Director Bryan Singer has been putting his Instagram account to good use over the past few years, teasing images to keep the interest going in his upcoming films. He did it for X-Men: Days of Future Past, and he’s now doing it for next year’s X-Men: Apocalypse. The latest image he’s revealed seemingly confirms the addition of founding X-Man (in the comics) Warren Worthington III, a.k.a. Angel. In the production art that Singer shared, we see what appears to be Angel in a cage on display in some kind of circus environment. Is this how we’re going to be introduced to circus performer Nightcrawler as well? Recently, news hit that young Brit actor Ben Hardy had been cast in an unknown role–he certainly seems to be a perfect fit for a young Angel.
Of course, the characters of Angel and Apocalypse tend to go hand in hand, as one of the Angel’s most famous storylines in the comics involved his feathered wings getting mutilated by Apocalypse, then getting transformed into the metal, winged, blue skinned Archangel. (Between Beast, Mystique,Nightcrawler and Archangel that would be four blue people in this movie; considering the 1980s setting, I hope Singer sneaks in New Order’s “Blue Monday” somewhere.)
I guess the inclusion of Warren Worthington really throws the whole movie timeline into “suspension of disbelief” territory, since we’ve got to buy that Wolverine’s time travel highjinks in Days of Future Past didn’t just alter the events of the original X-Men trilogy, but apparently also when characters were even born as well. X-Men: The Last Stand clearly showed Angel as a preteen in the early ’90s, and now he’ll be a teenager (if not an adult) in the 1983 set Apocalypse. Ugh, best not to try to do the mental gymnastics to try and explain that one away, and just enjoy that we’re probably getting Archangel in a movie.
