Channing Tatum will suit up as fan-favorite mutant Gambit for his own solo film in late 2016, but rumors have long been swirling that we’d see the Ragin’ Cajun a bit sooner than that. Introducing the character via a cameo in Bryan Singer’s X-Men: Apocalypse (despite its 1980s setting) to set up or tease the upcoming spinoff film would make sense from a marketing standpoint – considering it hits theaters five months earlier – but Tatum himself has announced that it’s not in the cards (no pun intended).
During an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit on Wednesday, Tatum was asked directly if he’d show up as Remy LeBeau in Apocalypse, and gave a firm denial:
“No ma’am, or sir. I definitely will not.”
So, I guess that solves that, unless of course he’s playing coy or has been sworn to secrecy. There’s always the chance that Gambit will be teased via some sort of post-credits sequence, so we’ll see what happens. In any case, Tatum seems excited about playing the character when the time comes, especially now that Rise of the Planet of the Apes director Rupert Wyatt has come aboard the project:
“We finally found someone [Wyatt] that I really do believe wants to make [the movie]. I just really think because Gambit is not the most popular or the biggest hero, I think there’s a really unique opportunity. Marvel’s done a lot of great movies that have made a ridiculous amount of money, and it’s always good to figure how to change the form.”
Tatum has already teased that, while an origin story, Gambit will be unlike other superhero projects. Hopefully we’ll find out exactly what that entails as we get closer to the film’s October 7th, 2016 release date.