A few days ago, the internet was all fired up over the rumor that Alan Cumming would be reprising the role of Nightcrawler in the upcoming X-Men: Days of Future Past.
Unfortunately, it turns out it was just that, a rumor. One that has since been debunked by Cumming himself in a radio interview:
“No, they haven’t [asked me to return]. Someone asked me that the other day and I said no. I know the one that’s coming up shoots this spring, but I wouldn’t be available anyway,”
[JoBlo]
Well, damnit.
As the roster of characters returning from the original X-Men series grows, this is the one I was most hoping for. For my money, the opening scene in X2 is the best of any superhero movie out there. I really would have loved to see more Nightcrawler on the big screen, but from the sound of it Cumming isn’t terrible interested. That said, I don’t think it would be too hard to recast the character considering the amount of make-up one needs to play him anyhow.
Bryan Singer has a tall order to fill with this go-around in the X-Men franchise, and I am incredibly curious to see how this all turns out. The mere fact that he stated that he is going to “fix shit” continuity wise has me cautiously optimistic, but he has a very large cast to work with now and an infamous story arc that I’m sure will be put under the magnifying glass of geek-critique – but if anyone can do this “right”, it’s Bryan Singer.
We will get to find out if this turns out to be a homerun for the franchise or another X3 on July 18, 2014.