Aaron Taylor-Johnson in ‘Kick-Ass’ (left) to play Marvel’s Quicksilver (right)

Despite the successes of both Spider-Man franchises, the majority of the X-Men franchise, and Disney’s official Marvel Cinematic Universe, comic fans have always had an issue with the entirety of the Marvel Universe being separated by the different studios. This has also become a problem for storytellers like Joss Whedon (The Avengers, Avengers: Age of Ultron), because it dictates what characters he can use and ultimately what stories he can tell. For Avengers: Age of Ultron, producers seem to have officially found a loophole and were able to cast Aaron Taylor-Johnson for the role of Quicksilver, a character that’s also appearing in Bryan Singer’s X-Men: Days of Future Past.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson

As Quicksilver, the 23 year-old Aaron Taylor-Johnson will be graduating from an amateur hero-wannabe in Kick-Ass to a full-fledged mutant with powers, although calling his character in Age of Ultron a mutant might be infringing on the rights that Fox retains for the X-Men. For Bryan Singer’s X-Men: Days of Future Past actor Evan Peters has been cast to play Pietro Maximoff, also known as Quicksilver. In Days of Future Past, Quicksilver will be officially dubbed a mutant and Bryan Singer has the rights to his origin story.

In Marvel’s comic continuity Pietro Maximoff, and his sister Wanda (played by Elizabeth Olsen), were both children of the mutant Magneto (played by Ian McKellen in Days of Future Past). When they discovered their powers and became Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch, the Maximoff siblings were recruited by Tony Stark (played by Robert Downy, Jr. in Age of Ultron) to join the Avengers. While one movie universe would have made it easy to set-up the siblings in X-Men and then throw them into Age of Ultron, like Disney did when building up to the first Avengers, Whedon now has to find a way to introduce Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch to his story which doesn’t involve select aspects of their back story.

Playing Pietro’s sister will be Aaron Taylor-Johnson’s Godzilla co-star Elizabeth Olsen (Oldboy). Godzilla is set for an early summer release next year.