There's 54 years of X-Men comics by now, so there are a lot of characters to explore.

At a certain point people want to see other movies besides comic book movies so you have to be really careful what you're going to pick, and how many are going to be released within a year.

I always feel like every film takes the franchise and hangs it in the balance.

With Legion, we're our own universe. It gives Noah [Hawley] the freedom to do what he wants to do. Because we play with so many different timelines, and we rebooted and not really rebooted and all that, we felt like, OK, we're going to throw it out there and hope the fans accept it.

I think the time has changed. Because of 9/11, because of the economy, it is more and more now. There is a darker awareness, although it would seem to reason that because life is so much tougher now people would seek entertainment to just totally escape.

When I originally sold X-Men it was because I knew there was 40 years of stories. That was the point! Not only to do the movie and establish the characters, you know, you love the one you're doing. It was because there are all these great stories, what a wealth of drama.

I think it's good to tell the fans "this movie's going to lead to that, and that will lead to..."