20th Century Fox
This summer’s latest foray into the X-Men universe, X-Men: Days of Future Past, had a lot to unpack due to a handy (or confusing) time-travel plot line. It allowed the mutants to jump back and forth between two eras: the present day, which is just a terrible place to be a mutant, and the 1970s, which while a lot groovier than modern times, was still the period directly after the events of X-Men: First Class. Read: it wasn’t really a party back then, either. Is there any time when it’s okay to be a mutant? It would be nice to exercise those powers without repercussion at some point.
Days of Future Past was a film full to the brim with interwoven subplots, a staggering amount of mutants shown in both their present version and past forms, and just a few villains here and there to shake things up and attempt to bring everything crashing down. Eventually, everything gets a little too crowded and even before the film was released, it was clear and known that certain material would be removed from the film.
And with the reworking of the overall plot – including several subplots removed – that meant some of the mutants didn’t get to make it to the time-travel party, at least in the large-scale way they were initially billed; X-Men staples Storm (Halle Berry) and Rogue (Anna Paquin) were among those heaviest hit. But breathe easy, because Days of Future Past is getting a new cut that’s going to go back to the source and ensure there are plenty more mutants in the universe. Gee, where’d they get that idea?
Simon Kinberg has announced that a new, extended edition of the film will be released next summer, called the “Rogue Cut”, which promises more than 10 minutes of additional footage – most importantly, the scenes snipped from Paquin’s subplot. While her name is on the title of the new cut, it’s not just all about Rogue; other footage involving other characters will be added to the film as well.
Kinberg spoke passionately about the need for the new cut, and why it was important to tap Rogue back into the game:
“It’s a big chunk, a substantial part of the movie…We want to give (fans) the fullest picture of the film – behind the camera, and in front of it…Every movie has scenes that are cut out, but not every movie has scenes cut out with such a beloved character.”
Aside from Rogue, it will be interesting to see who else makes the cut this time around. We’ll have to wait until next summer to see who he added (maybe Storm? Definitely Storm), but it’s clear that we’ll be seeing a much fuller roster this time around. At least X-Men: Apocalypse doesn’t involve time-travel.
