X-Men: Days of Future Past director Bryan Singer has just confirmed that Ellen Page, Anna Paquin, and Shawn Ashmore will be reprising their roles as Shadowcat, Rogue, and Iceman in his new film.

The young actors join what’s become a monster cast that continues to expand as Singer has decided to make liberal use of the time travel aspect of his next film to meet characters from previous X-Men films.

Just a few weeks back it was announced that Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen would be joining the cast of the next X-Men film. We should have known by the title of X-Men: Days of Future Past that there would be some time travel being used, but it appears as though 20th Century Fox is looking to include as many previous X-Men characters as possible to bring fans back to the franchise.

Many fans also assumed that director Bryan Singer had planned on including Wolverine as well when he hinted to the fact that more characters were to come. Considering Wolverine is one of the more popular characters in the franchise, this isn’t a total shock since Hugh Jackman has been the only one to branch out into his own solo film – not to mention the sequel The Wolverine, which is moving into post production.

Below you’ll find the tweet that director Bryan Singer sent out, explaining that Page, Paquin, and Ashmore would be returning to their roles in the X-Men universe.


 
We have to say we’re a bit skeptical of having so many well known actors in one film, but fans were very satisfied with Singer’s choices when he directed the original X-Men and X2: X-Men United. He also went on to produce X-Men: First Class, so there aren’t many reasons to doubt his casting choices. Singer recently explained the use of time travel in X-Men: Days of Future Past:

“It’s epic. We get to bring both casts together. We’ve cracked it in a way that makes sense. I had a two-hour conversation with James Cameron about time travel, string theory, multiverses and all that. You have to create your rules and stick with them. That’s what makes Terminator and Back To The Future work so well. And there are certain mechanisms in X-Men, certain powers, perceptions and characters, that make this possible. More than any of the movies I’ve made, it comes to me much more quickly than on other films. With Superman Returns I struggled a lot. I guess it’s either my history with the X-Men universe or I have some kind of knack for this particular story.”

X-Men: Days of Future Past and its growing cast hits theaters July 18, 2014.