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Comic Book / X-Men

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The strangest heroes of all!note 

"Sworn to protect a world that hates and fears them."

The Strangest Superheroes of them all. The Uncanny Misfits. The Heroic Outcasts.

The X-Men are a Super Team in the Marvel Universe created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby and first appeared in The X-Men #1 (September 1963).

The team are members of a human subspecies, Homo superiornote , colloquially referred to as "mutants". Mutants are humans who possess the "X-gene", a gene that gives them special superpowers and unique capabilities. Said to be humanity's next evolutionary phase, their presence has incited massive dissension as humans believe they will soon become extinct. While most strive for a civil coexistence, mutants are generally met with fear, hatred, violence, envy, and discrimination. Under increasing anti-mutant sentiment, mutant telepath Charles Xavier creates a haven at his Westchester mansion to train young mutants to use their powers for the benefit of humanity as well as to prove mutants can be heroes. Initially, he recruited Cyclops, Iceman, Angel, Beast and Jean Grey, calling them "X-Men" as they had power from the X-gene. Early issues introduced the team's archenemy Magneto and his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, who fight for total mutant supremacy and would battle the X-Men for years – the Brotherhood also introduced the twins Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch, who would reform and become Avengers. While the early issues focused on typical good versus evil/law versus crime stories, they did feature an undertone (which, depending on the issue, would become more overt) of racism and prejudice as a central theme.

The original run of X-Men stories stopped with issue #66 (March 1970), after which Marvel turned the title over to publishing reprints of older stories... until the X-Men underwent a significant Retool for The Bronze Age of Comic Books with ''Giant-Size X-Men'' #1 (May 1975), by writer Len Wein and artist Dave Cockrum, which brought in an almost entirely new team of main characters including iconic fan-favorites Wolverine and Storm, retaining only Cyclops and Professor X. Although the original team resembled the ethnicity and background of their readership in The '60s, the All-New All-Different team of 1975 was incredibly diverse (and for the most part averting Captain Ethnic), and subsequent team makeups have kept this aspect. Since its debut, the comic has been a major allegory of civil rights, specifically the American Civil Rights Movement and, more recently, the LGBTQ Rights Movement.

With Chris Claremont taking over as writer – at first alongside Cockrum, and subsequently with John Byrne as artist and co-plotter – X-Men (later renamed to Uncanny X-Men) ascended to become the most popular comic book franchise published by Marvel, a position it would maintain through the '80s and '90s. During Claremont's extremely long run from 1975 to 1991 alongside a succession of talented artists, the team continued to evolve over time: characters would join, leave and occasionally return to the team, resulting in the massive ensemble cast that the X-Men franchise is known for today.

The number of X-Men books has expanded enormously over time, including new team books, spinoff teams and character-centric solo books, many of which have their own pages here on TV Tropes. Spin-offs first began appearing in the '80s – Claremont and X-Men editor Louise Simonson were against the idea, wanting the X-Men to remain unique and special, but were informed that spin-offs would be created regardless of their involvement. Thus in 1982 they developed New Mutants, a companion title starring a team of teenage mutants also being trained at the Xavier School. In 1986 the series X-Factor was created, reuniting the original five X-Men in their own title; 1988 saw various ex-X-Men spun off into Excalibur, and the launch of the solo Wolverine comic. Various X-Men characters would also star in their own solo miniseries, from the early '80s through to the present day.

Coinciding with Claremont's departure, a second main X-Men series was launched in 1991, simply titled X-Men. Ever since, having multiple main X-Men titles has been more common than not – the degree to which the titles are interlinked has varied over time, usually more so when they have the same writer (such as in the mid-'90s when Uncanny writer Scott Lobdell took over writing X-Men as well). It has also varied whether the main X-Men titles are considered equally important or if there is a “flagship title”, such as Grant Morrison's New X-Men over 2001-04 or Jeff Lemire's Extraordinary X-Men over 2016-17.

