original X-Men movies. May the nerd-drool commence!

Bryan Singer, who directed X1 and X2, produced X3: The Last Stand and will also serve as producer on the new film, spoke to IGN about it:

And for those of you behind work firewalls or just too bandwidth challenged to view videos, Collider has been kind enough to transcript the salient parts of the interview.

IGN: You mentioned X-Men, and I just had to ask you because I’m a huge X-Men fan, what can you say about the new film coming out?

Singer:  I can say it’s being written right now and it will start shooting in a few months.  It’s going to be very ambitious.  It’s called Days of Future Past and it deals with aspects of that comic but also some very new things.   I just don’t want to give any of it away.  Matthew Vaughn will be directing and I’m totally excited about it. 

IGN: Knowing the “Days of Future Past” story from the comics, that is a bold direction even if it’s a different version of it.  I know Simon [Kinberg] said at Comic-Con that it can touch upon the entire X-Men film franchise or respect the entire X-Men film franchise, so is there room for some sort of cross-overs?  More than we might have seen in the past?

Singer:  I think there’s a strong desire to broaden out the universe.  The X-Men universe on its own is every bit as big as the Marvel universe and I think it’s time to reach out and explore it and perhaps even bring some connectivity between the films, as Marvel’s done so well.  You may see some of that, I don’t know. [Laughs]

That last part is actually what is getting me truly excited here, with my geeky brain already going into overdrive. For those non-comic book fanboys among you who might not get what all the fuss is about, let me clue you in. Days of Future Past was the title of one of the X-Men’s most acclaimed storylines. Published in 1981, it switched back and forth between the current time and dark future time where, in retaliation for Magneto’s Brotherhood of Evil Mutants assassinating human Senator Robert Kelly, mutants have been rounded up and kept in internment camps overseen by an army of Sentinels. The future version of Kitty Pryde, using some comic book science, sends her mind back in time to inhabit the body of her present day version and tries to warn the X-Men of this dystopian future.

While she succeeds in her mission by getting the X-Men to stop the Brotherhood in time, when her consciousness returns to her own future body she finds everything still the same and then realizes that they can’t really change the past and all they’ve done is create an alternate timeline instead.

What’s so exciting about this, is that this may be a way for FOX to reconcile First Class with the earlier three X-Men films. I say have the future timeline of those films (which I’m henceforth referring to as the Singer trilogy) actually be the one where Sentinels take over and have that Kitty Pryde travel back into the body of the Kitty Pryde of First Class. By explicitly stating them to actually be alternate timelines within the same universe, they immediately get rid of the gripes some people had about how some of the events and characters of First Class – which was supposed to be a prequel – didn’t match up with the Singer trilogy. Also it frees the First Class writers up to branch off into completely different stories without being beholden to what came before.

And for those of you that may think that this approach might be a bit too complex, I give you exhibit A: JJ Abram’s Star Trek reboot. He used the exact same tactic to great effect in that film, so I don’t see why Singer, director Matthew Vaughn and co couldn’t do the same here.

So what do you say? Would you want to see the casts of First Class as well as the Singer trilogy all in one movie? Done properly, this could be the type of geek-out superhero epic that could rival The Avengers.

Damn it, I’m drooling on my keyboard all over again.

Last Updated: August 2, 2012