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Director Simon Kinberg, producer Hutch Parker and the cast of X-Men: Dark Phoenix have revealed who they want to play a young Wolverine in the franchise now that Hugh Jackman has retired from the iconic role. The current X-Men films feature younger versions of iconic X-Men characters including Jean Grey, Cyclops and Storm – so it’s to be expected that fans aren’t too far away from seeing a young iteration of Wolverine on screen.
Speaking to GamesRadar about who they would choose to don Logan’s adamantium claws next, the cast revealed their dream casting ideas.
“Well, I know they’re kind of the same age, but I think Keanu Reeves would be a good Wolverine. I love me some Keanu Reeves,” revealed Sophie Turner, who stars as Jean Grey in the upcoming X-Men: Dark Phoenix.
GamesRadar asked the star whether her husband, Joe Jonas, could be a potential Wolverine candidate. “He always says that to me,” Turner revealed, “He’s like, ‘I’d be a great young Wolverine,’ I’m like, ‘I’m not going to pitch you for this, that’d be so weird!’”
Although on reflection, she did agree that her husband would be a good fit for the part, saying, “He would be actually, he’s hairy enough.”
Tye Sheridan, who stars as Cyclops, on mulling over the idea of Joe Jonas as Wolverine with GamesRadar, said “He’d be good at choreographing the action stuff!” Producer Hutch Parker added, “I can see that! I think he’d like it.”
Jessica Chastain, who joins the franchise in the new movie as a cosmic villain to the X-Men, offered a different option: “A lady Wolverine… Penelope Cruz!”
Another viable option, and an actor already connected to the X-Men universe was posed by Alexandra Shipp, who plays as Storm: “I know he was going to play Gambit, but Channing Tatum. Because he’s a dancer, so his physicality, his stunts might be really cool.”
But when GamesRadar asked director Simon Kinberg about the casting, he had sights on some big-name British actors, including Sophie Turner’s on-screen Game Of Thrones Stark sibling: “It’s a very hard question to answer, because there are only a few actors in the history of comic book movies who are so indelibly connected to their character, that it’s hard to imagine anyone else playing the role. I can’t imagine anybody but Hugh Jackman playing it… but if I think about actors who are just really interesting, and that I’d love to work with, Tom Hardy comes to mind; Richard Madden I think is a great actor.”
Ultimately though, revealed Kinberg, they would be more likely to cast an unknown actor, explaining, “One of the things that was so great about Hugh is that he was an unknown actor. He was a musical theatre actor from Australia that no one really knew. So I think if ever there was going to be a new Wolverine, I think the best place to look would be to discover somebody new.”
X-Men producer Hutch Parker echoed the sentiment, and revealed that they did consider casting a new Wolverine actor already: “We’ve talked about it for a while. There was a discussion around, should we recast Wolverine? And frankly we made a decision that no, we should just stay off it. It needs time, and presumably, as Disney begins to think about this, I’m sure they’ll have ideas on that.”
Alternatively, there’s currently an active online petition for Danny Devito to take up the mantle of the iconic character, which, at the time of writing, has garnered more than 37,000 signatures.
“Danny with claws,” considered Parker, when GamesRadar put the casting option to him, “That would be pretty funny, to watch Danny leap around and carve people up.”
Evan Peters, who plays Quicksilver is on board, saying “Danny Devito would be a great Wolverine.” While Alexandra Shipp revealed that she’s fully invested in the reimagined character: “Oh my god, I would totally sign that. I would not only sign that, I’d campaign for it!”
Simon Kinberg, however, had a more measured response: “I don’t know that I see Danny Devito as Wolverine, but I’m certainly a fan of his work as an actor.”
Perhaps we could see him as the next Gambit, then, instead?
X-Men: Dark Phoenix hits cinemas June 5, 2019, but if you can't wait until then, watch our video interview with Jessica Chastain and Sophie Turner below:
