So, in terms of mutants, if we can expect “some familiar, some new”, who are they most likely to be? Well if the First Class comic-book is anything to go by, Jean Grey, Cyclops and Beast should be certainties.

The comic series focuses upon Professor Xavier’s early X-students, including the three just mentioned, as well as Iceman and Angel. However, if First Class is to fit with Singer’s original films, the latter two would have to be cut, as Iceman is shown in X2 as a later recruit than Jean and Scott, whilst Angel only arrives on the scene as a virtual footnote in The Last Stand.

Whilst Vaughn is presumably under no compulsion to slavishly adhere to the original trilogy, producer Lauren Shuler Donner dropped a fairly sizeable hint that this is what will happen while speaking to the Fox Movie Channel.

“It is the first class of Xavier’s school, way back when,” she said, “so it’s young Scott, young Jean, young Beast and that’ll be really fun.”

Of course, that was said back when Singer was in the director’s chair, so much could change with Goldman’s rewrite. However, given that Beast and Cyclops were two fan-favourites with fairly minimal screen-time in the first three films, we’d put money on them getting a thorough airing here.