Meanwhile, new generations of teenage mutants have also been introduced to the extended X-Men cast over time. After the now-adult New Mutants were relaunched as the Darker and Edgier X-Force, a new generation of teens was introduced in 1994 with Generation X. In 2002 another younger generation was first introduced in a new volume of New Mutants and would go on to star in New X-Men: Academy X. As each generation grows to adulthood – at varying rates, given Comic-Book Time – their characters have joined the X-Men and other teams, or starred in revivals of their original series, or both.

The idea of a sovereign mutant nation has come up several times over the course of the comics, such as when Magneto conquered the country of Genosha in the '90s and when the X-Men founded the short-lived nation Utopia in the late '00s. It is the premise of the most recent relaunch of the X-Men line from 2019 under the creative control of Jonathan Hickman, which is based around the establishment of a mutant nation on the living island of Krakoa from Giant-Size X-Men #1.

The X-Men comics have been adapted in other media, including animated television series, video games, and a rather successful series of films.

X-Men comic series

    open/close all folders 

    The main titles in 2023 are: 
  • X-Men: The flagship book, about the main team of superheroes led by Cyclops and Marvel Girl.
  • Immortal X-Men — The Quiet Council rules the Krakoan age, for better... or worse. Now, shaken by Inferno (2021), they strive to hold together — no matter how much they want to tear each other apart. Featuring Professor X, Magneto, Mystique, Storm, Emma Frost, Nightcrawler, Colossus, Kate Pryde, Sebastian Shaw, Destiny, Exodus, and Mister Sinister. Written by Kieron Gillen and drawn by Lukas Werneck.
  • Marauders: Led by Captain Kate Pryde and funded by Emma Frost and the Hellfire Trading Company, this new team of Marauders sails the seas to protect those feared and hated. Featuring Kate Pryde, Bishop, Psylocke, Daken, Aurora, Tempo, Somnus, and Cassandra Nova. Written by Steve Orlando and drawn by Eleonora Carlini.
  • X-Men Red — Continuing from the events of S.W.O.R.D. (2020), Planet Arakko (formerly known as Mars) needs something more than just a team of heroes to defend it. Who will rise to the challenge? Written by Al Ewing and drawn by Stefano Caselli.
  • X-Force: The mutant CIA fights back against the enemies of Krakoa.
  • Legion of X — Continuing from Way of X, Nightcrawler and Legion have established the Legionnaires, a force to protect and cultivate "the Spark". Also features Juggernaut, Pixie, Doctor Nemesis, Blindfold, and Dust. Written by Si Spurrier and drawn by Jan Balzadua.
  • Wolverine: He's the best he is at what he does and what he does isn't pretty.
  • X-Men Legends: A chance for past writers of X-Men books (like Fabien Nicieza, Louise Simonson, and Peter David) to tell the stories they weren't able to get to the first time.

    Comic book titles linked to the X-Men include: 

Mini-series, limited series, and ongoing series:

