Kevin Bacon: Leader of the Hellfire Club?

There wasn't this much speculation and rumor mongering for the first 4 X-Men movies combined. This is ridiculous. The latest rumor? Kevin Bacon's role in X-Men: First Class will be that of Sebastian Shaw, leader of the underground mutant cabal known as the Hellfire Club.

The rumor comes from Forces of Geek, who don't provide a lick of context for the rumor. All they say is that one of their *snicker* "FOG Agents" uncovered it. As cheesy as that may sound, they might not be far off. I personally suspected Bacon would not be playing one of the more convoluted X-Men villains like Mister Sinister or Shadow King, and would instead play someone with an anti-mutant agenda. Shaw doesn't exactly fit that bill, but he's close. He's a mutant who is the Black King of a society for wealthy mutants known as the Hellfire Club, who's goals tend to shift depending on the season. Sometimes they're looking for world domination, sometimes they want mutants to thrive, sometimes they want mutants to die. Shaw's mutant power is to absorb kinetic energy and use it to amplify his strength. One of his chief lieutenants was Emma Frost(being played by Alice Eve), who served as Shaw's White Queen.

Take all this with a grain of salt for now, with more details to come.