Dark Phoenix being the "finale" of the X-Men series seems like an obvious lie in hindsight (in-depth analysis on the marketing campaign)
SPOILER WARNING: This will contain possible spoilers for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness!
After Dark Phoenix's release was delayed to June 2019, it was promoted to be an epic finale for the series and that the premise was about the X-Men fighting against the Dark Phoenix, which will be their greatest battle! That its a culmination of the X-Men series like Endgame was for the Avengers, according the official synopsis and writer/director Simon Kinberg.
Sophie Turner, James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Jennifer Lawrence fire up an all-star cast in this spectacular culmination of the X-Men saga! During a rescue mission in space, Jean Grey (Turner) is transformed into the infinitely powerful and dangerous Dark Phoenix. As Jean spirals out of control, the X-Men must unite to face their most devastating enemy yet — one of their own.
"I approach this movie as the culmination of 20 years of storytelling, of living with the X-Men for all this time and watching this family come together, and this movie is the movie that challenged that family and tears them apart in a new way," Kinberg said. "And so I imagined it as the culmination, and I even pitched it to the studio, as this is the culmination of this cycle of X-Men stories. Which there will be more X-Men movies in the future no doubt, but this particular cycle with this cast, it felt like it was time to do kind of what Game of Thrones has done, what Endgame has done, really see them challenged in a new way and sort of survive and go off into the sunset."
However, Jean Grey gives a narration at the end that literally says this is a lie:
Jean Grey: This is not the end me or the X-Men. Its a new beginning.
u/ViewerAnon saw a screening of the movie earlier that year and he said that narration wasn’t in the version he saw. Writer/Director Simon Kinberg even said that was added to the film at the last minute. So it seems that this addition happened after the merger was finalized in March 2019.
In hindsight, I think it is clear that the line was foreshadowing a future multiverse crossover. We saw characters from the previous Spider-Man film series make a return in Spider-Man: No Way Home and it seems like the same will happen with the X-Men. Marvel Studios is developing Deadpool 3 with Ryan Reynolds returning in the role and Patrick Stewart himself said that he had a long conversation with Kevin Feige about reprising his role as Professor X in late 2019, just a few months after Dark Phoenix released. Sir. Stewart might even have a supporting role in Multiverse of Madness.
WandaVision’s director (Matt Shakman) seemingly hinted at this after the show’s Quicksilver fake out. Here’s the quote:
For the fans that were disappointed, I'm just going to say: you know that those things are coming, right? The multiverse is coming. Mutants are coming. So, there you go.
That begs the question: Why was Dark Phoenix promoted as an epic finale to the series about the X-Men fighting the Dark Phoenix? Both the marketing and the PR saying that it was a culmination of the entire series like Avengers: Endgames. However, that doesn't make any sense considering the fact that the movie was prequel set decades before the Deadpool films and Logan. So how can it be a culmination? Not to mention New Mutants was released after it.
Short Answer: Dark Phoenix was designed to be an origin story about Jean Grey's transformation into Phoenix and her gradual descent into madness. With Jean as the protagonist, instead of the antagonist.
But Fox forcibly delayed it to be released in June 2019, which was a crowded marketplace. The delay also hurt the promotion of the movie as it was being released after the Disney merger was finalized and the marketing team getting laid off. This resulted in its awareness rate being lower than any other X-Men film. So the film had to face a lot of competition, but with very little advertisement.
The filmmakers knew the film didn't stand a chance at the Box Office and decided to misrepresent its basic premise in a desperate attempt to attract a wider audience.
Long Detailed Answer: Dark Phoenix was designed to be the complete opposite of what it was later promoted to be based on various sources.
For starters, the first trailer promoted the premise of the movie to be about the origin of Jean Grey, centered her descending into madness due to unresolved trauma from her childhood and undergoing a transformation. CineFex described that to be the premise of the film on their site.
The origins of the mutant Jean Grey, also known as Phoenix, who comes to terms with her powerful telepathic and telekinetic powers.
CineFex is a bimonthly journal that covers visual effects in films, interviewing people involved in the making of current films. So this description of Dark Phoenix is based on information gathered from people who were working on it, long before it was released in theaters.
