Currently showing in cinemas nationwide, X-Men: Apocalypse is serving as the conclusion to the X-Men: First Class trilogy and Wolverine 3 set to bring the curtain down on Hugh Jackman’s run as the eponymous character in 2017, the X-Men movie franchise as a whole is on the verge of undergoing a significant overhaul. Filmmaker Josh Boone (The Fault in Our Stars) is currently working on a film adaptation of the New Mutants comic book series, while rumors persist that recurring X-Men film director Bryan Singer is working on a followup to Apocalypse that could take the 2018 date currently being claimed by 20th Century Fox for a mystery X-Men universe-related movie.
X-Men franchise producer Simon Kinberg, who also co-wrote X-Men: Days of Future Past andApocalypse, has continued to keep fans in the loop on the status of developing X-Men sequels/spinoffs, including the now-confirmed Deadpool 2 and the New Mutants film adaptation. Kinberg has now provided an update on the time period setting for the next central X-Men film installment after Apocalypse – though, he avoided clarifying exactly which movie that will be, in the process.
Kinberg spoke briefly about what lies ahead for the X-Men movie franchise at the press junket for X-Men: Apocalypse. There, he told the news organizations in attendance (including Coming Soon) that“The next one is set in the ’90s.”
As a reminder, X-Men: First Class took place in the 1960s, where the film introduced younger versions of several mutant players from the original present-day X-Men film trilogy. Days of Future Past thereafter jumped back and forth between a post-apocalyptic future and the 1970s in the First Class timeline, ultimately giving rise to an “alternate” X-Menmove timeline that will be explored by the upcoming central X-Men film installments, starting with Apocalypse in the 1980s. The next X-Men movie will thus maintain that First Class trilogy pattern of setting the main installments in the film series roughly ten years apart, by taking place during the ’90s – that is, the ’90s from the same timeline as Apocalypse and its predecessors.
X-Men: Apocalypse is now showing in cinemas nationwide, followed by Wolverine 3 on March 2017, and unannounced X-Men films on October 2017 (possibly Gambit), January 2018 (possibly Deadpool 2), and July 2018. The New Mutants is also in development.