Here's an interesting bit of casting and un-casting news for you today.  EW.com reports that Lucas Till (Hannah Montana: The Movie) has been cast at the mutant "Havok" in Matthew Vaughn's X-Men: First Class.  It's news that follows yesterday's wave of casting news that had Nicholas Hoult (A Single Man) playing Beast, Caleb Landry Jones (The Last Exorcism) playing Banshee, and Aaron Johnson (Kick-Ass) playing Cyclops.  EW also says that last bit of casting is false and that Johnson isn't playing Cyclops or any other role in the film.

But then Entertainment Weekly goes on to say that these actors may be playing characters that are different than the ones being reported.  Hit the jump for what's baffling and where the (presumed) casting currently stands.

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Here's what Nicole Sperling wrote regarding all this recent casting:

"My sources tell me to keep in mind that these parts may not be the actual characters in the movie. Instead, this could be part of a misdirection campaign to keep some surprises from X-Men fans."

So...this casting news isn't real and that the characters we're talking about aren't in the movie?  Does that mean Till, Jones, et al. are playing mutants, but not the ones they're being named as?  It doesn't make any sense to "surprise" X-men fans since we'll know all the casting before they're even a week into shooting.  Releasing the names of characters who aren't in the movie seems like an overly-elaborate ruse for such a small and short-lived payoff.

As for Johnson not being in the movie, that's a little surprising since The Playlist reported the casting of Johnson as Cyclcops long before AICN reported it yesterday.  However, it's widely believed that Cyclops will be in the movie as will the other original X-Men: Jean Grey, Iceman, Angel, and Beast.  But it's interesting to see that of the original five X-Men, only Beast has been cast. Here's how the rest of the casting currently stands (provided that these actors are actually playing these characters—the only ones we can say for certain are James McAvoy as Professor Charles Xavier, Michael Fassbender as Magneto, and Hoult as Beast):

And as for rumored casting:

I've moved Johnson and Till into the rumor pile until another site collaborates or debunks EW's story.

The characters “Multiple Man” and “Willow” are also rumored to be in the film.  If there are misdirects among the roles, I would believe these would fall into that category.  It's either that or (hopefully) they're background characters like Kitty Pride/Shadowcat in the first two X-Men movies.