Matthew Vaughn Not Directing ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’?

In a surprising turn of events, Deadline bring word that Matthew Vaughn has decided not to direct the sequel to ‘X-Men: First Class,’ ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past.’ Reportedly atop 20th Century Fox’s replacement short list is Bryan Singer, who launched the ‘X-Men’ movie franchise with the first two films and who has been a guiding influence in each ‘X-Men’ film by producing. Vaughn would step back to produce the film with his fellow co-writer on the film, Simon Kinberg, and Lauren Shuler Donner. The director is rumored to instead move forward with his proposed feature film, ‘The Secret Service,’ re-teaming him with his ‘Kick-Ass’ creator Mark Millar.

Set to start production in January for a July 18th, 2014 release date, ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’ will likely star the likes of James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Rose Byrne, January Jones, Nicholas Hoult, Lucas Till, Caleb Landry Jones, Zoë Kravitz, Jason Flemyng and Jennifer Lawrence. All reprising their roles from ‘X-Men: First Class.’ The synopsis of the ‘Days of Future Past’ comic book story arc is as follows, “The storyline alternates between present day, in which the X-Men fight Mystique’s Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, and a future timeline caused by the X-Men’s failure to prevent the Brotherhood from assassinating Senator Robert Kelly. In this future universe, Sentinels rule the United States, and mutants live in internment camps. The present-day X-Men are forewarned of the possible future by a future version of their teammate Kitty Pryde, whose mind traveled back in time and possessed her younger self to warn the X-Men. She succeeds in her mission and returns to the future, but despite her success, the future timeline still exists as an alternative timeline rather than as the actual future.”