  • X-Men (Chris Claremont)
  • The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix
  • Age of Apocalypse: Spinning out of the Uncanny X-Force arc "The Dark Angel Saga", this title follows characters in the apocalyptic hellhole that was once the setting of the eponymous crossover from the 90s.
  • Alpha Flight
  • Amazing X-Men: A title featuring grand, High Concept X-Men adventures and features the teachers of the Jean Grey School and first time X-Man Firestar. The volume's first arc revolves around the X-Men facing off against Azazel in the afterlife world with Nightcrawler, who has been dead since 2010's X-Crossover Second Coming.
  • Astonishing X-Men: Ran 2004-2013. Initially written by Joss Whedon, continuing on where New X-Men left off. Later written by Warren Ellis, then by a rotating set of writers until Marjorie Liu came aboard the title with a new team line-up. Another volume ran 2017-2019.
  • Cable
  • Cable & Deadpool
  • Dazzler
  • Deadpool
  • District X
  • Emma Frost
  • Excalibur: A team based in the UK, made up of former X-Men and characters from the Marvel UK imprint.
  • Exiles
  • First X-Men
  • Generation Hope: After the events of Second Coming, the mutant Messiah Hope Summers returned to the 616 universe and started repopulating the mutant race activating the powers of new mutants around the world. This book is about her and her group of mutants called "Lights".
  • Generation X: A title launched in the 1990s focusing on Emma Frost's own Superhero School and her team of teenage mutants which included Jubilee.
  • Madrox
  • Magneto: Testament
  • Major X
  • Mekanix: A limited series starring Kitty Pryde, who's left the X-Men and is trying to make a new life for herself in Chicago. Later renamed and reprinted as X-Treme X-Men: Mekanix.
  • Mutant X
  • New Mutants: The first spin-off series from Uncanny X-Men (not counting Dazzler), launched in 1982, starring a group of teenage mutant students at the Xavier School. The series has been relaunched a few times since, with the same characters having aged to adulthood.
  • New X-Men: Academy X: Continuing from the second volume of New Mutants, starring a new group of teenage students at the Xavier School, launched in the early 2000s.
  • Old Man Logan: Originally an eight-chapter AU story, it spawned more books in that setting, inspired the film Logan, got a Secret Wars (2015) tie-in, and an ongoing series.
  • Snikt!
  • Spider-Man and the X-Men: Written by The Daily Show writer Elliott Kalan, this series was launched after Wolverine's death in 2014. This series continues Wolverine and the X-Men's Lighter and Softer approach with Spider-Man (on behest of Logan's will) teaching a special class at the Jean Grey School.
  • Ultimate Wolverine
  • Ultimate X-Men: Part of the Ultimate Universe, featuring re-imagined versions of the X-Men and their mythos.
  • Uncanny X-Men, originally titled The X-Men. The original and longest-running title, first launched in 1963. Relaunched multiple times:
  • Weapon H
  • Weapon X (1991)
  • Weapon X (2002)
  • Wolverine (which had its own spin-off titles, including Origins and The Best There Is)
  • Wolverine (1982)
  • Wolverine and the X-Men, not to be confused with the animated series of the same name. Written by Jason Aaron, it was the main title of Wolverine's Gold team and focuses on the adventures of Headmaster Logan, Headmistress Ororo (formerly Kitty Pryde) and the rest of the staff and the students on the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning.
