X-Men
The X-Men are a group of
comic book superheroes in the
Marvel Comics universe. Created by
Stan Lee and
Jack Kirby, they first appeared in
X-Men #1 (
September 1963).
The X-Men are one of the most popular comic book franchises in the world. Since the mid-
1980s, their series
Uncanny X-Men and its many spin-off comic books have sold briskly and turned their writers and illustrators into comic book industry superstars. The characters have also been adapted into several
animated series and
films, among other
media.
The X-Men are a group of
mutants,
human beings who, due to a quantum leap in
evolution, are born with
superhuman powers. Mutants are often hated by regular humans both because of ordinary
bigotry and because humans fear that mutants are destined to replace them. This fact is worsened by a number of mutants who use their powers to try to disrupt and dominate human society. The X-Men were gathered together by the benevolent
Professor X to defend a world that hates and fears them from "evil mutants".
Therein lies the sociopolitical undercurrent of the franchise. Mutants are often seen as a
metaphor for racial, religious and other
minorities oppressed by society. Professor X is often compared to African-American
civil rights leader
Martin Luther King Jr and the team's arch-enemy
Magneto to the more militant
Malcolm X.
The comic books
The original X-Men
Following the success of Fantastic Four in the early 1960s, Marvel Comics editor-in-chief Stan Lee helped brainstorm a variety of comics which helped launch what Lee called the "Marvel Age of comics", more generally known as the Silver Age of Comic Books. The X-Men were one of the last major entries in the first wave of the Marvel Age, and arguably the least successful - at the time. Despite sticking to Marvel's popular formula of crafting adventure stories around the humanity and foibles of its characters, the X-Men didn't catch on as other titles did.
In the comic book, the team was founded by the paraplegic Professor X (Charles Xavier) who possessed telepathic powers. Xavier gathered the X-Men under the cover of a "School for Gifted Youngsters" in Westchester County, New York (the estate on which the school was located would, decades later, occasionally be referred to as the X-Mansion).
Originally, the X-Men were a group of teenagers still learning to control as use their powers: Cyclops, Beast, Angel, Iceman and Marvel Girl. Cover-billed as "the strangest heroes of all", Lee and Kirby crafted a team whose four male members were physically unusual: Cyclops had to wear a visor to control the force beams his eyes emitted; Angel possessed wings; Beast was huge and could use his feet as hands; Iceman's body was covered in frost (though he could defrost and appear normal). Only Marvel Girl appeared normal.
(A precursor to this concept of preternaturally gifted children brought together to study in secret, lest they be hated and feared by a world that would not understand them, appeared in the 1953 science fiction novel Children of the Atom by Wilmar Shiras, which has often been credited - though never officially confirmed - with providing the inspiration for the X-Men. In fact, the children of "Children of The Atom" were also mutants, the results of an unintended experiment in genetic mutation. The term "Children of The Atom" is also used frequently throughout the franchise's history, often as subtitle for various X-Men publications and video games.)
Despite the philosophical concepts which have appeared in the X-Men series, co-creator Stan Lee has noted that his motivation for the team was to find a way to create a number of characters with a large variety of super-powers without having to come up with a separate and interesting origin for each one. He tapped the concept of genetic mutation as a way to make this aspect of his storytelling easier, so he could focus on telling the adventure yarns he wanted to sell.
The inaugural X-Men story also introduced their arch-nemesis, Magneto, who controlled magnetism and who felt that mutants should rule over normal humans. Magneto's character would later be fleshed out to reveal that he once shared a friendship with Professor X and his decree that mutants must rule or be ruled grew from his experiences as a Holocaust survivor. A few issues later, X-Men #4 introduced Magneto's team, the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, a quartet consisting of Quicksilver, the Scarlet Witch, Mastermind and the Toad.
Lee and Kirby did not remain long with the series, handing the reins over to Roy Thomas and Werner Roth. While the post-Lee/Kirby issues introduced a few other important villains, such as the Juggernaut, and the Sentinels also debuted during this era, the X-Men all too often fought easily-forgotten mutant criminals, alien invaders and subterranean monsters. As a result, the 1960s run is largely regarded as unremarkable, and most of the early stories are considered forgettable and silly, even by the standards of the day.
In the late 1960s, Thomas was joined by more well-known artists such as Jim Steranko and Neal Adams in an effort to save the series, whose sales were sagging. These later issues are more highly regarded by fans, and they introduced two more key heroes to the X-Men canon: Cyclops' brother Havok, and his flame Polaris.
Though sales did improve while Adams was on the book, it was too little too late, and Marvel stopped producing new issues of X-Men in 1969. The series continued by merely reprinting old issues. The X-Men also appeared in other Marvel Comics, but faded to near-obscurity.
