Simon Kinberg says Dark Phoenix is the natural culmination of Fox’s X-Men

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

Now that Disney's acquisition of Fox is official, our future now includes a relaunch of the X-MEN franchise, but as that's still several years down the road, we'll have to make the most of DARK PHOENIX. The upcoming film will likely serve as the conclusion of Fox's X-MEN series which began almost twenty years ago, and Simon Kinberg recently told ComicBook.com that this was always the plan.

"From the beginning of conceiving what we were going to do with this film and writing it, which was three plus years ago, so long before there was a Disney merger, I felt like this was the natural culmination for this cycle of X-Men movies," Kinberg explained. "Because it is seeing this family that you've come to love and know for how ever many films, and if you count the originals almost 20 years now, you see that family tested in a whole new way. You see that family start to fall apart in a real way for the first time, ultimately come back together." The DARK PHOENIX writer/director continued:

That felt like the culmination of a storyline or a cycle of these films. And for me, and for most of the fans … Dark Phoenix is the ultimate and most iconic storyline in the X-Men universe. And so I didn't know how we would top Dark Phoenix within this cycle. This felt like we had to earn our way back to Dark Phoenix. And I feel like we did hopefully, and beyond that felt like we'd want to sort of create an ending and the possibility of a new beginning. And that's what we do on this film.

Based on Simon Kinberg's comments, it seems that the X-MEN franchise would have undergone another re-imagining following the release of  DARK PHOENIX regardless of whether or not Disney took over. While it's nice that it doesn't sound like DARK PHOENIX will be dropping any major unresolved cliffhangers on us, it will still a little sad to see Fox's mighty franchise come to an end. Beyond Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds), I can't think of many elements which have a chance of surviving the transition as the X-Men join the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

The official synopsis for DARK PHOENIX:

In DARK PHOENIX, the X-MEN face their most formidable and powerful foe: one of their own, Jean Grey. During a rescue mission in space, Jean is nearly killed when she is hit by a mysterious cosmic force. Once she returns home, this force not only makes her infinitely more powerful, but far more unstable. Wrestling with this entity inside her, Jean unleashes her powers in ways she can neither comprehend nor contain. With Jean spiraling out of control, and hurting the ones she loves most, she begins to unravel the very fabric that holds the X-Men together. Now, with this family falling apart, they must find a way to unite — not only to save Jean’s soul, but to save our very planet from aliens who wish to weaponize this force and rule the galaxy.

DARK PHOENIX will hit theaters on June 7, 2019.