  • Wolverines
  • X-Factor series:
  • X-Force: Various incarnations, generally with the common theme of being a hard-edged mutant strike team.
    • X-Force (1991): A continuation of New Mutants, launched in 1991, with the main characters now as young adults led by Cable. In 2001 was Retooled to star an In Name Only publicity-hungry team with a completely different cast.
    • X-Force (2004): Rob Liefield and Fabian Nicieza's return to the title, featuring the original cast.
    • X-Force (2008): Starring the sanctioned strike team of mutantdom fighting to stop threats towards what little mutants remain. Spun off from the X-Men crossover event Messiah Complex. Written by Craig Kyle and Chris Yost.
    • Uncanny X-Force (2010): Starring a secret strike team as they confront the emerging threat of Apocalypse and the aftermath of what they wrought. Launched in the aftermath of the crossover event X-Men: Second Coming. Written by Rick Remender.
    • X-Force (2013) (Marvel NOW!)
    • X-Force (2018): Starring the original team, post-Extermination.
    • X-Force (2019) (Dawn of X)
  • X-Man
  • X-Men series:
    • X-Men (1991) vol. 2: Commonly nicknamed "Adjectiveless X-Men", launched in 1991 as a showcase for Jim Lee's art. Originally featured the "Blue team" of X-Men, while Uncanny X-Men featured the "Gold team"; later the two books became more interlinked.
    • New X-Men: The series was retitled 2001-2004 while written by Grant Morrison, to coincide with the first two movies, and became the flagship X-Men book.
    • X-Men: Legacy: The series was permanently retitled in 2008 from issue #208, when it became a solo book starring Professor X. Then from issue #226 it featured Rogue as its main character with a rotating supporting cast until it ended with #275. A second volume of X-Men: Legacy featuring Legion was launched for Marvel NOW!.
    • X-Men vol. 3: Launched in 2010, ended with #41. Highlighted the X-Men acting within the Marvel Universe.
    • X-Men (2013) vol. 4 (Marvel NOW!)
    • X-Men (2019) vol. 5: A new status quo that started in 2019 with the two mini-series House of X and Powers of X which led into Dawn of X.
    • X-Men (2021) vol. 6 (Reign of X)
  • X-Men: Black
  • X-Men: Days of Future Past - Doomsday
  • X-Men: First Class: A 2000s title featuring new stories set during the Silver Age Uncanny X-Men period. Nothing to do with the film of the same title, which went even further back in time.
  • X-Men Forever
  • X-Men: Grand Design, a trio of two-issue series recontextualizing the first three decades of X-Men continuity into a single, coherent narrative. Major storylines covered include the establishment of the first class, the Myth Arc involving the Phoenix Force, and a shadow battle waged by human separatists determined to bring about the fall of all mutants.
  • X-Men: Legacy: The first volume was a renamed X-Men vol 2, the second volume a 24-issue series about Legion.
  • The X-Men and the Micronauts: A crossover miniseries in which the X-Men fight alongside the titular Micronauts, alien freedom fighters from a subatomic universe. Notable for using a similar concept to the later Onslaught storyline.
  • X-Men 2099: A version of the team set in the year 2099.
  • X-Statix: A continuation of the latter part of the first volume of X-Force.
  • X-Treme X-Men:
  • X-Women: An Author Appeal one-shot by Chris Claremont and Milo Manara.

