X-Men fans were understandably upset last month when word got out that Dark Phoenix had undergone reshoots that changed the movie's final from a climactic space battle to one on a runaway train. Considering this is arguably the most cosmic storyline the X-Men have ever had, this was seen as a major step down. I would agree with that assessment. However, according to James McAvoy the change was necessary to avoid similarities with another comic book movie.
McAvoy and Michael Fassbender, who play ideological rivals Charles Xavier and Magneto, spoke with YahooUK and revealed that Dark Phoenix had an ending that was too similar to another superhero film. Too bad they don't tell us which one...
“The end [of ‘Dark Phoenix’] changed a hell of a lot,” said McAvoy. “The finale had to change. There was a lot of overlap and parallels with another superhero movie that came out… a while ago. And we had no idea that we were…”
“They had spies on set and [they] basically stole our ideas," Fassbender added, jokingly.
“We were basically trawling through the source material it seems,” said McAvoy.
I'm going to guess that movie was Captain Marvel.
Sophie Turner, who looks to be the central focus of the film as corrupted mutant Jean Grey, thinks the reshoots were a fantastic idea. However, she doesn't say shit about another superhero movie, so who knows if that was even true or not...
“It was just one of those things that was where the third act… you watch the first two acts and the third act just didn’t feel cohesive. We went back and we redid all of the third act, pretty much, and it was such a good decision. The third act is the best part of the movie for me.”
Reshoots are an ordinary part of the movie-making process, and I try to keep a tight grip on reporting such things because they can give a bad rap unnecessarily. But Dark Phoenix has gone through quite a lot more than typical reshoots, and so there's reason to be skeptical. I still hold out hope that Fox's X-Men franchise will get the quality conclusion it deserves. We'll find out on June 7th whether that's the case.