The people who worked on the effects have indeed stated themselves that the film is an origin story about how Jean becomes the Phoenix. Like special effects supervisor Greg Butler during an interview with io9.
io9: There was a lot more Phoenix spectacle that could have been in the film that audiences went into the film expecting to see. Do you regret that they were dialed back?
Butler: Not for the film Simon made. For the film that Dark Phoenix is, there just really wasn’t a space for that take on the Phoenix, I think. The story of how Jean becomes the Phoenix deserves its own time and space to breathe. All of the more over-the-top stuff wouldn’t have fit—it would have had to be a different movie on a conceptual level for the spectacular stakes to feel right here. If anything, that part of the Phoenix belongs in the second part of a two-film story. The idea of being the most powerful creature in the universe is interesting, but you need a really cosmic style story to explore that.
Visualization studio, Halon Entertainment referred to it as an origin story on their Twitter account.
#byrequest, a look back at our work on #DarkPhoenix. #previs and #postvis by #teamHalon. Our crew proposed, planned, and orchestrated many of the ambitious camera moves and thrilling set pieces in this dark origin story.
After the film's release, Simon Kinberg told io9 that took inspiration from Batman Begins. Stating that the first half is his favorite of the of the film because it focuses on Bruce Wayne before he becomes Batman and that is how he approached Dark Phoenix. Batman Begins is of course, an origin story about how Bruce Wayne becomes the Batman.
Kinberg: Ironically, the first half of Batman Begins is my favorite chunk of the Dark Knight movies. Obviously, they’re all masterpieces, but the first half of Batman Begins before he becomes Batman, I just found so relatable because he’s just a guy. He doesn’t have his suit or an alter ego. He’s not off fighting crime. I approached Dark Phoenix with those films in mind, and wanted to emphasize the character drama. The movie needed to be more raw and intimate and personal than we’d done with the franchise before.
That cast and crew also say this a few times in Rise of Phoenix - The Making of Dark Phoenix. Stating that Jean is the protagonist and the premise is about her gradual descent into madness and her transformation into the Phoenix happens at the end of the movie. Similar to how Bruce Wayne didn't become Batman until half way through Batman Begins. I'm going to quote/link to various parts of the video where they say this.
Sophie Turner: Our main goal was to just try and make it not feel like a superhero movie.
Simon Kinberg: It's a female led story there's a female protagonist and it's really about the strength of this female character.
Sophie Turner: The thing about Jean Grey is that she's not a villain.
Simon Kinberg: So you're gonna have to ostensibly play the trauma of losing your mind.
Most of these clips were taken while the film was being made, long before it was released in theaters. There is a clip of Michael Fassbender on the set of Genosha, where he says that the younger cast are meant to take over and be the future of the franchise.
If this was always suppose to be the final X-Men movie, why would he say something like this during filming? In fact, there isn't anything mentioning about the film being a finale or a culmination until the 30 seconds of the video (which is a hour and twenty minutes long). This strongly suggests that it was an afterthought added into the video at the last minute.
It seems that it all started when studio head Stacey Snider delayed the Phoenix's release date to June. Hollywood Reporter talked with a former Fox executive who told them that this was done to give Alita: Battle Angel its February date and the filmmakers begged them not to do it. The reason being that Phoenix wasn't designed for a summer release.
At first, the movie had a release date of Nov. 2, 2018. With more work needed on the movie, it was pushed to Feb. 14, 2019. Then, with marketing already underway, Fox pushed the release date to June 3, 2019. Initially, the studio messaged that the move was to take advantage of a Chinese release and hopes for a strong global performance.
However, insiders tell THR that the move was to placate James Cameron, Fox’s most important filmmaker, and his concerns for his movie, Alita: Battle Angel. According to one source, Cameron felt Alita would lose horribly when facing a December opening weekend that included Aquaman and Bumblebee, with Mary Poppins Returns opening up two days earlier. He wanted his expensive movie shifted. Stacey Snider, according to this source, obliged, giving Alita the February date and moving Dark Phoenix to June. “Emma, Hutch and Simon begged her not do it,” says this source.
Part of the reasoning was that Dark Phoenix was not designed to be a summer movie, says the Fox insider. In some ways, it was designed to be an anti-Apocalypse, to have less spectacle and scale. Big for off-season, too small for summer, says this person.
