During an interview with British outlet YahooMoviesUK to promote his upcoming film Glass, James McAvoy was asked about his Professor X teaming up with Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury in a future Marvel movie. I assume he’s being asked this question because of the Disney-Fox merger making waves.

James answers by making his own compelling argument why that could be tricky to combine the characters and it’s not because of the time period issues with his current team

“I don’t think we have talked about that actually. I don’t know if the X-Men can go into the Marvel universe, I’m not sure. Maybe, they could. But I think what is different about the Marvel universe at the moment anyway and the Avengers universe you only got a couple of superheroes in the world. Do you know what I mean? There’s a good amount But there’s a couple of teams, a couple of football [soccer] teams of them, you know. Whereas in the X-Men world you’re potentially seeing hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of them and the social implications of that is different.”

“So, in the X-Men world, they’re ghettoized and ostracized and they’re feared and all that stuff. And in the Avengers world, they’re sort of on their own more I know there are times when they are vilified and shunned, but they’re generally more honored and seen as heroes. And we’re [mutants] almost seen as immigrants that people that are scared of, do you know what I mean? The world of mutants and humans. That’s kind of weird, how do you resolve that?”

“But they’re very clever, they’ve done very well, I’m sure they’ll figure it out.”

You can watch that very interview below.

#Glass star James McAvoy isn’t sure about the X-Men joining the MCU "How do you resolve that?”: https://t.co/SnJZXPI6qk — Yahoo Movies UK (@YahooMoviesUK) January 14, 2019

We already have a pretty good idea why the Singerverse won’t be making the jump to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, mainly, the liberties Bryan Singer and Simon Kinberg has with the characters/stories told in their movies. When Spider-Man returned to the Marvel Cinematic Universe for Captain America: Civil War, they were quick to reboot and they needed the permission of Sony to do that.

Dark Phoenix is indeed assumed to be the swan-song for the main lineup as Deadpool is said to be one making the jump to the MCU, due to his limited connections to the broader Singerverse. It’s also tough to have characters from the 1990s make a jump to 2020, despite the continuity gymnastics 20th Century Fox is okay with, I doubt Kevin Feige will be willing to deal with it when a reboot is just cleaner for screenwriters.

Now, once the Disney-Fox merger completes (possibly spring/summer) all the Marvel rights Fox once held all revert to Marvel Studios and they can pretty do whatever they’d like. It would also mean that any studio contracts with actors will be terminated and also development deals (which is why X-Men projects are getting canceled). Basically, it’s expected that Marvel will reboot to both recast the roles, revive the branded comic book characters people know, and also find a different direction to introduce them into the MCU since they haven’t been mentioned or referred to over the last three phases.

I think James makes an excellent case as well and how difficult it will be to add the X-Men, given as they’re seen as “freaks and outsiders” to most of the human population. That could be a way to get us closer to Avengers vs X-Men eventually.

Dark Phoenix is set for release on June 7th.

SOURCE: YAHOO MOVIES UK