The All-New, All-Different X-Men
In 1975, writer Len Wein and artist Dave Cockrum reintroduced the X-Men as a new team. Rather than a team of teenagers, this group consisted of adults who hailed from a variety of nations and cultures. Giant-Size X-Men #1 introduced this team, called together by Professor X to rescue the original team from captivity.
This "All-New, All-Different X-Men" team was led by original member Cyclops. The core members of the group included Wolverine, Storm, Nightcrawler, Colossus, and Banshee. Another hero, Sunfire, departed after their first adventure, and yet another, Thunderbird, died during their second.
Giant-Sized X-Men #1 was successful enough that Marvel began publishing new issues of X-Men featuring the new team. Wein stepped down after the special and was succeeded as writer by Chris Claremont, who would go on to be the longest-standing contributor to the franchise. Cockrum remained with the title for two years, designing the group's visuals and contributing to important stories such as the return of the Sentinels, and the metamorphosis of Marvel Girl into Phoenix, an immensely powerful woman who would play a key role in future issues.
When Cockrum departed he was succeeded by John Byrne, with inks by Terry Austin. This marked the beginning of the X-Men's first true heyday, during which they ascended to become one of the most popular comics in the industry. Byrne and Austin both became in-demand artists throughout the 1980s due to the acclaim they received while on the X-Men.
The new X-Men were true to the ideals of the early Marvel Comics; although their adventures were inventive and exciting, it was the interplay among the characters and their differing viewpoints and morals which captured reader attention. Wolverine, in particular, became immensely popular, his rough-and-tumble demeanor combined with his sense of honor being a source of personal and team conflict. One ground-breaking scene implied that Wolverine killed a guard off-panel in order to break into an enemy stronghold, an act which marked Wolverine's nearly-unique role as an anti-hero in mainstream comics.
Claremont and Byrne - who co-plotted the stories - thrust the X-Men into a variety of desperate situations where their personal senses of self were tested. The ultimate example of this is also one of the key stories in X-Men history: "The Dark Phoenix Saga" (Uncanny X-Men #129-38, 1980). In this story, the X-Men's enemies, the Hellfire Club seduced Phoenix and turned her to their side. This tampering with her mind revealed that Jean Grey's human mind could not control her power, and she mutated into the vicious Dark Phoenix, going on to destroy an entire planet. The alien Shi'ar Imperial Guard, commanded by Xavier's alien love Lilandra, engaged the X-Men in a battle for Phoenix's life on Earth's moon. Phoenix committed suicide to prevent further deaths on her hands, a watershed moment for comics of the era in that major characters had rarely been killed up to that point. Her death in Uncanny X-Men #137 is a seminal moment in superhero comic books.
For their swansong, Claremont and Byrne produced "Days of Future Past" (Uncanny X-Men #141-142, 1981), which portrayed a dystopian future in which most of the X-Men are dead and Sentinels herd mutants into concentration camps. Despite its relative brevity, this uncompromising vision of a future Marvel Universe has inspired many X-Men stories in the decades since. This story revolved around the X-Men's newest member, the teenager Kitty Pryde, later known as Shadowcat.
Byrne departed after #143 and Cockrum returned, though his second run is not well-remembered. Though during this period Claremont wrote and Brent Anderson illustrated Marvel Graphic Novel #5: God Loves, Man Kills (1982). In it, the Reverend William Stryker initiated a religious crusade against mutants, capturing Professor X to manipulate his powers to attack and eradicate mutant minds. The X-Men united with Magneto to battle Stryker, resulting in one of the clearest examples of mutants as a metaphor for race relations in the series. (This story loosely inspired the second X-Men film in the early 2000s.)
Cockrum was succeeded on the regular series by Paul Smith, who illustrated a series of short arcs which introduced the underground mutant settlement the Morlocks, added the former supervillain Rogue to the team, explored Wolverine's love of a Japanese aristocrat named Mariko Yashida, and found Cyclops meeting and falling in love with Madelyne Prior, a seeming doppelganger of Jean Grey. This last story culminated in Uncanny X-Men #175, in which the Prior/Grey duality is resolved in a clever and believable manner, ending with Cyclops getting the happy ending which few superheroes receive, and retiring from the X-Men. (This development only lasted a few years, though, as later plot developments considerably complicated and ultimately ended the marriage.)
Smith was succeeded by John Romita, Jr who illustrated the title through #200. During his tenure the team added Rachel Summers (who later adopted the name Phoenix) and introduced Storm's sometime-love Forge.
