‘X-Men: Apocalypse’: Ben Hardy Confirmed as Angel; Concept Art Revealed

Next year’s X-Men: Apocalypse is set to bid farewell to one group of X-Men actors (First Class trilogy leads Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, and James McAvoy), while also introducing a whole new generation of mutants to the X-Men cinematic universe – many of whom have been depicted on the big screen before, albeit by older actors in the original modern-day X-Men film trilogy.

It was recently reported that the latter group will include Ben Hardy (EastEnders) in the role of Warren Worthington III a.k.a. Angel, but now director Bryan Singer has gone ahead and confirmed that story. Furthermore, official concept art of the character in Apocalypse has been unveiled – and yes, it appears as though he will look fairly different than Ben Foster did when he portrayed Angel in director Bret Ratner’s X-Men: The Last Stand.

For those not familiar: in the Marvel X-Men comic books, Warren is transformed by Apocalypse (played by Oscar Isaac in Singer’s film) to serve as “Death” in his Four Horsemen – four genetically-enhanced mutants who carry out their master’s bidding – and thus, goes from being Angel to Archangel. A certain version of the Four Horsemen were glimpsed some distance away from Apocalypse during the character’s appearance in the X-Men: Days of Future Past credits scene (which took place in Egypt in the far distant past).

Will Hardy’s Angel become the new “Death” when the storyline for Apocalypse picks up during the 1980s? That remains to be seen but, in the meantime, here’s the official concept art for Angel in X-Men: Apocalypse, courtesy of Empire (which confirmed the Hardy/Angel casting with Singer during a phone call):

For those just tuning in, here’s the roster of fresh-faced stars playing mutants in Apocalypse (besides Hardy):

• Sophie Turner (Game of Thrones) as Jean Grey.
• Tye Sheridan (Mud) as Scott Summers a.k.a. Cyclops.
• Alexandra Shipp (Straight Outta Compton) as Ororo Munroe a.k.a. Storm.
• Kodi Smit-McPhee (Dawn of the Planet of the Apes) as Kurt Wagner a.k.a. Nightcrawler.
• Newcomer Landa Condor as Jubilation Lee a.k.a. Jubilee.

One last note: if you’re struggling with the continuity problems that already exist within the X-Men cinematic universe (as well as issues that Apocalypse will seemingly add to the mix)… it’s probably not going to get any easier for you hereon out, between Apocalypse, Deadpool, and the Gambit movie arriving in 2016. You might be best off just chalking most of that up to Days of Future Past‘s time-traveling shenanigans (and the ripple effect that those events had on everything else) – for the time being, that is.

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Fantastic Four opens August 7th, 2015, Deadpool on February 12th, 2016, X-Men: Apocalypse on May 27th, 2016, Gambit on October 7th, 2016, Wolverine 3 (not the official title) on March 3rd, 2017, Fantastic Four 2 on June 9th, 2017, and some as-yet unspecified X-Men film on July 13th, 2018.

Source: Empire