Is Singer Out For X-MEN: APOCALYPSE?

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Bryan Singer has always been a divisive director in the X-Men Universe. There are fans who hate the first two movies because Singer made Singer movies rather than simply making fun X-Men flicks. Then he left the franchise in order to make Superman Returns over at Warner Bros., causing the top brass at Fox to hate fuck rush X-Men: The Last Stand to release with a mediocre director just so they could beat Superman to theaters.

But just as Singer returned to the franchise and crushed it with X-Men: Days of Future Past, the director faced sex abuse allegations that could now derail his return to the franchise.

Radar Online is reporting that Singer and execs at Fox are squaring off over whether Singer can or should helm what could be the biggest X-Men film to date, X-Men: Apocalypse. The deal was closed months ago, according to the report, but now Fox is getting nervous because their $250-350 million investment in the next X-Men movie could be affected from both set morale and publicity standpoints.

I won’t go into the innate homophobia of the whole situation, and I’m not going to make a judgement on whether Singer did what he was accused of or not. Both of which matter, but not today. It’s early and I’m on my first cup of coffee.

What I will say is that Singer has proven himself to be a hero of the X-Men universe. Along with Matthew Vaughn, Simon Kinberg and Lauren Shuler Donner, Singer has resurrected what was easily a dying franchise. Should he lose his job, there are very few directors who could fill his shoes. Vaughn, who directed X-Men: First Class, may be the only one.

The only thing Singer has going for him now is that Days of Future Past is by far the highest grossing X-Universe film with more than $610 million worldwide. The question for the Fox brass, I guess, is whether or not Singer can lead a massive creative team in the midst of these allegations. It’s a business decision and Fox has to make it fast (if they haven’t already) otherwise Apocalypse could really be the end of the X-Men movie world.