X-Men: The Gifted Will Be All About Bigotry

Ever since their first Marvel Comics debut, the X-Men have served as an allegory for many of society’s most pressing issues. The latest live-action entry in the storied franchise, Fox’s television series The Gifted, will be no exception, according to several of its stars.

As Emma Dumont, who plays Lorna Dane/Polaris, explained to Den of Geek, The Gifted will address plenty of modern day cases of bigotry.

“Yeah, I’m going to say straight-up you guys, our show’s about bigotry,” Dumont explained. “I’m sorry, but we see it in the first scene when Blink‘s running for her life and a cop could easily kill her dead with zero consequences, because of prejudice. Because of prejudging her for something people are uncomfortable with, that they don’t understand, because people are born with this thing, and that is literally where we live.”

According to Dumont, the cast has grown inspired by The Gifted‘s primary filming location – Atlanta, Georgia.

“It is heartbreaking, but I hope this show throws up a mirror on society,” says Dumont. “We love filming in Georgia, because it was such a big part of the civil rights movement in the United States, and yeah our mutant underground is based on the underground railroad. I mean, we aren’t trying to hide it, we’re not being cool. We’re being like, for real, these are the issues we want to talk about.”

Dumont’s costar, Jamie Chung, who plays Clarice Ferguson/Blink, echoed this, thanking The Gifted‘s showrunner for creating a platform for the issues to be addressed, albeit through the fantastical nature of the X-Men.

“It’s extremely important, I think that is why [Matt Nix] wanted to create this show and highlight it,” Chung explained. “It’s not comparable to what people are actually going through, but I think it makes our show quite different because we are highlighting those current events issues.”

The Gifted tells the emotional story of a suburban couple whose ordinary lives are rocked by the sudden discovery that their children possess mutant powers. Forced to go on the run from a hostile government, the family seeks help from an underground network of mutants and must fight to survive.

Set within the “X-Men” universe, the series stars Stephen Moyer (SHOTS FIRED, “True Blood”), Amy Acker (“Person of Interest”), Natalie Alyn Lind (GOTHAM) and Percy Hynes White (“Night at the Museum 3”) as the STRUCKER family. Also featured in the series are Sean Teale (“Reign”) as ECLIPSE/MARCOS DIAZ; Jamie Chung (GOTHAM) as BLINK/CLARICE FERGUSON; Emma Dumont (“Aquarius”) as POLARIS/LORNA DANE; Blair Redford (“Satisfaction”) as THUNDERBIRD/JOHN PROUDSTAR; and Coby Bell (“Burn Notice”) as Sentinel Services Agent JACE TURNER. The series is written by Matt Nix (“Burn Notice”), directed by Bryan Singer (the “X-Men” franchise”) and executive-produced by Nix, Singer, Lauren Shuler Donner and Simon Kinberg (“X-Men: Apocalypse,” “X-Men: Days of Future Past”) and Marvel’s Jeph Loeb and Jim Chory.

The Gifted premieres on Oct. 2 on Fox, with a pilot episode directed by veteran X-Men movies director Bryan Singer.

More The Gifted News: Fox Release Up Closes Videos Of The Gifted‘s Mutants / New Look At Polaris In The Gifted / The Gifted Promo Offers New Look At Sentinel Drones / The Gifted‘s X-Men Connections Explained