Simon Kinberg

Usually, you just have a hero and a villain - in any movie, not just a superhero movie.

I'm more fascinated by anti-heroes, and Gambit is one of those.

I think the best science fiction, especially literature, is political in nature and is often an allegory about something problematic in our world, and it's something that makes the 'X-Men' comics so relevant - they're about xenophobia and prejudice.

Part of what's interesting about the 'Star Wars' world is, villains are complex, obviously, and they occupy, as in life, different roles within different organizations.

I thought working in other universes that had a lot of history - and I had personal affection for, like 'Sherlock Holmes' or the 'X-Men' movies - would prepare me for it. But the truth is, there is nothing and has never been anything like 'Star Wars.'

When you're actually inside the experience of writing something, in some ways, you're just writing. Ultimately, you fall in love with the characters, and you get excited about the story, and you're sitting there in your sweatpants or pajamas, and you do get a little lost in it.

There is a religion around 'Star Wars' that is different than even the fanaticism around comic books and other media.

I love the 'Dark Knight' movies, and 'Dark Knight' and the last one are well over two hours, and I could've sat there for three and a half hours, so if it's good you have some leeway.

I write every first draft - almost every draft, but certainly the first - by hand on blank white pieces of paper, so I don't know how long it is as I'm writing; it just piles up, and then I input it all in my computer, and I learn how long it is.

The biggest lesson learned from 'X-Men: The Last Stand' or 'X3' was that if you are going to tell a Phoenix story, tell the Phoenix story. Don't make it the subplot of the movie. Make it the plot of the movie.

I'm a lifer for the 'X-Men' movies.

I hope that 'Gambit' doesn't take ten years, but it takes a little honing to get that tone and that voice exactly right. The character has such a specific voice in the comic, in the same way that Deadpool has a specific voice in the comic, that we want to make sure that we capture that voice on the page.

'Deadpool' feels like it exploded out of nowhere, but it was a ten-year development process on that movie. I think it was honed over those ten years.

The thing that's interesting about science fiction is that it is always, when it is done well, a lens on our world. And yet it is a metaphor.

The most important thing for me in an action sequence is, you understand the characters' intention and the challenges the characters are going to have to face: what the character story is within the action sequence.

I'm like a geek that grew up playing with Star Wars toys and creating action sequences, essentially, with toys.

I'm Jewish, so I don't know much about Easter eggs.

As wild and anarchistic as 'Deadpool''s marketing was in using the Internet, its viral pieces and billboards, 'Logan' was the opposite. We went really analog and old-fashioned, much like the movie itself.

The success of 'Deadpool' and 'Logan' have bolstered our confidence to make edgy, more daring, provocative bold movies that audiences will embrace.

Should a story be readily told in a PG-13 fashion, it should be for creative, not business, reasons.

We take the R-rating on a case by case basis when the story warrants it and necessitate that rating, and shouldn't be hemmed by the rules of PG or PG-13.

In the 'Days Of Future Past' comic, the aim is to go back in time to preserve peace for the lives of mutants in the future.

When I'm writing a first draft of a script, I can disappear into that for two, three months exclusively.

I produce more movies than I write, but when I write, it is such an immersive, intense process that it probably takes as much or more time than producing multiple movies.

When you're a writer in Hollywood, you don't get to work with other writers. You barely get to meet other writers. We're interchangeable, disposable pieces that never really get to collaborate.