As the long-running superhero franchise prepares to culminate with the upcoming Dark Phoenix, 20th Century Fox announces it has set May 13 as X-Men Day. They first appeared in Marvel Comics back in 1963, and later the uncanny X-Men mutant crew would conquer the movie world as well, beginning with Fox's 2000 film X-Men. The original X-Men movie cast, headed up by Patrick Stewart's Charles Xavier and Hugh Jackman's Wolverine, would continue through 2006's X-Men: Last Stand before being moved aside for a new generation of stars in 2011's X-Men: First Class.
After the soft reboot of the X-Men franchise with First Class, the second generation of characters continued on through X-Men: Days of Future Past and X-Men: Apocalypse, and will come together one more time for this summer's Dark Phoenix, which is in essence a remake of Last Stand (though fans hope this time the movie does justice to the popular Dark Phoenix comic book arc). Outside of the main franchise entries, the X-Men movie universe has also had room for three Wolverine standalone movies, including 2017's Logan, as well as two Deadpool movies starring Ryan Reynolds as the Merc With a Mouth. The future of the X-Men is very much up in the air now thanks to Disney's acquisition of Fox assets and the expected folding of X-Men into the MCU.
With the current incarnation of X-Men seemingly on its way out, possibly not to be replaced for quite a long time, 20th Century Fox will celebrate the long running superhero franchise with X-Men Day, set for May 13. Fox promises the day will be marked with fan celebrations, special events and the debut of exclusive X-Men content. Not coincidentally, advance tickets for Dark Phoenix will also go on sale beginning that same day. Fox asks that X-Men fans follow the Twitter account @XMenMovies for more information. The studio has also released a new poster which can be seen below:
With $5.7 billion in worldwide grosses, X-Men has indeed been a major franchise for Fox over the past 20 years. Of course, the road has sometimes been a rocky one as fans have not always been totally thrilled with some of the choices that have been made over the years. By and large, hardcore X-Men fans have objected to Wolverine being placed front-and-center in the franchise, though in recent years the main films have leaned less on the character as he's spun off to his own adventures. Of course, the X-Men flag has also been carried over the past few years by Deadpool, and indeed Fox's two irreverent Deadpool films proved the most successful entries in the series.
Where X-Men goes from here is anyone's guess, but for now Fox seems content to look back on the past of the franchise while getting ready for one last big adventure with Dark Phoenix. It remains to be seen what plans Disney has for X-Men going forward, but there are definitely some exciting possibilities as Marvel Studios takes over the characters.
Source: 20th Century Fox