Line-wide initiatives:

Marvel NOW! (2012) and All-New Marvel NOW! (2014)

  • All-New X-Factor: Focusing on a new iteration of the X-Factor superhero team and written by Peter David, it sees a return to the corporate-sponsored version of the team.
  • All-New X-Men: Launched by Brian Michael Bendis and Stuart Immonen. The setting takes place in the aftermath of Avengers vs. X-Men where the original five X-Men are yanked from the past into the present day.
  • Cyclops: Spinoff from All-New X-Men starring the time-displaced teenage Cyclops.
  • Magneto
  • Uncanny Avengers, a mutant-heavy Spin-Off of The Avengers that features the X-Men members Wolverine, Rogue, Havok and Sunfire as main characters.
  • X-Force (2013): Written by Si Spurrier, it merges the two teams and serves as a continuation of both series:
    • Cable and X-Force (2013): Written by Dennis Hopeless, Cable forms a new outlaw X-Force group.
    • Uncanny X-Force (2013): Written by Sam Humphries, follows Psylocke's new X-Force team.
    • X-Men (2013): Originally written by Brian Wood. Featuring an all-female team.

All-New, All-Different Marvel post-Secret Wars (2015)

ResurrXion (2017) and Marvel: A Fresh Start (2018)

Dawn of X (2019), Reign of X (2021), and Destiny of X (2022)

  • Children of the Atom: A new group of teenage mutant superheroes appear fighting crime in New York. But these teenagares aren't exactly what they seem...
  • Excalibur (2019): A new connection forms between the mutants, the magic of the world, and the Otherworld.
  • Fallen Angels (2019) — Not all belong in Paradise. Kwannon, the second Psylocke, finds herself in a new world for mutantkind and unsure of her place in it, and when a face from her past is killed, she seeks help to get vengeance.
  • Hellions: Mr. Sinister sets out to find a purpose for Krakoa's most dangerous mutants with Havok and Psylocke's help.
  • Knights of X — Captain Britain III (Betsy Braddock) fights to reclaim Otherworld from the mutant-hating forces of Avalon. Also featuring Gambit and Prestige.
  • Marauders: Led by Captain Kate Pryde and funded by Emma Frost and the Hellfire Trading Company, this new team of Marauders sails the seas to protect those feared and hated.
  • New Mutants (2019): The return of the classic team, plus a second team in alternating stories.
  • S.W.O.R.D. (2020): The mutant space program led by Abigail Brand.
  • Way of X: Nightcrawler searches for some purpose and meaning to unite the mutants of Krakoa to save them from Onslaught.
  • Wolverine (2020): The seventh Wolverine volume, launched by writer Benjamin Percy and artist Adam Kubert.
  • X-Corp: The X-Corporation led by Warren Worthington III and Monet St. Croix tries to launch their new products in a cut-throat world.
  • X-Factor (2020): Mutants have conquered death through The Five, but when a mutant dies, X-Factor is there to investigate the circumstances to follow the rules of resurrection.
  • X-Force (2019): The mutant nation of Krakoa's mutant CIA team. Written by Benjamin Percy.
  • X-Men (2019): The flagship title of Cyclops and his assembled "powerhouses" team.

