X-Men: Dark Phoenix to serve as a tribute to the women of the team

After the Dark Phoenix story-line was largely blotched in X-MEN: THE LAST STAND, Simon Kinberg will have the opportunity to redeem himself with X-MEN: DARK PHOENIX, which will much more appropriately put Jean Grey (Sophie Turner) front and center. But it won't just be Jean Grey under the spotlight, but also the other women of the film as well, including Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) and the mysterious villain played by Jessica Chastain. While speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Kinberg said that he "really wanted to acknowledge the strength of the women in the comic and in the actresses that we have and the central story-line demands it."

Sophie Turner added, "It’s really exciting. I think there’s such a revolution in superhero movies. I feel like this movie is a revelation because of it being like a drama but the hero is a female and she’s also the villain. It really is about her relationships with the females in the film, especially Jessica Chastain’s character. It’s really interesting to have those two characters be kind of the two biggest characters in the movie and both be female and so layered and so complex." At one point in X-MEN: DARK PHOENIX, Mystique will make a joking remark to Charles (James McAvoy) that the team should be renamed the X-Women because of how often they come to the rescue of the male members of the group, but everyone will find themselves threatened when Jessica Chastain's otherwordly shapeshifter character makes her entrance. The actress can't talk about the nature of her role without giving everything away, but she did say that the plethora of female roles in the script is what drew her towards the project.

I’ve always wanted to do a big comic book franchise-y film but I had some issues with the female characters in the films I was being offered. I was really pleased with this script because I think it’s a departure from the norm. This definitely passes the Bechdel test and I don’t know how many comic book films can say that.

X-MEN: DARK PHOENIX will hit theaters on November 2, 2018.