Nicholas Hoult Explains Why Beast Isn’t Always In Beast Mode In ‘X-Men: Days Of Future Past’

Joblo interviewed Nicholas Hoult about getting punched in the balls by James McAvoy during the filming of X-Men: Days of Future Past. Oh, I guess they also asked him about his character and stuff, including why Beast doesn’t always look like Beast in videos and pictures released so far. But first, here’s him talking about getting nut-punched by James McAvoy.

“I don’t think he was aiming there, but we were shooting a scene whereby we were meant to be flinching and things were blowing up above us and all this, and the camera panned to me and it was the first time the camera had been on me all day. And I was like, “Yes. Acting. Here I go.” I was into it. I was there, acting, and then I suddenly just feel [THWUMP] and doubled over in agony. It was a proper punch. He was like, ‘Oh I was just trying to give you something to act with. I thought I’d hit you in the leg and you’d flinch and it would look really good on screen, but I missed.’ So that was a nice moment.”

Pfft. The real Professor X would punch you in the balls with his mind.

Another funny part of the interview was Hoult’s description of a background actor’s reaction to a Sentinel.

“My favorite moment was we had a big scene where they were unveiling the Sentinels and one person in the crowd James [McAvoy] and I heard, just as they were unveiled look at and go, ‘It’s not as impressive as Optimus Prime.'”

Everything should be rated on a scale of “Optimus Prime” to “not Optimus Prime”.

Anyway, we said Nicholas Hoult explained why Beast doesn’t always look like a mutant in X-Men: Days Of Future Past, and here it is.

“Between the time of the last movie and this movie my character has created a serum which basically controls his mutation so his appearance is normal as long as he doesn’t get worked up. Any animal instinct or urges, that kind of brings him out.”

So they turned him into the Hulk? RABBLE RABBLE NECKBEARDS GIF REACTION.

To be fair, Beast had methods of passing as a non-mutant in the comics. Sometimes he’d accomplish it by using an image inducer:

Or by wearing a mask:

They could also be sticking to the continuity of X-Men (2000), where a Hank McCoy who’s older than Nicholas Hoult is seen in human form during a news segment:

Then again, let’s not overthink this. The real reason for a workaround to keep Hoult out of makeup is obvious. Makeup is time-consuming and an added expense, which is why they also swapped out Jennifer Lawrence’s bodypaint from First Class for a nudity-simulating bodysuit in Days Of Future Past. There’s also a segment of the audience seeing this in theaters because they have a crush on Nicholas Hoult and want to see him out of makeup. *whistles innocently*

Hat tip to CBM.

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