X-Men: Apocalypse Teased A Sinister Sequel That Never Came
Little good came out of "X-Men: Apocalypse." The preceding film "Days of Future Past" was meant to be a fresh start for the Merry Mutants. Instead, director Bryan Singer was exposed as creatively bankrupt; "Apocalypse" rehashes beats from Singer's previous movies like a "greatest hits" compilation. Singer always had little interest in the source material comics and "Apocalypse" showed he was out of his depth trying to make an "X-Men" movie that felt more like them.
This feeling of running on fumes, juxtaposed with a comical misuse of Oscar Isaac's talents, meant "Apocalypse" was the beginning of the end for 20th Century Fox's "X-Men" movies, not a new dawn. It's certainly when their spell over me ended.
The post-credits scene of "X-Men: Apocalypse" in particular is pointless. Its very inclusion was Fox taking a page from rival Marvel Studios, but the sequel set-up doesn't pay off. In this scene, men in black suits survey the remains of Weapon X, littered with dead soldiers killed by a feral Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) earlier in the film. They find a vial of Wolverine's frozen blood and pack it in a briefcase labeled "Essex Corp."
This refers to Nathaniel Essex, a.k.a. Mister Sinister, a prominent X-Men villain. He's an evil geneticist, so his apparent interest in Wolverine's DNA tracks. But if you're not a comic fan, that name means nothing to you. Since the "X-Men" franchise met an ignominious end with 2019's "Dark Phoenix," this post-credits stinger came to a total dead end, which means it still doesn't.
Who is Mister Sinister?
Sinister debuted in 1987's "Uncanny X-Men" #221; he'd been foreshadowed beforehand as the mastermind behind the "Mutant Massacre" storyline, where the outcast Morlocks were slaughtered by superpowered mercenaries the Marauders.
Famed "X-Men" writer Chris Claremont first conceived of Sinister as a new villain for his heroes; artist Marc Silvestri designed his appearance, best described as "a Dracula-themed David Bowie." This design tipped its hand to Claremont's planned origin; Sinister was meant to be the avatar of an evil mutant child. His monstrous appearance was because he was literally born from a childish imagination. This was ultimately unused, though Claremont got to briefly implement it decades later for his alternate timeline story, "X-Men: Forever."
Sinister's depicted origin is that he's an immortal scientist born in Victorian England. A contemporary of Charles Darwin, Nathaniel Essex is obsessed with evolution/the notion of survival of the fittest, and consequently, mutants. He believes that Scott Summers/Cyclops and Jean Grey hold the genetic potential to create the ultimate mutant, and so his plans often revolve around them. Sinister soon leaped from the comics to the screen in 1992's X-Men: The Animated Series. Voiced by Christopher Britton, he was the main antagonist of season 2 (and he's coming back for the revival, "X-Men '97").
More recently, writer Kieron Gillen has had a strong handle on Sinister, writing him in everything from 2011's "Uncanny X-Men" up to the ongoing "Immortal X-Men." Gillen's Sinister is a manipulative narcissist who revels in being evil but never loses his sense of humor. Gillen explained to CBR:
"The short of it is that Sinister was always campy, and I just turned up the dial and made him more self-aware of it [...] It's all a game to Sinister because he's a moral abyss with no bottom floor."
When a villain has a name and outfit as ostentatious as Mister Sinister does, their personality should match.
Some Sinister plans
What exactly were the cinematic plans for Mister Sinister? Since the stinger was about him acquiring Wolverine's DNA, and the next "X-Men" movie teed-up was "Logan," would he be appearing in that? Would Sinister be the creator of Laura/X-23, Wolverine's clone-daughter?
Director James Mangold shot that down, telling CinemaBlend his movie had no place for "operatic highly-costumed, stroboscopic villain." Sure enough, Sinister wasn't in the movie, and "Logan" was all the better for it.
Josh Boone, director of "The New Mutants," confirmed to /Film in 2020 that his movie was forcibly distanced from "Apocalypse" after that movie's poor reception. At one point, that movie was meant to introduce Sinister, with Jon Hamm considered for the part — this was scrapped early enough that nothing was ever filmed.
Could Hamm have pulled it off? He looks the part and is obviously a good actor, but he's also not what I envision for "campy supervillain." I feel this could've easily been a mismatch of actor and material in the same vein as Isaac playing Apocalypse. Hamm's former "Mad Men" co-star January Jones also had a rough go of it as Emma Frost in "X-Men: First Class"
Keep in mind, the real reason the "X-Men" franchise petered out is because 20th Century Fox was bought and absorbed by Disney. Marvel Studios would naturally prefer bringing the X-Men into their movies over continuing what Fox was doing. The franchise simply never had the time to recover from what "Apocalypse" wrought, and the disrupted plans for Mister Sinister are the glaring result.