Deadpool isn’t the only fan favorite character from the X-Men pantheon set to get some redemption on the big screen this year. After a couple of blink-or-you’ll-miss-it moments in ‘X-Men: The Last Stand’ and ‘X-Men Origins: Wolverine’, Psylocke is finally getting the proper feature film treatment thanks to Olivia Munn and ‘X-Men: Apocalypse’. But if her badass appearance during the Super Bowl wasn’t enough to convince you that Betsy Braddock is the real deal this time around, the actress recently talked about Psylocke’s strengths and motivations.
Just as she’s done since landing the part, Munn continued to express her excitement to play Psylocke during a recent interview with Collider. But this time, she went more in depth with the public perception of the scantily-clad ninja and shared that there is more to the powerful mutant than a sexy costume:
“Well, I’ve loved Psylocke… To me, I know that Psylocke is dressed very sexually. Out of all the costumes, it’s really revealing, but it’s important to know that she always had substantive plotlines… Just because she’s dressed like that, she’s not this promiscuous, slutty girl that’s—in fact, Apocalypse is the one who dressed her and gave her that outfit.
The way that I see Psylocke is as a very powerful weapon that has been used and abused by different people so that they could use her powers, and she’s somebody who’s just looking for righteous purpose. Right now, that’s why she’s one of the bad guys.. She’s definitely someone who’s very strong, who’s been through a lot. She has really powerful abilities and is just looking for a purpose.”
Building on that point, Munn discusses the deadly manner in which Psylocke chooses to attack her opposition. More than a pretty face indeed!
“The thing about Psylocke is that, I can see the way that she’s dressed but it has nothing to do with how strong she is and how powerful she is. That is something that I love about Psylocke. When most superheroes don’t enjoy killing or don’t want to kill but they will kill if they have to, Psylocke can create anything with her mind. She can kill from afar, like Magneto or Storm, but she chooses to create a sword, which is a very intimate way to kill someone. She experiences it.”
Finally, she shared a fun fact about Psylocke’s fighting style that evolved during shooting. Apparently taking after his onscreen persona, James McAvoy channeled a bit of Charles Xavier to offer some advice about the weapons of choice for one of Apocalypse’s most brutal Horsemen:
“That was actually James McAvoy’s idea. He was like, ‘If you can use both hands, then you can go, you can switch, you can…’ Because the thing about sword work is that you’re always keeping somebody off guard. They don’t really know it’s happening. You’re really throwing people off. He was like, ‘Well, you can really throw them off if you’re going from your real sword to your psychic sword and then just switching hands and it’s just …’ I was like, ‘That sounds awesome.’”
Clearly Olivia Munn is very passionate about playing Psylocke. Hopefully, that translates well onscreen and the character has much more screen time than she has had in the past. And who knows? Maybe this re-introduction into 20th Century Fox’s X-Men universe will lead to a spinoff a la ‘Deadpool’, ‘Gambit’, and ‘The Wolverine’. But is that something that you’d want to see? Let us know in the comment section.
‘X-Men: Apocalypse’ starring Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, Ben Hardy, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Tye Sheridan, Alexandra Shipp, Sophie Turner, Lana Condor, Olivia Munn, and Oscar Isaac opens in theaters on May 27, 2016.
