Well this confirms the story we had yesterday that Brett Ratner is signed to Direct X-Men 3. From everywhere, Comic Book News brought us the rumour yesterday and the story today:
According to Variety Twentieth Century Fox and Marvel Entertainment set Brett Ratner on Friday night to replace Matthew Vaughn as the director of “X3,” the third installment of the “X-Men” franchise.
Hiring keeps the film on track for an August start date and a Memorial Day weekend 2006 opening date.
Well he hasn’t lost that much time so it shouldn’t affect the production too much. However Ratner better be happy with the script, I doubt there’s much leeway for him, if he had time to change anything.
The trade adds that X3’s budget is locked, and Fox and Marvel brass consider the script by Zak Penn and Simon Kinberg to be at least as strong as that of the first two installments.
The story suggests that Matthew Vaughn acutally left because he was getting worried about the size of the production:
Vaughn dropped out less than a week ago. Official reason was that the “Layer Cake” director didn’t want to uproot his family, but it appears the exit followed his growing apprehension about taking on such a large assignment in his second outing.
Oh, and a quick snippet:
Maggie Grace [“Lost”] as playing Kitty Pryde.