In 1983, the increasing popularity of Uncanny X-Men, resulted in the first spin-off title The New Mutants. It starred a junior team of mutants attending Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. In 1985, the original X-Men, including a controversially-resurrected Jean Grey, formed X-Factor. Early issues of X-Factor introduced Apocalypse, a 2,000-year-old mutant who would become an important X-Men adversary.
In Uncanny X-Men #200 (1985), Professor X was badly injured and left Earth with Lilandra to heal. Magneto, whom Claremont had evolved to be an almost sympathetic character, agreed take over Xavier's school, serving as an X-Man and mentor to the New Mutants.
The expansion of the franchise
The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the X-Men franchise expand greatly, with a large number of additional titles joining the three existing series during a boom time for the comic book industry.
1986 saw the first major X-Men crossover, a story which occurred simultaneously in all of the X-Men books being published. This story, the grisly "Mutant Massacre", featured a group a murderous mutants called the Marauders who slaughtered the Morlocks and severely injured many of the X-Men who intervened. It introduced the villain Mr. Sinister, a mutant geneticist who was the Marauders' leader. It also brought Sabretooth, previously an adversary of Iron Fist, into the X-Men fold as an adversary for Wolverine, with the suggestion that the two were somehow linked in the past. (John Byrne has observed that the original intention was that Sabretooth was Wolverine's father, but plot developments following Byrne's departure made this implausible.)
In 1987, after Nightcrawler, Shadowcat and Phoenix II were relocated to the spin-off Excalibur, Claremont unveiled a new X-Men line-up consisting of Storm, Rogue, Wolverine, Colossus, Havok and several characters new to the team: Dazzler, Longshot, and Psylocke.
Following the crossover "The Fall of the Mutants", in which the X-Men almost died fighting a demon called the Adversary in Dallas, the team briefly relocated to an abandoned outpost in Australia. The Australian period saw the introduction of the Reavers, a band of cyborg mercenaries and the X-Over "Inferno," in which the X-Teams battle Mr. Sinister, his creation the Goblin Queen and the groups of demons she allied herself with.
In late 1989, Marvel began publishing Uncanny X-Men twice a month, allowing Claremont to write intertwined plot threats involving several globe-trotting X-Men. The 1990 crossover, "The X-tinction Agenda", pulled the X-Men back together, with two new members: Jubilee and Gambit. From 1987 until 1990 Marc Silvestri illustrated Uncanny X-Men. He was succeeded by Jim Lee, who would become the most popular artist on the series since Byrne.
After the X-Men's return to the mansion and Professor X's return to Earth in early 1991, Marvel revised the entire regiment of X-books: Artist Rob Liefeld transformed The New Mutants into the platoon-like X-Force, led by the mysterious warhawk Cable. The original X-Men abandoned the X-Factor role and returned to the X-Men. And Havok, Polaris and several secondary mutants formed a new X-Factor.
To make room for the enlarged main team, in 1991 Marvel launched a second X-Men series, simply called X-Men. Written by Claremont and illustrated by Lee, the new series featured the "blue team," consisting of Beast, Psylocke, Rogue, Gambit, Cyclops and Wolverine. Uncanny X-Men, written and illustrated by Lee and Whilce Portacio, featured the "gold team," consisting of Colossus, Iceman, Archangel (formerly Angel), Jean Grey, Storm, and Bishop, a gun-toting renegade mutant from a distant future. Professor X, Banshee and Jubilee stayed on as non-combatant X-Men.
The popular art of Lee and Liefield and the buzz produced by this reformation lifted the X-Men's popularity even further and the first issues of X-Force and X-Men became two of the best-selling comic book issues of all time. These sales landmarks were helped substantially by the unprecedented boom in the comic book industry at the time, as well as widespread speculative investment in popular comic books by the general public and novel new marketing gimmicks employed by the publishers. The sales levels proved untenable and collapsed along with the rest of the industry in the mid-1990s.
Internal friction soon split the X-Men books' creative teams. Claremont left after only three issues of X-Men because of clashes with Marvel editors, ending his 15 year stint as X-Men scribe. Months later, Liefield and Lee left Marvel with several other popular artists to form Image Comics.
1992 saw the debut of the X-Men animated series on the Fox network. Meanwhile Uncanny X-Men was handed over to writer Scott Lobdell and artist Joe Madureira, whose manga-like style helped generate a new interest in Japanese comic books in the U.S. X-Men continued with writer Fabian Nicieza and artist Andy Kubert and later Lobdell and artist Salvador Larroca.