    Storylines and events involving the X-Men include: 

...and too many more to name. Every major character has had at least one miniseries, usually several. See what The Other Wiki has to say about it.

    Alternate Universes 

Here are the different incarnations of the X-Men so far:

  • The Original Team: The founding team from 1963, which featured Cyclops, Angel, Beast, Iceman, and Marvel Girl as its central cast, and was led by Professor X. Later additions included Mimic (the first non-mutant, and only briefly), Polaris, and Cyclops' long-lost brother Havok to the roster, as well as retconning Changeling into becoming a member to facilitate one of the first instances of Death Is Cheap.
  • The All-New All-Different X-Men: Introduced in the pivotal Giant-Size X-Men #1, in which Professor X and Cyclops were forced to recruit a new, international, multi-racial team, made up of Storm from Kenya, Nightcrawler from West Germany, Colossus from Russia, Banshee from Ireland, Sunfire from Japan, Thunderbird from an Apache nation, and, of course, Wolverine from Canada, to save the old team from a failed mission on Krakoa. This team continued into the main X-Men title from issue #94 onwards; Sunfire left the team almost immediately, and Thunderbird was promptly killed off. Marvel Girl soon rejoined the team, apparently died and resurrected with greatly expanded powers, and took on the new name Phoenix. Eventually Banshee had to leave the team due to injury, and the story of Jean's growing power tragically culminated in The Dark Phoenix Saga.
  • From Dark Phoenix to the Brood Saga: Soon after the death of Jean Grey, teenager Kitty Pryde joined the team and initially took the codename Sprite. Cyclops took an unspecified leave of absence to grieve, leaving Storm as the leader. Angel rejoined the team as well, but left after ten issues over a dispute about whether Wolverine was trustworthy. Soon afterwards Cyclops fell back into the X-Men's orbit and remained with the team until the end of the Brood Saga; during this period, a de-powered Carol Danvers was also a close associate of the X-Men (although not an official member).
  • From the Brood Saga to the Mutant Massacre: Cyclops left the team again, seemingly for good this time, getting married and settling down for a normal life in Alaska. Kitty Pryde abandoned the codename Sprite, becoming Ariel and eventually Shadowcat. Former villain Rogue defected to the X-Men and soon became an integral part of the team. Rachel Summers, the daughter from the alternate future of Cyclops and Jean from Days of Future Past, travelled back to the present day and claimed her mother's mantle as the second Phoenix. Storm temporarily left the team as well after being de-powered, leaving Nightcrawler as team leader, before returning to the team as a Badass Normal and reclaiming her position as leader. Professor X departed for outer space and left charge of the Xavier School to Magneto, who had gradually undergone a Heel–Face Turn.
  • Post-Mutant-Massacre and the Australia era: The X-Men underwent a drastic shift in their line-up after the Mutant Massacre, with only Storm, Wolverine and Rogue remaining as members; new recruits included Psylocke, Dazzler, Longshot (who was an alien rather than a mutant) and the return of Havok. Storm took a leave of absence to go on a quest to recover her superpowers, leaving Wolverine as team leader for the first time – around the same time she returned, Colossus was also able to return as an active team member. During the period where the team were presumed dead and operating from exile in the Australian outback, they were aided by the mysterious elderly portal-creating mutant Gateway.
  • Dissolution and Rebirth: During a period where the X-Men were dissolved and scattered across the world, Wolverine teamed up with newcomer Jubilee and reunited with a now body-swapped Psylocke, the once-again-active Banshee teamed up with long-time recurring character Forge, and Storm became travelling companions with the newly introduced Gambit. These seven eventually came together as a new team of X-Men and reunited with Professor X, although this lineup was short-lived.
  • Blue and Gold: At the time when a second ongoing main X-Men title was launched to run alongside Uncanny X-Men, the main characters were split into two teams: the "Blue" team from X-Men consisted of Cyclops, Beast, Wolverine, Psylocke, Jubilee, Rogue and Gambit, while the "Gold" team from Uncanny X-Men consisted of Storm, Jean Grey, Archangel (formerly Angel), Iceman, Colossus, Forge and new character Bishop. Forge left the X-Men and ended up joining X-Factor; Revanche, in Psylocke's original body, briefly joined the Blue Team and left shortly before her death; Colossus defected to Magneto's Acolytes due to the Trauma Conga Line he had been living through, while at the same time Wolverine also left the X-Men after having the adamantium ripped out of his body; finally, Jubilee left to become a founding member of the new class of young mutants in Generation X. By the end of this era, the Blue and Gold teams had more-or-less merged into one big team.
