Last month we learned that Fox had delayed ‘The New Mutants’ by nearly a year, pushing back the release date of the horror-tinged ‘X-Men’ spinoff from April 2018 to February 2019. The move came amid a broader shake up of the studio’s ‘X-Men’ slate, which also saw ‘Gambit’ get delayed by a few months (partly to position it for a summer release and partly to allow the studio to recruit yet another director) while ‘Deadpool 2’ was moved forward to open opposite ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’.
But why was ‘New Mutants’ delayed? After all, the film was barely three months from its original release date. We didn’t really have an answer at the time, just speculation. Though rumors have since surfaced of reshoots, they’ve also been dismissed by star Maisie Williams, who said simply that she’d “done a load of ADR (Automated Dialog Replacement, in which dialog is recorded in post-production, often to provide a clearer reading or insert a new line).” A new piece in The Hollywood Reporter, though, asserts that the film is due to undergo a “round of additional photography” – or reshoots – that will in part serve to insert a new character into the film.
So ‘New Mutants’ is, in fact, getting reshoots (though in fairness to Williams, they haven’t happened yet and may not have been scheduled when she provided the aforementioned comment earlier this month), which are almost certainly behind the delay. And not only that, but those reshoots will introduce a new character. No word yet on who that character might be or even how big of a role they might have. Though of the classic New Mutants team, the film does not presently feature Magma, Karma, Cypher, or Warlock, any of whom would be a fair guess.
‘The New Mutants’ is directed by Josh Boone and stars Anya Taylor-Joy, Maisie Williams, Charlie Heaton, Henry Zaga, Blu Hunt, and Alice Braga. The film is due to arrive in theaters on February 22, 2019.
Be sure to check back with ScienceFiction.com for more on ‘The New Mutants’ and other upcoming ‘X-Men’ movies as it becomes available!
