Hank McCoy (Before the Fur)


Okay, I’m getting psyched. Psyched to see some SENTINELS!

X-Men: Days of Future Past might just deliver the X-Men movie I've been dreaming about for so long. With Hugh Jackman and Ellen Page headlining, it’s looking more and more like a straight-up re-telling of THE story that first got me into Marvel comics to begin with.

Peter Dinklage is an excellent addition to the cast. I really think he’s a phenomenal actor. Who will the guy be playing though?

Initially, a lot of the speculation was centered around Puck from Alpha Flight. Now, I don’t think this would have been terrible. But I would have a couple of problems with it.

1. He’s a better actor than what’s needed for this part. While there’s no shame in Dinklage portraying a superhero with dwarfism (I mean, the X-Men are all about diversity), I don’t necessarily think of Puck as a character that needs a great deal of screentime or character development. He’s cool, but my point is, it’d be a waste of Dinklage. He’s got more depth he could bring to a role in the movie.

2. This would likely continue the long-standing and personally loathed tradition of just cramming superpowered people into X-Men movies without much forethought or planning. Puck isn’t necessarily a mutant and while I admit the easiest way to slip him into any Marvel movie is to just go "what the hell, just make him a mutant," I just don’t dig it.

Of course, recent speculation has centered around the possibility that Dinklage will be playing a bad guy. This opens up a whole range of possibilities.

Sentinel creator Bolivar Trask is a likely candidate. The guy has made an appearance X-Men: The Last Stand, but I don’t even recall it, which means it couldn’t have been that big of a part, right? Maybe they’ll just look the other way and pretend that didn’t happen or maybe they’ll put Dinklage in as a relative of Trask and say that in the X-Men film universe, Bolivar’s cousin or brother made the Sentinels or something.

Anyway, I hope that this is the case. I mean, sure, Dinklage could make an appearance as some new, unheard of villain or maybe even some Nimrod-type sentinel (Bastion, maybe?) and that might be cool. But I really think Dinklage could portray the tragedy of the guy who sets out to protect the human race and ends up inadvertently sort of ‘giving birth’ to the apocalypse.

My point here is, they need to use Dinklage in some way that showcases just what a powerful actor he is, not just have him be some raging, stereotypical villain or pithy superhero. X-Men: First Class had depth in the characterizations, I think, and that’s what’s going to make this next movie work. With a little luck and some good planning, I think this could rivaling The Dark Knight Rises and The Avengers. We’ll see.

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