  • Onslaught era: Following Age of Apocalypse, former New Mutants and X-Force team leader Cannonball was recruited to the main X-Men team. The events of Onslaught forced Professor X to depart; around the same time, the X-Men discovered Joseph, whom they believed to be a de-aged amnesiac Magneto. Archangel and Psylocke left the team not long after, and Wolverine returned. During Operation Zero Tolerance, the X-Men were joined by the Morlock girl Marrow, South African boy Maggott and Dr Cecilia Reyes; meanwhile, Gambit was cast out of the X-Men in disgrace. Cyclops, Jean and Iceman all took indefinite leaves of absence. Joseph left the team after learning he was not Magneto. At the end of this era Cannonball left the X-Men and soon rejoined X-Force, Maggott departed to join Generation X,note  and Cecilia quit the superhero life to work as a doctor again.
  • From the Hunt For Xavier to The Twelve: Beginning with Storm, Wolverine, Rogue and Marrow as the only active X-Men, they were reunited with many former teammates: Nightcrawler, Shadowcat and Colossus rejoined after the disbanding of Excalibur; Gambit was invited back soon after; and Professor X returned in the Hunt for Xavier storyline. The enormous crossover story The Twelve also brought back many other former teammates.
  • X-Men: Revolution era: After a six-month Time Skip the X-Men's team lineup has gone through another change, with each main book featuring a different set of characters: Uncanny X-Men focused on Storm, Jean, Beast, Rogue, Gambit and former New Mutants and X-Force mentor Cable, while the adjectiveless title focused on Wolverine, Nightcrawler, Psylocke, Archangel, Colossus and the new Thunderbird. Towards the end of this era, Colossus died in a Heroic Sacrifice.
  • New X-Men: A relaunch in 2001 by writer Grant Morrison which revamped the X-Men for the modern era, giving them black and yellow outfits and introducing darker, more mature, and more complex storylines, like the Genoshan genocide and having Xavier's School become an actual school, with hundreds of mutant students. The book revitalized the franchise and was critically and commercially successful, but was also controversial for some of its takes on characters, like Magneto. This era introduced the character of X-23, Wolverine's clone daughter, as well as the "special class" of Xavier's students, like Quentin Quire, Glob Herman, and the Stepford Cuckoos.
  • Decimation, Hope, and Utopia: At the end of House of M, the Scarlet Witch depowered 99% of all mutants in an event dubbed the "Decimation" or "M-Day," causing a massive period of upheaval and death in the X-Men's world. This led to a period where the X-Men were less concerned with superheroics and more with preventing their own extinction. This eventually led to a trilogy of crossovers (Messiah Complex, Second Coming, and Messiah War) about Hope Summers, the first mutant baby born after M-Day and so-called "mutant messiah." This era also saw the X-Men move to San Francisco and then their own island made of the remains of Asteroid M, Utopia.
  • Schism, the Phoenix Five, and the Original Five: An era defined by the conflict between Cylops and Wolverine. The Schism event saw Wolverine split from Cyclops and take half of the X-Men back to Westchester in order to run the Jean Grey School, while Cyclops ran his own "Extinction Team." And then Avengers vs. X-Men saw Cyclops, Emma Frost, Namor, Colossus, and Magik each get a portion of the Phoenix Force and try to fix the world. In the aftermath of that event, Cyclops was declared a mutant terrorist and found himself on the run, while Beast brought the Original Five X-Men to the present. This status quo eventually ended with Secret Wars (2015).
  • Inhumans and ResurrXion: Post-Secret Wars (2015), mutants were again on the brink of extinction due to the Inhuman's Terrigen cloud poisoning them with "M-Pox." This led into the event Inhumans vs. X-Men and the relaunch Resurr Xion. This was a return to nostalgia, with the team books again being split in blue and gold. Though there were some popular decisions, like giving Laura Kinney the Wolverine name and bringing back the original Jean Grey from the dead to lead her own book, overall, many of the decisions were criticized by both fans and critics and many of the books were unpopular.
  • Disassembled and the Age of X-Man: A new relaunch in 2018 saw the storyline X-Men Disassembled, which led into the Age of X-Man event. While the event itself was considered good, this era is generally considered lackluster or downright mean, considering the number of deaths that occur in the main book. This era didn't last long, as it seemed only a stopgap until Jonathan Hickman took over the books and launched the next era...
  • The Krakoan Age: Following the two mini-series House of X and Powers of X and the formation of the mutant island nation of Krakoa, a relaunch called Dawn of X happened. Krakoa ushered in a new era of prosperity for mutants, especially since they found a way to bring the dead back to life. The new Krakoan team of X-Men was formed, which consisted of Cyclops, Marvel Girl, Polaris, Rogue, Sunfire, Synch, and Wolverine (Laura Kinney). However, Krakoa also holds some deep, dark secrets, especially concerning Moira MacTaggert.

