Introduced in the 1990’s Uncanny X-Men #266, Gambit quickly won the hearts of fans as he had interesting abilities and a multilayered backstory, which resonated heavily with series’ reader-base. With the ability to charge inanimate objects with energy and convert them into deadly weapons, Gambit captivated the X-Men fandom. A thief by profession, he was extremely agile and a strategist by nature.
The popularity sky-rocketed when he made a brief appearance in Hugh Jackman’s 2009 film, X-Men Origins: Wolverine. Fans were ecstatic to see The Trickster make an appearance, which led to Channing Tatum being offered to play the role in a standalone film.
However, Marvel decided to pull the plug on the film, as Edgar Wright, who was offered to write the script of the anti-hero, turned down the offer.
Edgar Wright Turned Down Gambit’s Standalone Film
Gambit has often been a polarizing character in the X-Men Universe. Fans of the franchise who have been reading the comic books since the 1990s, would call him a minor character of the Children of the Atom. This is majorly because of the X-Men animated series, which featured characters like Wolverine or Storm in the limelight, as his questionable past made him a convoluted character.
As a result, the character has failed to achieve the kind of popularity and dedication from fans that some of the other characters have.
This temperament was evident when Edgar Wright shared the same thoughts during an interview, where he shared that he was not familiar with the character. During an exclusive interview with Slash Film, Simon Kinberg shared how he had chased Wright to work in a Gambit film featuring Channing Tatum. He said,
“He’s one of my favorite directors of all time and one of my favorite people, just a super great guy. Obviously a cinephile… I’ve chased Edgar for ‘X-Men’ movies. I’ve chased him for literally every possible thing. We have talked about every movie.”
The Shaun of the Dead filmmaker acknowledged the statement and revealed how he was unfamiliar with the character, as he made his debut in the comic books after his time. He said,
“Gambit wasn’t a character I knew too well. He appeared after my time reading Marvels — roughly 1985–1990 or so. [He] wasn’t one that I knew a lot about and hadn’t really read growing up, so it felt like it was someone else’s dream gig. Maybe he means more to people who watched the [animated] show? Which again, was after my time.”
Edgar Wright is the go-to man to write a smash-hit blockbuster film. However, once he decided to turn down the project, he never saw the dawn of light.
Why Did Marvel Never Decide To Work on the Gambit Movie?
As per Medium, 20th Century Fox’s X-Men film franchise had decided to come up with a spin-off film, and even a couple of scripts had been written. However, the idea was again discarded when Disney acquired 20th Century Fox. It was believed that Channing Tatum was going to play the anti-hero, but while talking to Vanity Fair about the film getting trashed, he had to “spiritually, emotionally, [and] kind of mentally let it go.”
In a separate interview with Variety, the actor mentioned how he was so devasted that he had not watched any of the Marvel films, ever since. He said,
“I shut off my Marvel machine. I haven’t been able to see any of the movies. I loved that character. It was just too sad. It was like losing a friend because I was so ready to play him.”
Naturally, the news was too big to handle because it was one of Tatum’s dream projects and the film getting scrapped for the second time was soul-crushing. This was true not just for the actor, but for the fans as well.
X-Men (1992) can be streamed on Disney+.
