Either something incredible or something terrible is brewing in the world of comic book movies. As he has been doing for the last few months, director Bryan Singer has taken to his Twitter feed to make a major announcement, this time revealing that Evan Peters of American Horror Story is a late addition to the cast of X-Men: Days of Future Past. But while that in and of itself isn't very shocking news, it's the character he will be playing that makes this whole situation a head-scratcher. According to the director, Peters will be playing the role of Quicksilver, one of the two new superheroes that Joss Whedon has been promising for Marvel Studios' The Avengers 2.
As we've previously written about, Quicksilver and his comic book sister Scarlet Witch exist in a strange area from a rights perspective. Both of them are known for being members of The Avengers, which means that the rights to use them belong to Marvel Studios; but on the other hand they are also mutants, which means that 20th Century Fox (the studio behind all of the X-Men movies) can use them too. If Marvel uses them the catch is that they can never be referred to as mutants.
The reason why I say that this is either incredible or terrible is because this could either be seen as an aggressive move on Fox's part or perhaps an opportunity to crossover. It's entirely possible that Fox is forcing Quicksilver into X-Men: Days of Future Past because they want to take ownership of the character, knowing that their movie will be out in 2014 and that Avengers 2 is scheduled for 2015. Or perhaps this is Fox sticking out an Olive branch - maybe Whedon will cast Peters as his Quicksilver as well? In Singer's Tweet he does write, "Before he was an #Avenger, he was just a REALLY fast kid. Thrilled to say #EvanPeters is joining #XMen #DaysOfFuturePast as #Quicksilver." Obviously this is a developing situation and hopefully more details will be revealed.
X-Men: Days Of Future Past is currently in production and will be in theaters on July 18, 2014.
