In some odd Friday evening news, BlackBook magazine talked to Josh Schwartz, the writer and executive producer of shows like "The O.C.," "Gossip Girl" and "Chuck" (soon to be getting his own comic book!) and found out that he'd taken over the job of writing a screenplay for a Young X-Men movie (that title still hasn't been confirmed) which originally was to be written by Zack Penn. What's even odder than that juicy news is that BlackBook then took the story down, even though you can still see the original post at the link below. Thanks to the wonders of the internet, we were able to grab some of the original text which had Schwartz saying some rather unflattering remarks about his superhero peers and predecessors:
Something he can talk about, however, is news that he will pen the screenplay for the next installment of X-Men, a prequel of sorts. "I'm very well aware that I'll be bludgeoned by purists, but I love its mythology, and it comes with a pretty hefty paycheck." Of the project, he beams with excitement about the opportunity to involve lesser known X-Men characters who haven't yet been portrayed on film. It will center on teenage characters at the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning. "It's not like I'm adding new characters like Toaster Head, or anything like that." Despite his enthusiam, he's cautious, given the double-edged sword inherent in the seemingly inexhaustible renaissance of the genre. "The Hulk looks like it's going to be terrible. And why does he look like he's fighting against the monster from Cloverfield? I mean, with Transformers, it's not like fans were going to come back saying, 'You used the wrong car.' This, however, is a different story." Of his predecessors and their successes (or failures), he says, "Brett Ratner didn't have a lot of credibility going in to the third X-Men movie, but I think Bryan Singer [who directed the first two installments] got a free pass on Superman Returns because of his work on X-Men."