Crossovers continued as almost annual events during the 1990s. Although they boosted sales, many fans complained that they were just cheap publicity stunts. Crossovers from the decade include:
- "The X-Tinction Agenda" (1990), in which the government of Genosha, a fictional island off the coast of Madagascar where mutants are used as prison labor, attempted to capture the X-Teams.\n* "The X-Cutioner's Song" (1992), in which Cable's clone Stryfe framed the X-Force leader for an attempt on Professor X's life and captured and tormented his genetic parents, Cyclops and Jean Grey.\n* "Fatal Attractions" (1993), in which Magneto and his new team the Acolytes returned.\n* "The Phalanx Covenant" (1994), in which Phalanx, a "techno-organic" alien life form attempted to assimilate mutants into its collective mind and body.\n* "Age of Apocalypse" (1995), in which a time-traveler kills Professor X before he ever forms the X-Men. An alternative reality unfolded in which Apocalypse ruled North America and Magneto led a resistance.\n* "Onslaught" (1996), which dominated all Marvel comic books for two months. In it, Professor X lost control over his powers, creating an evil second personality called Onslaught who battled the X-Men, The Avengers and the Fantastic Four.\n* "Operation Zero Tolerance" (1997), in which an anti-mutant army was given license to hunt the X-Men teams and other mutants across the U.S.\n* "The Twelve" (1999), in which Apocalypse conspired to capture a dozen mutants and absorb their powers, hoping to become omnipotent.
Along the way, the 1990s saw an even greater glut of X-books:
Generation X, (debuted
1994);
X-Man (debuted
1995), and solo series for several characters:
Cable,
Gambit,
Bishop and
Deadpool. In
1998 Excalibur and
X-Factor ended and the latter was replaced with the
parallel world series
Mutant X.
The new regime
Following the settlement of Marvel's bankruptcy in
1997, the X-Men books went through a series of transformations under new Marvel editor-in-chief
Joe Quesada.
Several major characters such as Bishop, Gambit, Jean Grey and Cyclops were written out of the X-Men, and a new team was assembled consisting of Wolverine, Rogue, Beast, Storm and newcomers
Marrow,
Cannonball, Maggott and Cecilia Reyes. This team was soon supplanted by one assembled by popular writer/artist
Alan Davis in
1998, with Davis drawing
X-Men and Adam Kubert drawing
Uncanny X-Men. Davis' tenure ended in
2000 with the return of Chris Claremont to the fold.
Marvel instituted a six-month time gap between issues of X-Books, allowing Claremont and illustrators to completely revise the X-Men in a single month. Claremont took over writing both X-Men books, with a cast of the old regulars plus new arrivals
Thunderbird II and
Sage. Wandering plot lines and forgettable new villains plagued Claremont's return, leading Quesada to remove him in early
2001. Quesada paired Claremont with Larroca for a new title,
X-Treme X-Men.
Marvel finally decided it was time to clean house in the X-Men line.
Gambit,
Bishop,
X-Man,
Mutant X and
Generation X were cancelled, while
X-Force was heavily revised (and later retitled
X-Statix) and a brief, John Byrne-created retro series,
X-Men: The Hidden Years, was also axed. A few new books were launched, including
Weapon X.
Other drastic changes included the deaths of Colossus and Psylocke in
Uncanny X-Men #390 and
X-Treme X-Men #3 respectively, and the uncovering of Wolverine's beginnings in the
2001 Origin mini-series, which revealed that Wolverine was born James Howlett, son of rich plantation owners in late
19th Century Canada, and has long suffered fits of
amnesia.
Most significantly, 2001 saw the ascent of popular writer
Grant Morrison and artist
Frank Quitely to the retitled
New X-Men series. Its heroes were outfitted in black leather uniforms resembling those of the 2000 X-Men feature film. Also, a student body of teenage mutants was added to Xavier's School. The book was noted for its
science fiction concepts, its sense of humor and its ambitious twists and turns such as the killing of 16 million mutants in
Genosha at the hands of the Sentinels. Most fans applauded Morrison's edgy approach and, for the first time since the early 1980s, there was a consensus that the X-Men were an artistically, not just commercially, successful franchise.
Meanwhile
Uncanny X-Men was revamped by writers Joe Casey and
Chuck Austen, and artists Ian Churchill,
Kia Asamiya and Ron Garney. The book, which focused on traditional action and adventure, added several new characters:
Husk,
Northstar, and - perhaps most surprisingly - Juggernaut. However, Chuck Austen's unorthodox spins on older characters created a backlash of anger amongst longtime, hardcore fans. It grew to the point where Austin had earned the nickname, "the most hated man in comics," with fans clamoring for his removal.
