Deadpool director Tim Miller is eager to jump back into the Marvel fold with the X-Men, and has one specific idea in mind to introduce the famed team of mutants into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Speaking to THR on the newest season of his Netflix series Love Death + Robots, Miller stated “The X-Men are my favorite characters. I wrote [Marvel boss] Kevin Feige, and I’m like, ‘If there was ever anything that you would let me do in the Marvel Universe, please, the X-Men would be it”. Miller also further elaborated that “I had an X-Men movie in development at Fox when the merger happened, which would have been awesome. [It was based on] X-Men 143, which was Home Alone meets Alien.”
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Miller also stated that “the whole X-Men universe” is something he considers to be Marvel’s “secret weapon they haven’t been able to unveil yet”. Miller himself has some previous experience within the X-Men franchise as the director 2016’s Deadpool. While not an X-Men movie per se, Deadpool is nonetheless a kind of off-shoot of it, officially introducing Ryan Reynolds’ Merc with a Mouth on the big screen (after his far less acclaimed debut in 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine) and situating Deadpool alongside such X-Men as Colossus (Stefan Kapičić) and Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand).
Miller’s choice of X-Men #143 as the basis for his X-Men movie pitch is one that would surely excite fans and present a very different kind of X-Men movie. In X-Men #143, the X-Men find themselves battling a monstrous foe when the X-Mansion is attacked by a creature known as the N’Garai demon. As Miller points out, the story carries some noteworthy influences from 1979’s sci-fi horror classic Alien, while the single location setting and holiday season timeframe is also the basis from the Home Alone DNA Miller speaks of. That alone would surely make Miller’s X-Men movie a unique one, to say the least.
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Throughout the entirety of the original X-Men franchise’s run, the series was under the purview of 20th Century Fox, which precluded the X-Men from appearing in any MCU movies. With Fox’s acquisition by Disney in 2019 (the studio subsequently renamed 20th Century Studios), the X-Men became available to Marvel Studios for the first time. 2022’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness was the first MCU movie to bring previously Fox-owned Marvel characters into the franchise with the appearance (and shockingly quick death) of a variant of Sir Patrick Stewart’s Professor Charles Xavier.
2024’s Deadpool & Wolverine later brought back Hugh Jackman out of superhero retirement as a variant of Wolverine, Jackman’s prior iteration of the character having died in 2017’s Logan. With the X-Men-connected characters previously seen in the first two Deadpool movies, Deadpool & Wolverine effectively set the stage for the MCU’s version of the X-Men via the upcoming multiverse crossover event of 2027’s Avengers: Secret Wars.
It’s unlikely that Miller’s X-Men pitch will be get off the ground before Secret Wars, which numerous cast members of the Fox X-Men franchise are confirmed to return in, and which Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine could plausibly make his swan song in, as well. Having said that, with Secret Wars setting up Marvel to start anew with the X-Men as part of its foundation, Marvel Studios should likely start laying the groundwork for the X-Men’s role in the new franchise as early as possible. With Tim Miller’s background directing the first Deadpool movie and coming in with a pitch already in place, his idea for an X-Men movie pitting the mutants against the N’Gari demon could be a good place to start.
The X-Men and Deadpool movies are available to stream on Disney+.
