X-Men: Apocalypse facts for kids

Quick facts for kids X-Men: Apocalypse
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Bryan Singer
Produced by	Simon Kinberg Bryan Singer Hutch Parker Lauren Shuler Donner
Screenplay by	Simon Kinberg
Story by	Bryan Singer Simon Kinberg Michael Dougherty Dan Harris
Starring	James McAvoy Michael Fassbender Jennifer Lawrence Oscar Isaac Nicholas Hoult Rose Byrne Tye Sheridan Sophie Turner Olivia Munn Lucas Till
Music by	John Ottman
Cinematography	Newton Thomas Sigel
Editing by	John Ottman Michael Louis Hill
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date(s)	May 9, 2016 (2016-05-09) (London) May 27, 2016 (2016-05-27) (United States)
Running time	144 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$178 million
Money made	$543.9 million

X-Men: Apocalypse is a 2016 American superhero film directed and produced by Bryan Singer and written by Simon Kinberg from a story by Singer, Kinberg, Michael Dougherty, and Dan Harris. The film is based on the fictional X-Men characters that appear in Marvel Comics. It is the sixth mainline installment in the X-Men film series and the ninth installment overall. It is the sequel to X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) and stars James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Oscar Isaac, Nicholas Hoult, Rose Byrne, Tye Sheridan, Sophie Turner, Olivia Munn, and Lucas Till. In the film, the ancient mutant En Sabah Nur / Apocalypse is inadvertently revived in 1983, and he plans to wipe out modern civilization and take over the world, leading the X-Men to try to stop him and defeat his team of mutants.

The film was announced by Singer in December 2013, with Kinberg, Dougherty, and Harris attached to develop the story. Casting began in October 2014, while principal photography commenced in April 2015 in Montreal and ended in August of the same year.

X-Men: Apocalypse premiered in London on May 9, 2016, and was released in the United States on May 27, 2016, in RealD 3D, IMAX 3D, 4DX and Dolby Cinema formats by 20th Century Fox. The film received mixed reviews from critics. Many critics said it is inferior to its predecessor. A sequel, titled Dark Phoenix, was released on June 7, 2019.

Cast

The cast of X-Men: Apocalypse at the 2015 San Diego Comic-Con. From top to bottom: McAvoy, Fassbender, Lawrence, Isaac, Hoult, Munn, Peters, Smit-McPhee, Turner, Sheridan, Shipp, Condor, Till, and Hardy

• James McAvoy as Professor Charles Xavier:
  A pacifist mutant and the world's most powerful telepath, who is the founder of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters and leads the team of mutants known as the X-Men, in order to protect humankind and battle against the deadly enemy within. During the latter part of the film's production, McAvoy shaved his head for the role.
• Michael Fassbender as Erik Lehnsherr / Magneto:
  A mutant Auschwitz survivor with the ability to control magnetic fields and manipulate metal, who was once Xavier's closest ally and best friend, until his belief that mankind and mutantkind would never coexist led to their separation. He is globally infamous for attempting to assassinate U.S. President Richard Nixon on live broadcast 10 years prior.
  • Bill Milner appears in archival footage as a Young Erik.
• Jennifer Lawrence as Raven / Mystique:
  A mutant with shapeshifting abilities, globally renowned for saving Nixon's life 10 years prior. She was once Xavier's closest ally and his adoptive sister. Lawrence said, "she hears about what happened to Erik and she wants to seek him out and help him".
• Oscar Isaac as En Sabah Nur / Apocalypse:
  Born in ancient times, and presumably the world's first mutant, he has a variety of destructive superhuman abilities, including telekinesis, cyberpathy, teleportation, and the ability to augment other mutants' abilities, as a result of being able to amass powers when transferring his consciousness from one body to another. Isaac described Nur as the "creative-slash-destructive force of the Earth". He added, "When things start to go awry, or when things seem like they're not moving towards evolution, [En Sabah Nur] destroys those civilizations." Isaac had to go through extensive makeup and prosthetics applications, and wore high-heeled boots to appear taller and a 40-pound suit. The full costume was uncomfortable, particularly in the humid environment of the outdoor scenes, which forced Isaac to go to a cooling tent between takes. Nur's previous old-form (seen at the beginning of the film) was played by Berdj Garabedian, a 70-year-old Canadian real estate agent, and avid silver screen fan in his first credited film role.
• Nicholas Hoult as Hank McCoy / Beast:
  A mutant with leonine attributes, prehensile feet and superhuman physical abilities. Hank acts as a teacher in Xavier's school and he builds inventions for troubled students. He also built the X-Jet.
• Rose Byrne as Moira MacTaggert:
  A CIA operative who first met and fell in love with Xavier in First Class, where he wiped portions of her memories of him and the X-Men at the end. Simon Kinberg said they are "essentially, strangers" when they meet in this film.
• Evan Peters as Peter Maximoff / Quicksilver:
  A mutant who can move, think, and perceive at hypersonic speeds, and the son of Magneto.
• Tye Sheridan as Scott Summers / Cyclops:
  A mutant who fires destructive optic beams and wears a ruby visor or sunglasses to stabilize and contain them, and who is the younger brother of Havok. Sheridan describes Cyclops as "angry and a bit lost". He added, "He's now learning about being a mutant and trying to handle his powers."
• Sophie Turner as Jean Grey:
  A mutant who is scared of her telepathic and telekinetic power, and one of Charles Xavier's most prized students. Turner states that she was cast in the film because of the "dark side" of her character Sansa Stark in Game of Thrones. She compared Jean to Sansa and described being an outcast in the human world who struggles with her power and gift, the same way Sansa, who wanted to live a normal life, felt. Turner learned archery in preparation for the role.
• Olivia Munn as Psylocke:
  A mutant with psionic abilities. Her abilities include projecting purple psychic energy, usually into the form of an energy blade that can burn through metal. Munn described Psylocke as "very lethal, very powerful and very strong". She practiced sword fighting in preparation for the role.
• Kodi Smit-McPhee as Kurt Wagner / Nightcrawler:
  A German teleporting mutant and one of Charles Xavier's new students. Singer said Nightcrawler is a source of comic relief.
• Alexandra Shipp as Ororo Munroe / Storm:
  A young mutant orphan who can control weather. Storm is discovered by Apocalypse in Cairo. Shipp partially shaved her head to sport a Mohawk for the role.
• Lucas Till as Alex Summers / Havok:
  A mutant who has the ability to absorb energy and release it with destructive force from his body, and the older brother of Cyclops.
• Josh Helman as Colonel William Stryker:
  A military officer who hates mutants and has, in the ten years since Days of Future Past, been developing his own plans for resolving "the mutant problem".
• Ben Hardy as Angel:
  A mutant with bird-like feathered wings who gains metallic wings that can shoot razor sharp feather-projectiles, similar to his Archangel counterpart in the comics. Hardy practiced indoor skydiving in preparation for his role.
• Lana Condor as Jubilee:
  A mutant student at Charles's school who has the ability to create psionic energy plasmoids. Discussing her first day on X-Men: Apocalypse, Condor says, "I was very new and it was my first role. I'd never been on a set before or in front of a camera, so I didn't know what to expect. The first day we shot scenes in an 80s-themed mall with hundreds of extras in 80s gear, plus crew and cameras. It was surreal ... It's a lot easier when you have the costume, as that helps bring everything to life. She has her iconic yellow jacket, which is a staple. It's very bold and confident, like her. A lot of her costumes are super 80s. I also listened to music from the 80s and that helped."

