As you’ve probably heard in the days since San Diego Comicon, Fox has announced a fifth X-Men film is in the works.  This one, called X-Men: First Class, is set in the 60s, with a more James Bond, adventurey kind of tone, and will be directed by Matthew Vaughn (Kick-Ass, Stardust).

The REAL X-Men: First Class

I’m excited about it. Nervously excited, but excited.  The internet is already filling up with doom and gloom worriers, and maybe they’ve got a point, but I’ll remain excited, cause it does have some things that intrigue me.  Let’s do a quick run down of the stuff that looks good, and the stuff that has me worried.

The good:

• Set in the past, so we won’t have to worry about how to or whether to resurrect Cyclops, Jean and Xavier, which I’m thinking would be tricky.
• Some REALLY good casting.  I’m not a huge fan of James McAvoy, but he DOES strike me as a pretty decent Xavier.  January Jones as Emma Frost is also a great pic.  Too bad they couldn’t have snagged her Mad Men costar Christina Hendricks to play Jean Grey.
• Havok is in it.  ’bout time.
• Hellfire Club.  Nice.
• Angel Salvatore.  Yeah, I said it.  I’m a fan.  For those who didn’t read Grant Morrison’s run on New X-Men, Angel is a young student at Xaviers School who was part of the “special class” of mutants who were misfits among the misfits of the X-Men.  She had fly-like powers, and that’s pretty cool – not everyone who’s a mutant is always guaranteed to have cool, sexy powers.  Some people are going to be brundle-fly.  This intrigues me.
• Banshee.  Again, about time.

The OTHER X-Man named Angel

The bits that worry me:

• No Jean.  No Scott.  No Logan.  So… wait… I thought this was an X-Men movie? Not that every X property has to have all three of these characters, but, you know… maybe one of them?  Maybe there will be cameos.
• Darwin.  Yes, I like Ed Brubaker’s Deadly Genesis mini-series, but even I have to admit that Darwin, whose power is to evolve to meet whatever adversity presents itself, is a dumb character.  I don’t care that they cast a Twilight actor to play him, because as I’ve said, the similarities between X-Men and Twilight are pretty numerous, I just don’t like the character.
• Havok but no Cyclops?  I know this is just a repeat of the first bullet, but still… No Cyclops?!?
• Still no love for my man Cable.  5 movies in and no Cable. C’mon, people, just have him just blast in from the future, you can explain who he is later.
• Mystique.  Again.  People, you can write an x-men movie without Mystique!  And, come on, really,  it’s a total writing cop-out.  What the?!? Some senator or something just launched a nuclear missile at the sun?  oh, wait… it’s Mystique.  Chuck just told the X-Men to all pat their heads while rubbing their tummies while chewing gum while running?  Oh, wait… it’s Mystique.  Bleh.
• It’s called X-Men: First Class, but only features (so far) ONE (Beast) original X-Man.  I’m not saying that the movie continuity has to mirror the comics exactly, but c’mon… 1 for 5?
• It’s been rumored that Azazel, Nightcrawler’s father, will appear.  I… um… I thought we all agreed to pretend that Chuck Austin’s writing stint on Uncanny X-men, including Azazel and Sammy The Squid-Boy never actually happened.

Even Sammy the Squidboy is a little concerned about the possibility of a Chuck-Austin-created character appearing in the next X-Men film.

Although… if they have Juggernaut in the movie, with a little pink squid dude hanging out with him… I dunno, that’s so absurd it might work.

IGN has a pretty nice rundown of the rumored cast at http://movies.ign.com/articles/110/1109906p1.html?_cmpid=ign597, so if you want more details, definitely check that out, too.

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Yeap, the ol’ BigSteamRobot site is still a little bland looking.  I’ll try and get it a little more spiffy this coming week.  And for those wondering, yes, that’s two posts and neither have been about Warmachine.  That’ll change.  I promise.

I’ve now watched Rush: Beyond The Lighted Stage twice now, and I’m sure I’ll watch it another five or six times before I clear it from my tivo.  What does Rush have to do with Big Steam Robot?  Well… EVERYTHING.

Let’s face it, there’s not much more geekier of a band than Rush.

• Zepplin, yeah, lots of fantasy / Lord of the Rings type subject matter, but their overall acceptance by your average classic rock headbanger does negate their nerd-cred to an extent.  Still a bad ass band, and it’s officially no longer hip to hate on Stairway To Heaven (Waynes World was fifteen years ago, dude.), but really, about as nerdy as Van Halen at this point, and Van Halen is not nerdy.
• Yes – Okay, definitely more nerdy than Rush, BUT more people out there in rock and roll land know Owner Of A Lonely Heart than Starship Trooper or Your Move, so, much like Zepplin, their geek-cred is watered down.  Because Owner Of A Lonely Heart sucks.  For real.
• Weezer – One nerdy album followed up by several less nerdy albums does not equal geek cred, and all the black rimmed glasses in the world aren’t going to change that.
• MC Front A Lot, Nursehella, etc – I love nerdcore rap, it’s true, but it’s not rock and roll.
• Diver – SERIOUSLY nerdy, but unknown outside of the Flint area, so, you know… doesn’t count.  Good dudes, though.

So really, Rush are the kings of Nerd Rock, as appointed by me.  Now, I’ve often said that people who don’t know about Rush don’t NEED to know about Rush, but with their new album coming out soon (more on that in a second), and the documentary playing on VH1 (albeit later at night then Craig Ferguson), I think it might just be time to discuss my favorite band.  And yeah, they’re nerdy enough to go here.

So from time to time, I think I’m gonna post some recommendations / thoughts in an Ingus’ Guide To Being A Rush Dork sort of format, mostly for my pal SouthBayLouis, who had the misfortune to start his listening with By-Tor and the Snow Dog.  That’s not beginning stuff there.

Oh, that new album?  It’s called Clockwork Angels.  Yeah.  Steampunk AND Angels.  If there’s an album title that’s more Ingus out there, I’d like to hear it.