The former exclusive and another insider also told Hollywood reporter that the delay hurt the film’s promotion and brand awareness. As the marketing team was getting laid-off due to the merger. More people knew about the existence of Rocketman than Dark Phoenix. They weren't even sure how to promote the film's premise and questioned whether or not it should be advertised as the final X-Men movie.
At the time, preparations for the Disney-Fox acquisition were in full swing. Marketing and publicity and distribution execs were either being forced out or had one eye on the door. “The campaign was muddled,” says a former Fox executive. “Was this the final X-Men movie? Was it about a character going back? This movie just got lost.”
“Definite awareness never got a score over 75 on tracking,” says one insider. “An X-Men movie had never been below 90.”
“When definite awareness of Rocketman is higher than an X-Men movie, you know you’re in strange territory,” says another insider.
This strongly suggests that it being promoted as the final X-Men movie was nothing more than a misleading marketing strategy. As I said earlier, the goal was to make it feel that it wasn't a superhero movie. Simon Kinberg stated that is the reason why X-Men was not in the title, to let audiences know it was different from the other X-films.
But now, it was being released on the same day The Secret Life of Pets 2, a sequel to a film that made over over 875 million dollars at the box office. It was also coming out a week after Godzilla: King of the Monsters and a week before Men in Black: International, these are two huge IPs. Not to mention Aladdin come out not long before that and Toy Story 4 soon after. Dark Phoenix was sandwiched between and had to had to face off against a lot of competition.
A psychodrama wouldn't be able to compete with all of that and the brand awareness was shockingly low. I have seen many people online founding out about it for the first time after it released in theaters. I made a collection of those posts to give you an idea of how bad the awareness rate was. The crazy thing is that there are posts from people who didn't find out about it until over two years later! You can see them at the bottom of the link. That is how bad the brand awareness was.
There were even reports about this long before the movie came out. In January 2019, John Campea said that he talked with a source that was connected to the production of the film. He was told that they didn't know what to do with it and that there was literal panic at Fox. In March 2019, Vanity Flair reported that the movie was facing promotional difficulties because long-term employees of the Fox marketing team were being laid-off due to the studio's merger with Disney and that promotion was no where near where it should be. They said that people were freaking out, similar to what John Campea said.
So Dark Phoenix’s marketing campaign changed direction in an desperate attempt to create buzz and compete with the summer releases. Making it seem like it centered around an epic final battle, with the First Class being the protagonists and Jean being the antagonist. Sophie Turner did not even get top billing, instead she gets fifth billing behind all of the First Class cast. Despite having significantly more screen time than other characters (as shown by estimates) and her character's journey defining the film's narrative structure.
Mystique’s death being spoiled in the second trailer and in interviews is an another example of their desperation. Kinberg told Entertainment Weekly that it was done to show that this is a movie where where shocking and intense things happen. Except it is the only major death that happens.
However, in Rise of Phoenix Kinberg suggests that Mystique’s death is meant to be a surprise and is the midpoint climax of the film. Remember, this recording was done while they were making the movie. It is clear that it was spoiled just to generate buzz.
Simon Kinberg: I felt like killing this particular character in the middle of the film would let you know just how dangerous and unhinged Jean was.
A marketing campaign completely misrepresenting a film's premise and spoiling major plot points in an attempt to attract a wider audience is unfortunately common. Chris Stuckmann made a whole video on this a few years ago.
If the film was never delayed to June they probably wouldn't have resorted to these methods. It doesn't even seem like it was Disney's idea to promote it as an epic finale but Fox trying capitalize on the Endgame hype. Lets see what Marvel Studio really has planned.
EDIT: I recently came across an article by The Hollywood Reporter that from March 2019 reporting that Kevin Feige met with several members of the old X-Men cast.
Marvel Studios has not publicly revealed any plans for integrating members of the X-Men and Fantastic Four into its cinematic universe, though Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige is said to have met with several members of the X-Men old guard in recent months.
Patrick Stewart’s interview with Digital Spy suggests that is true.
"I met with Kevin Feige a couple of months ago and we had long, long conversations," he explained. "And there have been moves and suggestions, which include Charles Xavier."