The future of the X-Men is in Gavin Hood’s hands. Fox has finally announced Hood as the director of Wolverine, the spin-off from the X-Men movies and the only current film on deck for the franchise (although a Magnento spin-off is still planned).

Hood is a much more acclaimed name than I’d expect the studio to pick for a super hero spin-off movie. He was the writer/director behind Tsotsi, which took the 2005 Best Foreign Film Oscar. Variety reports that Fox executives were convinced he was the right man for the job after seeing his most recent production, Rendition, which opens in theaters in October.

The script for Wolverine is already assembled by writer David Benioff and filming is expected to begin as soon as Hugh Jackman is done filming with Baz Luhrman on Australia so the spin-off can hit theaters next year. Originally I felt that meant they were rushing this into production to meet a deadline, but if they’re actually bringing a talented, stylish director on board perhaps they aren’t short-changing the future of the X-films after all.