Additionally, Carolina Bartczak plays Magda Gurzsky, the wife of Erik Lehnsherr and mother of their mutant daughter Nina Gurzsky. Magda and Erik live happily in Poland together hidden away from the world. She and her daughter are killed when a militia comes looking for Erik after he accidentally exposes who he is while trying to save a coworker. Tómas Lemarquis portrays Caliban, a mutant with the ability to sense and track other mutants, and wrestler "Giant" Gustav Claude Ouimet plays The Blob, Angel's opponent in an underground fight club. Monique Ganderton, Warren Scherer, Rochelle Okoye, and Fraser Aitcheson play Apocalypse's prior lieutenants, Death, Pestilence, Famine, and War respectively. Zehra Leverman reprised her role as Quicksilver's mother, Ms. Maximoff

Hugh Jackman makes an uncredited appearance as Logan / Wolverine, in his Weapon X form. In that same scene, director Bryan Singer cameos as a guard who is killed by Wolverine as he attempts to escape the complex. X-Men co-creator Stan Lee and his wife Joan B. Lee make a cameo appearance together, as bystanders witnessing the launch of nuclear missiles worldwide; this was Joan's last film before her death the following year. Željko Ivanek cameos as a Pentagon scientist. In a deleted scene, Scott shows Jean a record from Dazzler. The scene is not in the theatrical film, but is included on the home video release.

Journalist Jessica Savitch and actors Leslie Parrish and Michael Forest (appearing in footage with dialogue from the 1967 Star Trek episode "Who Mourns for Adonais?") also appear in cameos

Music

On March 2, 2015, it was announced that John Ottman, who composed the scores for X2 and X-Men: Days of Future Past, would return to write and compose the score for Apocalypse. On May 20, 2016, the official soundtrack was released as a digital download. In addition to Ottman's score, the film features a remix of the second movement of Ludwig van Beethoven's seventh symphony entitled "Beethoven Havok" and two songs contemporary to the film's 1983 setting, "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)" by Eurythmics and "The Four Horsemen" by Metallica.

Visual effects

The visual effects are provided by Moving Picture Company and Hydraulx and Supervised by Anders Langlands and Colin Strause with help from Digital Domain, Cinesite, and Rising Sun Pictures.

Release

X-Men: Apocalypse had its world premiere in London on May 9, 2016. The film was released in 20,796 screens across 76 international markets on May 18, 2016, one week before its North American debut. Apocalypse was issued triple 3D, 4DX, and 2D formats, and in IMAX 3D in select international markets, using the DMR process. It opened in Korea on May 25 and in China on June 3. It was released in Japan on August 11.

Home media

The film was released by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment on digital download on September 9, 2016, and on DVD, Blu-ray, 3D Blu-Ray, and Ultra HD Blu-ray on October 4, 2016. The film topped the national home video sales charts for the week ending on October 9, 2016.

X-Men: Apocalypse was released on The Walt Disney Company's streaming service Disney+ on July 17, 2020.

Sequel

In May 2016, Simon Kinberg said the next X-Men film would be set in the 1990s. He separately said the post-credits scene mentioning the Essex Corporation was related to Logan (2017), and that it could have ties to Gambit as well as the following X-Men film. Bryan Singer said he would be interested in having the villain Proteus in an X-Men film. He also said he would be stepping away from the franchise, but could envision returning later in some capacity. In 2017, Singer was removed from production. The film's sequel, Dark Phoenix, was released on June 7, 2019.

Accolades

Images for kids

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  Englefield House, Berkshire, England served as the X-Mansion.

See also

In Spanish: X-Men: Apocalipsis para niños