Invasion Co-Creator Simon Kinberg Talks Season 2 And Beyond, Star Wars Rebels, X-Men & More [Exclusive Interview]

For nearly 20 years, Simon Kinberg has been one of the biggest filmmakers in Hollywood. From his first screenplay, "Mr. & Mrs. Smith," becoming a blockbuster hit starring Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, to shepherding the "X-Men" movies for well over a decade and co-creating "Star Wars Rebels," Kinberg has certainly left his mark on the business. Now, he's making his mark on the world of premium streaming television as his sci-fi series "Invasion" is wrapping up its second season on Apple TV+.

The second season of "Invasion" picks up just months after the events of season 1, with the aliens escalating their attacks in an all-out war against the humans. If Kinberg has his way, this will just be the second part of a larger story that plays out over a couple more seasons — but we'll get to that. Even if this show doesn't get a third season, Kinberg has plenty to keep him busy, as he's producing projects such as "Deadpool 3," a reboot of Stephen King's "The Running Man," and a heist film directed by F. Gary Gray called "Lift," among many other things. The man stays busy.

I had the good fortune of speaking with Kinberg about his career in honor of the forthcoming "Invasion" season 2 finale. We discussed why he sees himself as a writer above all else, what it means for him to see his "Rebels" characters making the jump to live-action, what advice he has for the person tasked with tackling Marvel's "X-Men" reboot, and much more.

Note: This interview has been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.

You shaped a whole lot of things that I love more than anything in the world. Not to get too ahead of myself here, but "Star Wars Rebels" is one of the best parts of the religion I subscribe to.

That's awesome. Thanks. I subscribe to the same religion, so that means a lot to me.

We're here to talk about "Invasion," which is coming up on two seasons pretty much in the books at this point. I'd like to tie this to the beginning for you. Right now, you're in a situation where you co-created this big sci-fi series for Apple, one of the biggest companies on the planet. That's most people's dream heading into this business. When you started, was it like, "I want to produce, I want to direct, I want to write?" Where did you start? Where were your ambitions originally?

It's a long time ago. I just turned 50 on August 2. My senior thesis at Columbia was a screenplay and how I saw myself was as a screenwriter. I would say how I still see myself, despite having produced, and even directed some things, and produced a lot of things, I still see myself primarily and in my soul as a writer. But my thesis project for film school was a script that became "Mr. & Mrs. Smith."

That catapulted my career at a very young age. I've been doing this now for over 25 years and I've done almost everything, including something I would never, ever do again, cameo acting, in "Mr. & Mrs. Smith." I think of all of the things I do, I love, love, love producing because I get to work with other writers, which doesn't happen when you're writing. I love directing because I get to work even more directly with actors. But the thing by far and away that I think is my natural musculature is writing. [If] I was put on the planet to do anything — good, bad, or otherwise — writing is it.

You took on directing under pretty big circumstances, I would say. Was that challenging for you as a writer then, to go on and take on all this other responsibility in a big-ass movie like "Dark Phoenix," or how did that feel for you?

The physical scale challenges of it were not that daunting, only because I had produced on the ground every single minute of every single day of shooting however many other "X-Men" movies of similar scale with different directors, and different kinds of situations. So I felt ready in terms of what it would mean, and how many people I would be marshaling as a leader of the film, when you're the director. I think the thing that was the most surprising to me as a director, both times, with two movies of different scales and expectations, was how much I missed having a director. When I'm on set, the back and forth I have with the director creatively is like ... that's my marriage. That is I think where some of the best creative work comes out of me as a writer, as a producer.

When I was there without another director and I was the only writer, it felt lonely, and it felt as though I was existing creatively in a silo, even though I was collaborating with some extraordinary actors who had their own perspectives. There was certainly inspiration there, but it was different. That's what I found, and I was surprised by it I guess, because I felt as though when you really are in a symbiotic relationship with the director as a writer or especially as a writer-producer, the titles don't matter anymore. You both end up doing a little bit of each other's jobs. The director will come up with lines, you might even come up with a shot, you might ask for a different take. You'll have a perspective on the way an actor should perform a moment, or a line, or a scene. You might want to change the scene as a writer-producer, and if you have a director that you're really in partnership with, they'll be open to it. So I felt like all of that I missed, and that was the most surprising part.

Circling back to "Invasion," that first season was very much a slow burn until it wasn't. Season 2, less so. As a writer, did you always see that being the case when you were taking it to Apple? Was that part of the sell? Like, "Hey, you've got to go on this ride with us?"

That was always the concept. The concept was the first season was essentially the feeling of day one of an invasion. The second season, you would leap forward in time, you would really be thrust into something that was much more propulsive and action-oriented. You'd already be situated with the characters so you would know them more intimately, and you wouldn't need to take the time to necessarily learn all of the idiosyncrasies and personalities of the characters. You could get a little deeper, faster into the plot and like I said, action. I mean, you know my work: I haven't done a lot in television. As someone who's spent most of my career working in movies, I imagined a show a little bit the way I imagined a movie, which was I saw the first season like act one of a movie, which is a lot of setup.

I saw the second season as part one, like the first 30 minutes of the second act of a movie, which is where you really start to get into the action. Then I saw, in my hopes and dreams, a season 3 like the back half of the second act of a movie where now the action is really accelerated, and the challenges are massive and seem insurmountable. Then if, God willing, we were to have a fourth season, that's where, for me, it would be the third act of just final conflict and everything erupting, and then resolving. So there was a build, and it did mimic in many ways the structure of a movie.

So your ideal world would be four seasons for the show?

Yes.

And you haven't heard yet about doing season 3?

We were working on season 3 scripts before the [writers] strike started, and we're working on those scripts, and the response to season 2 has been really, really positive, and even bigger than season 1. Apple's been really happy with the show. So fingers crossed we will get a shot at making season 3.

