Simon Kinberg Talks X-Men Films And How They Got More Sci-Fi

Longtime X-Men film series writer, producer, and DARK PHOENIX director Simon Kinberg spoke with Polygon about the sci-fi trajectory of his Hollywood career. During the interview, he opened up about films he worked on, like THE LAST STAND, FIRST CLASS, DAYS OF FUTURE PAST, and APOCALYPSE, providing some nice behind the scenes details of his work with the likes of Bryan Singer, Brett Ratner, and Matthew Vaughn.

Kinberg on Juggernaut’s Famous Line in X-MEN 3

“The real on that is that was a reshoot [director, Brett] Ratner line.”

Kinberg on director Matthew Vaughn

“With Matthew [who originally signed to direct X-MEN: THE LAST STAND], it was a major departure from Bryan Singer, who had directed the first two movies. Matthew himself is a world builder — or maybe more than a world builder, a tone builder. He wanted to do something tonally very different than the previous two films. And so we were really in the script phase, even through pre-production, because Matthew was aboard for a long time [Note: Vaughn left late into pre-prod over creative differences]. And so it felt like, even though we weren’t creating an entirely new universe, because Bryan had obviously done an amazing job of building the foundation with the first two films, and all of those decades’ worth of incredible comics, we were creating a new tone within that world and new rules. I think you saw that tone in X-Men: First Class. But it was a real sci-fi sandbox.”

Kinberg on going more sci-fi with X-MEN

“The gateway was Days of Future Past because even though there isn’t high science fiction, like apocalypse or aliens, time travel is as big a science fiction trope. It sort of opened up what we could do because even though it wasn’t technically the multiverse thing that, ultimately, I think in some ways spawned it, it was outside the bounds of linear storytelling on Earth. It was other dimensions. There wasn’t a lot of pushback from the studio. Although paying all those actors, I don’t think they were wild about that, but it was a successful film and one I’m very proud of.

“With Apocalypse, we entered a much more science fiction tone. Bryan was directing the film, as he had so many of them, and it was new terrain for him. He would talk about being able to direct, like, a real, pure science fiction movie. Not space opera, but science fiction.”

Read more from the interview on Polygon.

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