We’re getting more and more news about the upcoming “X-Men: Apocalypse”, including a confirmation that Kodi Smit-McPhee will be playing the role of Nightcrawler, the mutant with teleportation capabilities in the upcoming production. Previously, the role was handled by Alan Cumming, and while reception to his performance was mostly positive, Kodi Smit-McPhee has promised fans that he’ll attempt to play the character in a truer style to the original.
He says that he’s going to “make it his own”, as the whole experience will be a glimpse into the past. According to him, the Nightcrawler that was presented in “X2: X-Men United” was a bit of a rougher version of the character, one that has had a violent past and now he’s more interested in presenting a vulnerable version of him, one that people are used to from the comics. He went on to say that this will be the “fun, happy, swashbuckling Nightcrawler that we all love”, so fans will definitely have something interesting to watch in his performance.
There was also a peculiar bit about his statement, where he said “But as I said, all of the traditional things that we want in it—it’s still there. Hint, hint.” – and nobody seems to have a clue what that “hint, hint” could have possibly meant so far. According to some, it could be related to the origins of the character, as the comic books eventually revealed that Mystique is actually his mother, with Azazel being the father.
Both characters have been shown in the film part of the franchise’s universe so far, and considering the setting of the film (1962), it could make sense in the context of the storyline as a whole. Whether or not the new film will pay a lot of attention to that part of its plot, we don’t know – but there is definitely some potential to explore the roots of Nightcrawler in an interesting way.
We’ll probably find out a bit more about that once the release date of the film starts getting closer, but there’s still more than one year to go until it’s released. The producers will probably start giving some more solid hints about upcoming plots details around the beginning of 2016, as that would be the ideal time to start building up some hype for the film.
Would there be any interesting revelations in “X-Men: Apocalypse”, and how much will the new film show about Nightcrawler? We’re going to find out in about a year, but until then, many fans will probably not give up speculating about the numerous possibilities for the new production. Hopefully, the studio will handle it with the kind of respect it deserves.