In
2004, Morrison left
New X-Men and Marvel prepared for what was already being called the "post-Morrison period". Marvel cancelled
X-Treme X-Men and launched
Astonishing X-Men. The latter is notable for being written by
Joss Whedon, creator of
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and drawn by popular artist John Cassaday. Marvel has since also launched several more X-Men series including
Rogue,
Nightcrawler,
District X,
New X-Men: Academy X, and a new series of
Excalibur.
Ultimate X-Men
In 2000 writer
Mark Millar and artist Adam Kubert introduced an updated and re-envisioned version of the X-Men as the
Ultimate X-Men. This title started from scratch with new versions of each character, and is set outside of the
Marvel Universe continuity in the
Ultimate Marvel Universe.
In this version the X-Men, other than Professor X and Wolverine, are still teenagers. The team originally included these two as well as Cyclops, Jean Grey, Colossus, Iceman, Beast and Storm. "Ultimate" versions of Nightcrawler, Rogue, Shadowcat and Angel have since been introduced. Their enemies include The Hellfire Club, The Sentinels, and Magneto and The Brotherhood of Mutants.
Many of the versions of these characters keep only the basics, changing them to be (Marvel argues) more accessible to today's teenagers.
Other media
Animated television series
In 1989, Marvel Entertainment produced a pilot for an X-Men animated series called "Pryde of the X-Men," in which Kitty Pryde joins the X-Men, consisting of Colossus, Cyclops, Dazzler, Nightcrawler, Professor X, Storm and Wolverine. In that episode, the team battled Magneto and The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. The episode never aired but was released on video in 1991 to the scorn and ridicule of X-Men fans, who were particularly tickled by Wolverine's almost Australian-sounding accent.
In 1992, the Fox Network began airing a new
X-Men animated series with the roster of Beast, Cyclops, Gambit, Jean Grey, Jubilee, Professor X, Rogue, Storm and Wolverine with Cable, Bishop and Archangel often guesting. The team's adversaries included Mr. Sinister, Sabretooth, Apocalypse, the Sentinels and Magneto. The series often utilized stories from the Claremont years and even attempted its own Phoenix and Dark Phoenix sagas in its third season. The series was an extraordinary success, becoming one of the most watched animated series in television history. It continued for five seasons, ending in 1997, but Fox and the
ABC Family Network began airing reruns after the success of the 2000 X-Men film.
In 2000,
Warner Brothers Network launched
X-Men: Evolution, which portrayed Cyclops, Jean Grey, Nightcrawler, Rogue and Shadowcat as teenagers attending regular high school in addition to Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. At the latter, Professor X, Storm and Wolverine were their teachers. The series, which was aimed at younger children than its predecessor, irked longtime X-Men fans but gathered moderate ratings. The first season featured the Brotherhood of Mutants, including of Magneto, Mystique, Quicksilver and Toad. Later seasons introduced versions of The New Mutants and Acolytes, both made up of seemingly random medleys of secondary mutants from throughout the X-books' history. The third and fourth seasons predominantly featured Apocalypse as the X-Men's adversary. The series ended in 2003 after its fourth season.
Feature films
In 2000,
20th Century Fox released
X-Men, a $75 million
film adaptation of the comic book, directed by
Bryan Singer. The film featured Storm (
Halle Berry) Cyclops (James Marsden) and Jean Grey (
Famke Janssen) as leather-clad X-Men who also served as teachers at Professor Xavier's (
Patrick Stewart) school for mutant children and teenagers. Wolverine (
Hugh Jackman) and Rogue (
Anna Paquin) were two mutant wanderers who crossed their path. The mutants battled Magneto (
Ian McKellen) who built a machine that turns humans into mutants and planned to affect a congregation of world leaders. His Brotherhood of Mutants included Mystique (
Rebecca Romijn-Stamos), Sabretooth (Tyler Mane) and Toad (Ray Park). The film gathered good reviews, approval from fans, and earned $157.3 million at the box office, helping usher in a new era of Marvel movies including 2002's
Spider-Man and 2003's Daredevil and Hulk.
In
2003, the sequel film
X2: X-Men United, also directed by Singer, was released. That film was loosely based on the
1982 X-Men
graphic novel God Loves, Man Kills. Instead of a minister, William Stryker (
Brian Cox) is an high-ranking army general who leads a government siege on the X-Men's headquarters to build his own version of Professor X's mutant-hunting computer Cerebro. The X-Men team up with Magneto and Mystique to battle Stryker. The film also introduced Nightcrawler (
Alan Cummings) to movie-goers. The movie was an even greater success than the first, earning $214 million and many fans and critics considered it an improvement to
X-Men.
X3 is planned for
2006.
Related articles
External links
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