EXCLUSIVE: Following the success of its animated series X-Men ’97, Marvel Studios is now ramping things up on its live-action X-Men movie with Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds & Snakes scribe Michael Lesslie in negotiations to pen the movie. The film is still in early development with no talent or director attached and no release date set. Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige will produce.
As Deadline reported last fall , this project became one of the first major writing assignments to open up once the writers strike had been resolved. Feige and his execs made it clear there was no rush and have taken their time meeting with numerous candidates since then. Late last week, the decision was made to go with Lesslie.
(Lesslie was mentioned in the InSneider Newsletter as a finalist.) Related Stories News Famke Janssen On Possibly Reprising X-Men Role: "You Never Know" Festivals Rachel Zegler On Whether There's More 'Hunger Games' With Lucy Gray Baird - SXSW Studio Even with Lesslie officially boarding, it still will be some time before we get a movie in theaters as the film will now look to find a director to oversee the development with Feige and Lesslie. All that said, the news that Marvel has started development on the live-action pic is sure to excite fans of the franchise who have been begging for a new movie since Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox and its library in 2019.
The X-Men universe was by far the most popular and profitable Marvel IP that Fox contro.
