Before the MCU expanded like we know and love it today, the X-Men cinematic universe stood as the most successful hero-group franchise. What’s more, spinoffs were in development and planned to center around individual characters from the franchise. One of these proposed spinoffs was to be focused on Remy Etienne LeBeau, who is also known as Gambit. Gambit is a mutant who possesses the ability to manipulate emery and make objects explode.

The spin-off was proposed and canceled before shooting even began, and Channing Tatum was pinned for the lead role, with different directors being attached to the project, such as Rupert Wyatt and Gore Verbinksi. Ultimately, the movie never got made, something which Tatum remembers as a traumatizing loss. Here’s everything we know about the Gambit movie and why it did not happen.

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What the Gambit Movie Was Supposed to be About

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The plot of the potential Gambit movie was a large part of the reason as to why it was so delayed. Two of the directors involved with the project cited script issues as a major reason why the project never came to fruition and why they had to pull out. Both directors echoed each other’s sentiments when they testified that the project felt rushed and never had a fully realized script in the time window before directing was scheduled to begin. Prospective director Reid Carolin recently confirmed their vision of a Deadpool-style R-rated rom-com.

Who Was Involved in the Movie?

Another issue which hindered Gambit from ever moving past it’s initial stages were the constant changes regarding who was actually involved with the film in terms of cast and directors. Channing Tatum signed on when the project was initially announced in a leading role, and turbulence began way back in 2015. Shortly after he was announced as the lead in the film, reports began to surface in summer of 2015 that he was backing out of the project due to production issues. His involvement was speculated after this and a lot of back and forth happened in the media as to if he would be involved or not. There was never much substantial evidence of any other actors signing on to the project which caused further speculation that the film had been cancelled.

The film went through several different directors being attached to the project at multiple stages in its development, and these included Rupert Wyatt, Doug Liman and Gore Verbinski. The film was pushed back multiple times and each director has a similar story surrounding script issues and lack of budget which made it difficult for the film to take off.

Why the Movie Ultimately Didn’t Happen

One major reason that the film was not produced was because of the failure of The Fantastic Four films. The films underperformed by Marvel’s standards, only grossing $167 million against a $120 million budget. Since this film was released in 2015, the timeframe for its underperformance severely affected the production of Gambit, and huge slashes were made to the budget which resulted in an unorganized script and general production issues.

Indeed, the project was delayed multiple times throughout its time in pre-production, which put more of a black mark on the prospect of the project actually taking off. Wyatt was the first director who was attached to the role, but shortly after the film was announced, he pulled out of the project. After he left production, Doug Liman signed on. The release date was pushed back once again and eventually Liman pulled out of production too. The project did not find much more success with Gore Verbinski’s direction and similar issues persisted until it was finally canceled.

Deadpool’s success also contributed to further delays in Gambit’s production: when the former released to huge success, critically and commerically, the latter was ordered to be rewritten in order to follow a similar adult-oriented, R-rated formula. This caused further shifts in the direction the movie was intended to go in, ultimately resulting in too many revisions within a short period of time. Gambit was consequently shelved.