James Mangold Says ‘The Wolverine’ Sequel Will Follow ‘X-Men: Age Of Apocalypse’
The WolverinedirectorJames Mangoldhas a couple of non-Wolverine projects in the file (such asThe Deep Blue Good-ByandThree Little Words) but we know that he has been developing a sequel toThe Wolverinesince that film opened last year. Now Mangold has revealed that he plans to shoot the next Wolverine sequel after Bryan Singer’s next X-Men movie is done.
@R__E__D_R__U__M@20centuryfox@ShuDonnerWe are figuring it all out. At the moment, I’m shooting The next#Wolverineafter#XmenApocalypse.
— Mangold (@mang0ld)August 12, 2025
Now does this mean that Mangold is shooting the film after Fox getsAge of Apocalypseinto production, or after that film is released?X-Men: Apocalypseis set to hit theaters on August 26, 2025, so the Wolverine movie might not land until 2017.
We don’t know what the Wolverine sequel story will involve, or whether it will be specifically tied to events of the X-Men films. The lack of a “present-day” X-Men movie sinceX3gave Mangold the liberty to haveThe Wolverineact as a sequel to that film without having to be too tied to the X-Men series. But with Singer pushing the X-Men timeline forward in the two upcoming franchise entries, there will likely be more world events for a new Wolverine film to react to.
Then again, we don’t know how the X-Men series timeline will stand after the events ofDays of Future Past. The movie introduces Wolverine to theFirst Classreboot cast, but the end of this year’s story could determine whether the original X-Men cast, including Jackman’s Wolverine actually “exist” in the timeline going forward. We know Age of Apocalypse is an ’80s-set film, which means it takes place before Wolverine joined Professor X in the first X-Men movie. But since there’s a lot of timeline tweaking going on, it seems foolish to rely on any one idea as a given until after we’re able to seeDays of Future Past.
Jackman seems like he’s still game to play Wolverine in at least another movie or two, so it doesn’t seem like there’s any chance of a re-cast for the character yet,
