It’s no secret from watching footage from Dark Phoenix that the movie doesn’t stay too close to the source material. Certain elements, like for example the Shi’ar Empire, are missing.
In a new interview with Digital Spy director Simon Kingberg discussed how and why certain elements of the original Dark Phoenix comic book were left out of the movie.
“I think if I had four hours to tell this story I would’ve included the Hellfire Club, I might’ve included Lilandra,” he explains. “Because I wanted it to be so focused on Jean and I wanted to really tell a character story a little differently than we have in the past in the X-Men.””In the past it’s been a little more horizontal, meaning there was a breadth of character, there was a bunch of characters. In this one I wanted to go a little more vertical, I wanted to go deep with our main characters, and especially with Jean.”So while I loved the Hellfire characters and their role in the Dark Phoenix saga in the comics, and I loved the Lilandra storyline in the comics, all of those felt like they were going to start to compete with the main story of Jean and her emotional crack-up and the break-up of the X-Men family,” he continued. “And I didn’t want to draw away from that main emotional through-line.”
So there you have it, in order to focus on the main X-Men character Kinberg felt there were elements of the comic that needed to be sacrificed. Do you agree with his methodology?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xpmjD4ffzYIn Dark Phoenix, the X-Men face their most formidable and powerful foe: one of their own, Jean Grey. During a rescue mission in space, Jean is nearly killed when she is hit by a mysterious cosmic force. Once she returns home, this force not only makes her infinitely more powerful, but far more unstable. Wrestling with this entity inside her, Jean unleashes her powers in ways she can neither comprehend nor contain. With Jean spiraling our of control, and hurting the ones she loves most, she begins to unravel the very fabric that holds the X-Men together. Now, with this family falling apart, they must find a way to unite – not only to save Jean’s soul, but to save our very planet from aliens who wish to weaponize this force and rule the galaxy.
Dark Phoenix is being directed by Simon Kinberg. James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence and Michael Fassbender are confirmed to return to the roles of Charles Xavier, Mystique and Magneto respectively. Sophie Turner, Tye Sheridan, Nicholas Hoult, Alexandra Shipp and Kodi Smit-McPhee will also return.
The film is due for release on June 7, 2019 in North America. In the UK the movie drops on June 5.
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