Channing Tatum to Play Gambit in Standalone X-MEN Film?

Gambit is a favorite character for a lot of X-Men fans. Unfortunately, the character was wasted in X-Men: Origins Wolverine when he was played by Taylor Kitsch. We heard rumors of a spinoff film for awhile, but that died down a long time ago. A standalone Gambit film is now back in the news thanks to X-Men producer Lauren Shuler Donner. In a recent interview with Empire, she says that Channing Tatum is on board to take on the lead role.

"I'm dying to do a Gambit movie with Channing Tatum. That doesn't have to be a great big movie. It's a thief in New Orleans, it's a whole different story. He's on board, and I have to get the studio on board. How can anyone resist Channing? He's such a sweetheart."

During a press conference last year, Tatum said that he would like to play Gambit, but there was no hint that he was actually going to do it. This is what he said at the time,

“I would like to play Gambit. Gambit’s my favourite. I’m from New Orleans, around that area. My dad’s from New Orleans, and I like to do a Cajun accent. I could do it for real.

No knock on Taylor Kitsch, though, ’cause I actually like his Gambit, but I’ve always lived around Cajun people. Gambit was always like the woman-loving, cigarette-smoking, drinking guy. He was the punk rock of all the superheroes. He’s a thief. He kind of rode the line.”

I've grown to enjoy Tatum's film work over the years, and I think he would actually be awesome as Gambit. If Donner is pushing this movie forward and putting pressure on the studio to do it, then I'm sure it will eventually happen.