With Fox expanding its X-Men universe further from the clutches of Disney, a new teaser video for The New Mutants hints at the movie's big bad.

The X-Men movies have never been a particularly light-hearted affair, with recent installments like the raunchy action/comedy Deadpool and grisly neo-western Logan having even moved the franchise fully into R-Rated terrain. Josh Boone's The New Mutants looks to be the franchise's darkest entry yet, with a horror-tinged story about a group of troubled mutant teens and a grim aesthetic to match.

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Over on The New Mutants Instagram and Twitter accounts, 20th Century Fox has released a series of haunting videos that appear to relate to Maisie Williams' Wolfsbane, Anya Taylor-Joy's Magik, Henry Zaga's Sunspot, and Blu Hunt's Mirage. Various teasers depict scorched floors (Sunspot), nightmarish homelands (Magik), and tragic religious pasts (Wolfsbane). However, most interestingly, the latest post seems to point to Mirage's deadly encounter with the Demon Bear (see the video below), setting up the whole premise of the film.

Those who have read the "Demon Bear Saga" from the comics will know that the evil entity originally existed only in the mind of Mirage. However, finding power, the villainous Demon Bear broke into the real world and killed her parents. (Cue one particular panel which shows a badly injured Mirage limping through a snow-covered scene while dripping with blood.) Unless there was any doubt that this is what the teaser is alluding to, note the bear-shaped necklace in the foreground too.

Fans already knew that the movie would be loosely adapting Chris Claremont’s acclaimed storyline from the early '80s, but have so far been left in the dark about how the Demon Bear will fit into the feature. Apart from the mauled arm of Alice Braga's Cecilia Reyes in the first trailer, Boone has kept the movie's overarching villain hidden from sight. However, given the cryptic Demon Bear teaser and a recent boom in promotional material, could another New Mutants trailer be lurking in the shadows?

Boone has mentioned that he originally pitched The New Mutants as a trilogy, meaning that three of the superhero horror movies could be heading to the Foxverse. As we diversify away from the standard tales of Charles and Jean, the likes of Deadpool 2, X-Force, Gambit, and The New Mutants show that the comic book powerhouse can stand on its own two feet. Sure, it may be convenient to have Xavier's gifted youngsters suiting up alongside Iron Man and friends, but you can't deny that Fox has some amazing X-Men properties on the horizon. Hopefully, The New Mutants will do justice to the "Demon Bear saga" when it hits theaters next year.

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Source: 20th Century Fox