Mark Millar Explains How 'Old Man Logan' Could Work Without Marvel Studios Characters

While Fox hasn't officially confirmed anything, it's widely believed that the next Wolverine movie will be based on the Old Man Logan comic book arc written by Mark Millar. Which, of course, raises its own set of questions. Namely, what are they going to do about the fact that most of the characters in it aren't owned by 20th Century Fox?

Millar, who serves as a creative consultant for Fox, isn't worried. In an interview, he explains how the Old Man Logan storyline could work on the big screen, without using Marvel Cinematic Universe characters like Hawkeye and the Hulk. Read the Mark Millar Old Man Logan comments after the jump. 

The Old Man Logan plot picks up many years a dystopian, supervillain-filled future. The former Wolverine has retired to a quiet life with his family, but agrees to help when a now-blind Hawkeye approaches him for help delivering a package. Millar doesn't come out and say Wolverine 3 will be based on Old Man Logan, but as he pointed out, star Hugh Jackman all but confirmed it at Comic-Con.

Although Fox has the rights to Wolverine, Marvel Studios has the rights to Hawkeye and most of the other key characters in the storyline. And the odds of the two sides joining forces, like Sony and Marvel are doing for Spider-Man, aren't great. But Millar speaking to IGN, Millar shared some thoughts on how an Old Man Logan movie could work without its MCU-owned supporting characters.

They're not important to the story. The way I worked that thing is I actually structured it as, I broke it down mechanically – I figured out going from this part of America to that part of America and what he would encounter along the way, and then I added in the adversities later. Basically Wolverine doing The Road movie is the important thing and he has a friend [a blind Hawkeye] with him. But that friend could be Cyclops and he could be blind by the fact that his ruby-quartz visor is broken and he has to keep his eyes closed the whole time and everything, but still insists on driving the car they're crossing America with. There's lots of stuff. Instead of the Hulk, you could have the Blob or something.

Honestly, the continuity stuff is the most boring side of it. I kind of like it, keeping it in the X-Men universe a little, too, because comic fans are different from the mainstream world. I know this stuff backwards because I've lived my whole life loving this stuff, but most people don't know all the minutia and everything so I think keeping it simplified and keeping it generally X-Men universe is a smarter thing to do.

None of the X-Men movies are completely faithful adaptation of the source material, nor should they be. The big screen version of Wolverine has no connection whatsoever to Hawkeye, the Hulk, etc., so emotionally it probably makes more sense to put him with characters who already exist in the X-Men universe.

As of now, the only non-Wolverine character confirmed for the next movie is Professor X. The character doesn't have a significant role in the arc as it exists in the comics, but it sounds like he will in the movie. Patrick Stewart has teased he'll be making "more than an appearance," and Jackman has teased the "quasi-father/son sort of relationship" between the two characters.

The next Wolverine movie arrives March 3, 2017. James Mangold is directing.