'X-Men: Apocalypse' Spoilers: Apocalypse Is 'Superhumanly Persuasive,' Filmmakers Reveal
As has been previously reported, when the X-Men return to the big screen in May, they will be facing off with what may be the most powerful X-Men adversary of all time: Apocalypse. But what makes this new villain so powerful and what threat does he pose to the mutants and the rest of the world?
"X-Men: Apocalypse" director Bryan Singer and producer Simon Kinberg recently revealed some major details about En Sabah Nur aka Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac) in an on-set interview with some members of the press. According to Kinberg, as quoted by IGN, "He's the most powerful mutant we've ever had in one of these movies and that he would be an unbeatable foe for any individual mutant in these X-Men movies."
Singer explained that Apocalypse has a whole array of powers that he acquired as he moved from body to body over the years. These powers include the ability to imbue fellow mutants with power and increase their own powers and abilities, the ability to shield himself from psychic power, the ability to alter the inorganic molecules in things, and, as Isaac revealed during Comic-Con, the power of persuasion. This last power may be his most important, and he uses it to turn followers such as Magneto/Erik Lehnsherr (Michael Fassbender) into his Four Horsemen. Kinberg said that it will be interesting to see just how much of this persuasiveness is a function of his mutant power or "just he's like any cult leader who is really good at convincing people to follow him." The filmmakers revealed that they do not make this explicit in the film, but said that the character is "superhumanly persuasive."
"But I have to say, in the end, his greatest power is the power of persuasion, is the ability to know what he needs and who he needs it out of and to get it from them, as he does with the Horsemen, and as he has through civilization after civilization for tens of thousands of years," Singer said in another interview.
"X-Men: Apocalypse" hits theaters on May 27.