If I Did Dat… X-Men: The First Class Casting

Ok, I’ve just been around the blogosphere and heard the news that Bryan Singer may not be available to direct the X-Men: The First Class movie because of his obligations in directing a movie called Jack The Giant Killer. Either Jack is going to win him an Oscar or the X-Men movie is not worth it to Mr. Singer. I’m assuming the First Class movie is going to be like the Ultimate series for Marvel (a re-telling of origin stories if they took place today and not in the 1950s or 1970s). This means that the X-Men were only 5 deep in team members and not a cast of hundreds in an entire academy. That could open up the movie to a strong ensemble treatment instead of them focusing their attention on Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine and casting everyone else as a supporting role. Wolverine wasn’t in the First Class, so unless they want to piss up geekdom by destroying canon, they’ll keep him out of it. If anything, this movie would either focus on the five young mutants being trained by Professor X or on the frenemy relationship between Professor X and Magneto.
So that leaves the original five of Cylcops, Jean Grey, Beast, Iceman, and Angel with Professor X. I, for one, believe that limiting the number of heroes can greatly help in these ensemble things. Look at the recent Star Trek movie. They were able to successfully take care of a sizeable cast while giving the right focus to the right characters at the right time. It should be possible with the First Class. Sure, Star Trek focused a lot on Kirk, but all of the others got to have their moments in the spotlight. That’s not the hard part. The hard part is going to be with the cast of villains since they are just as numerous in size but don’t get as much face-time, and shouldn’t since the move is called X-Men: First Class and not The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants: First Class… man, that’s a horrible name for a group.

All of this has made me think who would I cast for this upcoming X-Men movie? They’d all have to be younger (or be able to portray younger) people than in the original movies.

Scott Summers/Cylcops: Matthew Bomer
I’ve only seen one episode of White Collar, but that was more than enough to convince me that Bomer has the chops to play the solemn field leader of this band of mutants. In the early days, Cyclops was the model student who was almost militaristic in the way he handled himself. In other words, he was boring. Sometimes, the only things that could make you feel for the guy was his crush on Jean Grey and the fact that he can’t control his wicked awesome powers of being able to shoot lasers from his eyes (I know they aren’t technically lasers, but saying Optic Blasts didn’t feel right in that sentence). I believe Matthew Bomer can seduce the audience with Cyclops even though the character a virtually dry, no-nonsense type of guy.

Jean Grey: Rachel Nichols
Yeah, I have a thing for Rachel Nichols, which makes sense for me to cast her as Jean Grey, since she’ll also have to convince audiences into why she’s the target of both Cyclops and Wolverine’s affections for so many years. I know she’s not a natural redhead, but she was able to Scarlett in GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra and she was redheaded, green skinned alien in the Star Trek movie and I didn’t mind one bit that she wasn’t a natural. Of course, it helped that she was in her skivvies for portions of each movie.

Hank McCoy/Beast: Karl Urban
Yeah, thanks to Star Trek, I now have a thing for Karl Urban. I loved his Bones in Star Trek, which convinced me that he would be the perfect man to play the intellectual Beast. Kelsey Grammar was my first choice to play Beast when the original movies came out, but it was a shame that he was only brought in for that god-awful Last Stand movie. Karl Urban is young enough to be in this group of young mutants and whether they decide to go with is pre-blue fur phase or his current half-man/half-animal look won’t matter because he can do it.

Bobby Drake/Iceman: Chris Pine
That’s right. I just hit a Star Trek tri-fecta. Chris Pine was Captain Kirk in the Star Trek movie and even though this would be a step down for him since it’s not the leading role, he can’t deny that he would be perfect for the role of the quick-witted, short-tempered, bad boy of the group. You guessed it. He was Wolverine before Wolverine was Wolverine. Maybe if we sold it to him like that, he’d jump at the chance to play the role.

Warren Worthington III/Angel: Justin Hartley
Some of you may not recognize this actor, but he plays Oliver Queen/Green Arrow on the Smallville television show. So he’s pretty much shown me that he can play the rich kid, which Angel was. Come on, even his name sounds loaded: Warren Worthington III.

Professor Charles Xavier: Patrick Stewart
I’ll admit it. This is a total cop out. I scoured the web and couldn’t find anyone better. Yeah, he’s old and *SPOILER ALERT* when they young-ified him for X-Men Origins: Wolverine, he looked creepy. But you can’t find anyone else to play Professor X. Even when I was watching the Star Trek: TNG episodes as they were coming out, I knew he’d be perfect for Prof X. I tried though. I really tried. I almost went with Timothy Olyphant because he was my Lex Luthor choice, but he was too young. I looked around at all of the British actors I could think of, but a lot of them were too dour or frumpy or were a former Doctor Who (and I’ve dipped my pen into that bucket enough, Peter Davison would be a good alternative). Nope, has to be Patrick Stewart. I worry about the age/make-up thing later.

Magneto: Liam Neeson
This was a little easier. Mainly because, even though I liked Ian McKlellen, I thought he looked too old and fragile. He’s more mastermind than evil villain to me. Nope, for this one I wanted either Liam Neeson or Chrisopher Lee. I’m diving into the Jedi\Sith pool for this one. Even though Christopher Lee did a fine job as Count Duku in Attack of the Clones, I can see Liam Neeson be more of the evil villain that can single-handedly take the X-men to their limits. Yes, he’s a little younger than Patrick Stewart, but I couldn’t pass on the idea of the man from Schindler’s List portray an evil mutant born out of the Holocaust.

Toad: Jason Flemyng
Who’s Jason Flemyng? I remember this guy from the League of Extraordinary Gentlemenwith Sean Connery. He played Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Of course, I’m choosing him because of his portrayal of Dr. Jekyll, in case any of you were wondering.

Blob: Dan Castenella
Ok, this one is kind of a joke entry, but it makes you pause. Blob, in my mind, is going to be almost completely CG. So all I really need is a voice and who better than the voice of Homer Simpson? No knock to Kevin Durand, who played Blob in the Wolverine movie, but my image of Blob is someone that could tower over the X-men, both vertically and horizontally.

Scarlet Witch: Emmanuelle Vaugier
I’m going virtual unknown here and with this choice, I’m surprised at how a hottie like her is still unknown. She played Detective Angell on CSI: NY for a year and she was in Two and a Half Men, Smallville, and Human Target for a while as well. Look her up on IMDB. Hottie. Now imagine her in skin-tight red leather. HOTTIE! She may be unknown, but this role will make her a star. Scarlet Witch is Magneto’s daughter. Before she became a hero on the Avengers, she was a card carrying member of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants (really dumb name). As the token female on the baddie group, she could hold her own with her hexes.

Quicksilver: Eric Johnson
Fatigue has set in and I’ve phoned this one in. I decided on Eric Johnson to play the white-haired speedster because I liked him as Whitney Ford in the first season of Smallville and I think his Flash Gordon television show was a good idea, just poorly executed and sorely missing the soundtrack by Queen. Man, I’ve got to start doing smaller casts.