New Delhi, Aug. 15 -- Adam Driver didn't walk onstage with the rest of them.

Sadie Sink as Jean Grey, Kit Connor as Cyclops, Christopher Abbott as Professor Charles Xavier, Samara Weaving as Emma Frost, Inde Navarrette as Rogue, and Maya Boyd as Storm. Then, in a final video played for the audience, Driver appeared alone, not as one of them, but as their antagonist. His character is named Nathaniel Milbury, a pseudonym that longtime Marvel Comics readers will recognize as belonging to Mister Sinister, one of the most formidable villain figures in X-Men history.

That sequencing was deliberate. Marvel's first fully owned X-Men film, slated for May 5, 2028, is not being structured as a team movie in the manner of the Fox franchise, with en...