I mentioned "Star Wars," and I'm not blowing smoke when I say this: "Star Wars Rebels" is amongst my favorite things in that universe. What's it been like for you, because I know you're a little distant from it now, but to see these characters and everything grow? You have a situation now where these characters are coming to live-action. Dave Filoni's going to be doing a live-action movie with these characters. What's that been like for you?

It's been amazing. "Star Wars" is a religion for me too, and "Star Wars" is the reason that I wanted to get into movies when I was a really little kid before I even understood what getting into movies meant. I saw the first original "Star Wars" movies, honestly, I could not even count how many times, but well over a hundred times each of the films. I had every possible thing that my parents could purchase within their means. I also, in many ways — I'm older than you, but my earliest vivid memories are very tied to "Star Wars." And I'll tell you one really quick story, it's like kinship between us. When I was a kid, I had pneumonia so bad that I was in the hospital. I remember I woke up from being unconscious in the hospital for however long. What my parents had done is they left a little toy Lego Millennium Falcon by my bed, and I was like, "I'm going to be okay."

That's so sweet.

Yeah, so the idea of actually working in the "Star Wars" universe — and I worked with J.J. [Abrams] and Larry Kasdan and Michael Arndt on "Force Awakens," and I worked with Gareth Edwards and company on ["Rogue One"], and I even was around ["The Last Jedi" director] Rian Johnson a little bit — that was beyond a dream come true. Having worked in universes like the "X-Men" and greater "Star Wars," and even things that I grew up loving like "Sherlock Holmes," the idea of creating original characters, that was the draw for me of "Star Wars Rebels." That we could actually create original main characters who had not been in the previous movies and had no relationship to The Skywalker Saga. They were their own entire thing. Dave was an incredible partner. When I talk about having a great collaborative relationship with the director, one of the best relationships I've had in my career was with Dave.

He became a friend and we just had such a blast together. We used to have these story sessions, they would go on for hours and hours. While I was babbling, and talking, and working with the writers in our writers' room, Dave would be scribbling things. I have a bunch of them in my house. And it was this beautiful piece of art that would be the inspiration for the best shot in the show. So he's a visual genius, and we all knew that, and I really believed in him as a live-action director, and championed him as such long before he was doing it. So it's really cool. It's really cool to see them live-action in the show and to imagine them continuing their lives beyond "Rebels" in all kinds of formats. I'll tell you what's the coolest though, is walking Comic-Con and seeing people dressed up cosplaying the characters that we created from "Rebels."

Hell yeah.

Dude, I mean, I've walked around and seen "X-Men" characters and "Deadpool" characters and characters that I've been around and I've shepherded. But they didn't come out of my imagination. That's a very, very different feeling and it's a rush every time I see it. I've gone to [San Diego] Comic-Con every single year basically since I could drive a car. This year I've noticed more, and maybe it's because of "Ahsoka" probably, but it was before "Ahsoka" premiered, more "Rebels" cosplaying than I've ever seen, and it was dope.

That's awesome. So I know I've got to let you go in a second. I've got two quick questions I'd like to get to if you don't mind. First off, Edgar Wright is one of my favorite directors working today. You are working on "The Running Man" with him. What's going on with that? Can you tell me anything about that?

Yeah, he's one of my favorite directors of all time and one of my favorite people, just a super great guy. Obviously a cinephile. We are working on it actively. He's actively working on the script with Michael Bacall. And our hope would be that it is a movie that, again, all fingers crossed and luck and everything else go our way, that Edgar could maybe direct next year.

That's one that's ripe for a remake.

Well, what's cool is that Edgar, completely separately, before myself and Paramount started down the journey of figuring out how to get the remake rights, which was complicated, he had tweeted, just on his own — and I follow him obviously on every possible platform — he had tweeted that if there was one movie he would remake ever, it was "Running Man."

Yeah. I remember that.

So did I. And so when it came time, I was like, "Guys, I think we could maybe get ... " And I've chased Edgar for everything. I've chased Edgar for "X-Men" movies. I've chased him for literally every possible thing. We have talked about every movie. So yeah, this one would be a big dream.

Last one for you. So you've touched on "X-Men" quite a bit. As we know, Marvel Studios now has the rights and they're going to reboot it. We recently heard they're possibly looking for a writer. What advice would you give as maybe the biggest shepherd of that franchise to whoever ends up in that chair?

I'd really want to sit with that person for hours and hours. But if I had one piece of advice, honestly, it is a very cliché thing, but it just is true: The strength of the "X-Men" is the characters. As much as there's great storytelling and great plot and incredible action sequences and all of those things are going to be required of the movies, as they are in the comics, what sets, for me, the "X-Men" apart is that they are the richest collection of characters in any comic book ever. It's a family of people, and it will become — and it was for me for 16 years — a family of traveling circus performers. Every couple of years, we would get together in some foreign city, usually in Canada, and we would tell another story.

So it's really about the characters that will get you the best actors. Those actors will bring those characters to life in a whole new way that honestly I cannot wait to see. I really am such a fan of what Marvel does and I'm obviously a massive, massive fan of the "X-Men." Like the "Star Wars" movies. I read two comics when I was growing up religiously. I read others, but the religious ones were for me, "Batman" and "X-Men." I remember when, by the way, it was, ironically, insanely, [Marvel Studios head] Kevin Feige who called me up. He was working at [Marvel's production company] at the time. They were in the studio. He called me up about "X-Men: [The Last Stand]" when Bryan Singer and his writers, Mike [Dougherty] and Dan [Harris], left to go do "Superman [Returns]." They needed a writer. And so it all comes, in a very strange way, full circle.

The "Invasion" season 2 finale premieres Wednesday, October 25, on Apple TV+.