The spin off of the most successful film franchise of all time (Harry Potter) has a confirmed writer (JK Rowling), release date (November 2016) and title (Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them). The fantasy adventure will depict legendary wizard Newt Scamander travelling the world in search of its most fearsome creatures, seventy years before Harry and co read the textbook based on his notes. The next logical step is the appointment of a director and the only one of those to be mentioned in contention for the job was Oscar winner Alfonso Cuaron (Children of Men, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Gravity). However, the Mexican has confirmed that it’s not in his plans. He’s taking a quick break from directing but has expressed interest in making a back to roots horror with fewer time-consuming visual effects. He’s still yet to offer comment on the rumour of his part in The Shining prequel The Overlook Hotel.
Bryan Singer (The Usual Suspects, X-Men, X2, X-Men: Days of Future Past, Apt Pupil, Valkyrie) is set to bring sci-fi disaster epic X-Men: Apocalypse (the eight in the series) to us in 2016 with the First Class graduates Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult and James McAvoy as well as Channing Tatum and Hugh Jackman (still waiting for word on Evan Peters, Lucas Till and Rose Byrne). We weren’t sure if the main cast would expand beyond this until writer Simon Kinberg announced that “It will focus primarily on the First Class cast but it will certainly have some of the original cast involved, too.”
The return of the original X-Men (James Marsden, Famke Janssen, Kelsey Grammer, Ben Foster, Alan Cumming, Rebecca Romijn) cast has long been rumoured but this is the first real confirmation. Many of them (Patrick Stewart, Halle Berry, Daniel Cudmore, Anna Paquin, Shawn Ashmore, Ellen Page, Ian McKellen) do reappear in this month’s DOFP, which is making a huge impact on the box office.
Also today, the ever excellent Empire Magazine are celebrating their 301st issue and their 25th birthday with a poll of the 301 greatest films of all time, voted for by the fans. So, to find out if Rocky knocked out Raging Bull, if Lord of the Rings (You Shall Not) passed Avatar, if The Dark Knight rised over Avengers or if Star Wars shrieked “Noooooo!” as Shawshank, Pulp Fiction, Inception, Fight Club or Godfather beat it to the top spot, click here. You can find the full list as well as Empire’s monthly goodness in their next issue this Thursday.
X-Men: Apocalypse – May 19th 2016
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them – November 18th 2016
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