Buried in Deadline's report about 20th Century Fox President of Production Emma Watts signing on for three more years at the studio, there's news about forward movement on one of the studio's most anticipated upcoming sequels. They're confirming what we all expected, that Matthew Vaughn has agreed to direct the sequel to X-Men: First Class, which hired Simon Kinberg back in November to write the script, and will once again have Bryan Singer on board as a producer. Vaughn's participation had never been especially in doubt, but given the rushed production process on the last one, and the fact that he spent this long closing the deal, you have to assume there were some major negotiations involved.
With the bulk of the cast officially signed on for sequels, we can probably assume that production will start moving forward quickly. And though First Class wasn't quite the monster hit the studio might have wanted it to be, grossing less than all of the other X-Men movies including the awful X-Men Origins: Wolverine, it's still a viable superhero franchise, and that counts for a lot. Vaughn has suggested in the past that he might want to kick off the movie with the Kennedy assassination, meaning we're in for another period film, so now we'll see if he can stick with any of those promises. It will be his first time working with Kinberg, but the guy has plenty of strong credits to his name, including the first Sherlock Holmes and the upcoming This Means War and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter-- Kinberg knows how to write action if nothing else, and might be an improvement on the mess of five writers credited on the original First Class movie.
If you have any specific hopes for the X-Men sequel, though, share them with us in the comments!
