On the heels of this morning’s news that Gore Verbinski has dropped out of directing Fox’s long-developed Gambit movie, the studio has revealed a new slate of release date shakeups, giving Gambit, Untitled Deadpool Sequel, and The New Mutants new release dates.

Good news first, Untitled Deadpool Sequel has been bumped up by two weeks and will now land in theaters on May 18, 2018 instead of June 1. Ryan Reynolds will return as the foul-mouthed vigilante alongside Brianna Hildebrand as Negasonic Teenage Warhead, Morena Baccarin as Vanessa, and (cringe) T.J. Miller as Weasel and newcomers Josh Brolin as Cable and Zazie Beets as Domino. The new release date puts Deadpool 2 a week ahead of the Star Wars box office domination that’s sure to come with Solo: A Star Wars story, a smart move considering the Star Wars films have proven to have long legs. Deadpool will now return to theaters up against Sony’s horror pic Slender Man.

Now the bad news. Josh Boone‘s horror-tinged take on The New Mutants is getting a major bump back on the schedule and will now land in theaters 10 months later than originally scheduled. The film moves from April 13, 2018 to February 22, 2019. Anya Taylor-Joy, Maisie Williams and Charlie Heaton star in the YA X-Men spinoff about a group of diverse teenage mutants kept in a research facility against their will. The shift prevents Fox from having two superhero films in theaters at the same time overseas, but the significant bump suggests that there are larger factors at play, either because the film needs more work before it’s ready for audiences or possibly due to strategy or fallout surrounding the Disney-Fox deal. Per The Tracking Board, the film tested OK, but the studio wants to rework it to be scarier in the wake of last year’s landmark year for horror.

Finally, there’s the Gambit movie, which has seen a tortured pre-production process, losing directors Doug Liman (American Made) and Rupert Wyatt (War for the Planet of The Apes), and as of this morning, Gore Verbinski (Pirates of the Caribbean). The Channing Tatum vehicle has been pushed from the recently set February 14, 2019 to a summer slot on June 7, 2019. Per The Hollywood Reporter, the film has a “heavy comedic tone as it revolves around a heist” and the thinking is that it’ll do better as a summer Marvel movie.

X-Men: Dark Phoenix is still slated to hit theaters on November 2, 2018.

For more of the latest of Fox’s growing X-Men verse, check out our recent coverage in the links below.

Source: Collider

Josh Boone is directing the Fox movie from a script he co-wrote with Knate Gwaltney.
Fox’s long-awaited X-Men spinoff New Mutants is finally getting casting up.

Anya Taylor-Joy, the star of The Witch and Split, and Game of Thrones’ Maisie Williams have signed on to star in the project, the ensemble young adult super hero movie being directed by Josh Boone.

The movie is headed towards an early July start and is armed with a script by Boone and his writing partner, Knate Gwaltney. Simon Kinberg and Karen Rosenfelt are producing.

New Mutants, created by Chris Claremont and Bob McLeod, was the first X-Men comic spinoff, launched in the early 1980s as the franchise began two decades of dominating the comic book industry.

The movie will focus on the angst-driven adventures of a diverse group of teens that include Native American Danielle Moonstar, Scots girl Wolfsbane, Brazilian ladies man Sunspot, a Kentuckian code-named Cannonball, and Russian teen Magik. Also in the mix will be an alien named Warlock.

Taylor-Joy will play Magik, a girl who has learned sorcery and uses teleportation discs to travel. She is also the sister of Colossus, an X-Man who appeared in Deadpool.

Williams will play Wolfsbane, a girl struggling to reconcile her religious beliefs with her power to turn into a wolf.

Boone has been eyeing the actresses since last year but was only able pull the trigger on them once the movie was greenlit earlier this year. The movie has a April 13, 2018 release date.

The studio is making serious efforts to find ethnically appropriate actors, conducting wide searches for a Native American to play Moonstar and a South American for Sunspot.

Taylor-Joy broke out with the 2015 award-winning period horror movie The Witch and starred with James McAvoy in M. Night Shyamalan’s surprise hit, Split. She is repped by CAA, Felker Toczek and Troika in the UK.

Williams plays Arya Stark in Thrones, which launches its seventh season in July. She is repped by WME, Jackoway Tyerman and UK’s Louise Johnston Management.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter