X-Men: First Class Writer Kinberg Signs Deal to Create Fox's Marvel Universe

Simon Kinberg and his Genre Films banner have signed a new three-year first-look deal at 20th Century Fox, which will allow him to expand those franchises into an interconnected universe of interconnected X-Men and Fantastic Four movies, according to The Hollywood Reporter. How this affects Mark Millar, who has previously been identified as Fox's answer to Marvel "showrunner" Joss Whedon, isn't clear. Millar's role has been fairly difficult to get a bead on, since he's not spoken much publicly about it. He's also been working hard on adaptations of his creator-owned comics like Kick-Ass 2 and The Secret Service. During that time, he and X-Men: Days of Future Past director Bryan Singer don't seem to have been in a lot of contact and there's been some speculation that Millar won't start his work as "Fox's Marvel guy" in earnest until Fantastic Four gets off the ground. "I have a lot of ideas on how to built those brands and do what everybody is thinking of these days: Be like Marvel," Kinberg told THR. "I want to be able to build stories over multiple movies." "Simon is one of the best out there," said 20th Century Fox production president Emma Watts. "We feel very lucky that he calls Fox his home and hope to build our slates together for many years to come." In addition to his work as a writer/producer on X-Men: Days of Future Past and Fantastic Four, Kinberg is attached to the revival of the Star Wars universe on film as well as other non-Fox projects like Thor director Kenneth Branagh's Cinderella. Kinberg is also working on an adadptation of Rust, an Archaia graphic novel which could get a green light in 2014. Meanwhile, Fox's X-Men universe includes at least three films in various stages of development right now: X-Men: Apocalypse, announced today by filmmaker Bryan Singer; X-Force, presumably directed by Kick-Ass 2's Jeff Wadlow; and Deadpool.