'X-Men: Dark Phoenix' ready to cast Jessica Chastain as villain Lilandra

Actress Jessica Chastain is in negotiation to star as a villain in Simon Kinberg's X-Men: Dark Phoenix.

If the deal gets finalised, the sources said the 40- year-old actress would play Lilandra, the empress of an alien empire, who leads the quest to imprison and execute Dark Phoenix, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Kinberg is also writing the script for the latest instalment of Fox's X-Men movie franchise.

At the same time, the studio has closed deals with Jennifer Lawrence, Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy and Nicholas Hoult to return to the popular franchise.

Sophie Turner, the Game of Thrones star, who played young Jean Grey in X-Men: Apocalypse, is reprising her role. Her co-stars from the early instalment, Alexandra Shipp, Tye Sheridan and Kodi Smit-McPhee will also come back to play Storm, Cyclops, and the Nightcrawler.

In the comic books, Jean Grey aka Phoenix is a mutant with telepathic abilities. She becomes imbued by a cosmic energy called the Phoenix Force which results in her abilities dialled to 11. It overtakes her personality and makes her evil, forcing X-Men to stop her. 

Simon Kinberg had touched upon the subject in 2006's X-Men: The Last Stand. The movie was panned by critics and fans alike for not doing justice to Dark Phoenix storyline. Kinberg in an interview with Entertainment Weekly, in 2015, had said that The Dark Phoenix story went from being the A-plot to the B-plot. He is currently writing the script hoping to tell that story again.