General trope examples:

The X-Men comics provide examples of the following tropes:

    open/close all folders 

    Tropes - # to E 
  • Aborted Arc:
    • Zaladane's supposed connection to Polaris has never been explored or touched upon, though Zaladane's being Killed Off for Real doubtless has helped.
    • The events of House of M and Decimation resulted in some titles having to suddenly cancel their plots, such as the Weapon X series.
    • When Alisa is introduced, she worries about a mysterious person finding her, but nothing has come of it in the 6 years since then.
  • Absurdly Sharp Blade: Wolverine's adamantium-coated claws can cut through just about anything.
  • Academy of Adventure: For decades, the Charles Xavier School For Gifted Youngsters was the main hub for the X-Men team. Post-Schism and during Avengers Vs. X-Men, Wolverine became the headmaster and renamed it the "Jean Grey School For Higher Learning".
  • Action Dress Rip: Wolverine performs this for Jean Grey when they're escaping from some sentinels, Jean having been captured while on a date with Cyclops, and is having difficulty doing the deed herself.
  • The Adjectival Superhero: A dozen times over, to distinguish all their many series. "All-New, All-Different", "Astonishing", "Uncanny", and "X-Treme".
  • Addiction-Powered: The drug Kick is a highly addictive power-booster that works only on mutants. It's inverted when it's revealed that it comes from the sentient bacteria Sublime, making its mutation to be an addictive power source.
  • An Aesop: In one famous issue, after a mutant friend commits suicide over harassment, Kitty gives an impassioned speech about the nature of words and how they hurt, even rattling off a list of derogatory slurs to make her point.
  • All of the Other Reindeer: Many of the X-Men are ostracized for their gifts:
    • Cyclops is unable to control his (very destructive) optical blasts.
    • Rogue sometimes falls into a depression for not being able to touch another human being without sucking their lifeforce and memories.
    • Nightcrawler's demonic appearance was the reason for being persecuted in his home town.
  • All Your Base Are Belong to Us: The X-Mansion used to get trashed every few years, usually by the villains (one occasion had Kitty being responsible, killing a demon with the X-Jet's engines... and taking out half the mansion in the process). After Messiah Complex, this practice has died down (especially since between 2007 and 2011 the X-Men didn't have a mansion to trash).
  • Alternate Universe: This trope often crosses over with Bad Future, but not always. As the trope itself describes, the X-Men and their associated Spin-Off groups sometimes find themselves either having to deal with, or sometimes even visiting, various different Alternate Universes or Bad Futures, to the point where several different members of the team even come from them. Rachel's from the Days of Future Past timeline, Cable spent most of his life in a Dystopic Hellhole, Bishop's a cop from a future where mutants either work for the government or are otherwise herded into concentration camps, and X-Man and Uncanny X-Force's Nightcrawler are from the Age of Apocalypse timeline, where Apocalypse started taking over everything before the X-Men were even formed.
  • Amazing Technicolor Population: Mutant skin color ranges far beyond peach to brown seen in humans. Blue is an especially common color, for some reason — there have probably been more blue X-Men than black X-Men. Background mutants are also commonly given unusual skin color to make their subspecies immediately identifiable to the reader.
  • Amazon Brigade: The 2013 relaunch of (adjectiveless) X-Men featured an all-female team: Storm, Rogue, Kitty Pryde, Rachel Summers, Psylocke and Jubilee. They also got a villainous counterpart with a race-lifted Lady Deathstrike forming a "Sisterhood" with Typhoid Mary and Amora the Enchantress.
  • Amusing Alien: Lockheed the dragon isn't actually a dragon; he's an alien that happens to resemble a cat-sized purple dragon. Astonishing reveals that he isn't a regular Team Pet; he's an empath who speaks dozens of languages, and is smarter than the professor. And he'd been spying on the X-Men for SWORD since he came back.
  • An Alien Named "Bob": Gladiator, a member of the Strontian race serving the Shi'ar Empire, is actually named "Kallark". This is because he is an Expy of Superman, aka "Clark".
  • Anti-Climactic Unmasking: The story arc of Kaga in Astonishing X-Men, who is nothing more than a deformed elderly man who survived Hiroshima who's jealous of the X-Men's looks.
  • Armed Females, Unarmed Males: The Rasputin siblings Piotr, Illyana, and Mikhail qualify. Piotr has super strength and a metallic form, while Mikhail can manipulate matter and energy. While Illyana has her own mutant and magical abilities, she also wields a sword created from her own life energy.
  • Army of The Ages: Inverted when Fitzroy tries to conquer the present (his past) with future sentinel technology. It finally backfires spectacularly when he opens a portal to a prison riot in the future, bringing in a horde of mutant inmates— Bishop follows.
  • Artifact Alias: The original five X-Men take their code names in order to protect their identities and keep their powers secret. All but Jean Grey hang on to them even after their identities became public knowledge. The tradition of mutants taking up names to reflect their mutations continued as well, with most mutants choosing mutant names for reasons that have nothing to do with concealing their identities.
  • Artifact Title: The X-Men are still occasionally referred to as "the Children of the Atom", despite the original 1960s explanation for the X-gene (increased radiation from atomic weapons testing in the atmosphere) long since having been retconned away.
  • Artistic License – Biology: The comic constantly asserts that mutants are the next stage of human evolution, a phrase which in itself proves the writing team aren't really trying to give an accurate depiction of genetics. Evolution is a consistent physical change shared by all members of a species. The x-gene is so utterly random and varied in the people who receive it that and the powers it gives that mutantkind can't even be called a species. Also, evolution is designed to assist in helping a species survive and thrive in an environment but adaptation plays no role in what kind of powers a mutant receives. In fact, many mutants, such as Rogue or Toad, have their lives actively hampered by their powers.
  • Ashes to Crashes: Destiny (girlfriend/advisor to Mystique) left very specific instructions for when Mystique was to scatter her ashes. It was to be on the fantail of a particular cruise liner, on a specific date, at a specific time. Mystique waits for the specific time, then tosses the ashes, only to have the wind blow them right back in her face. The fact that Destiny was a clairvoyant means the entire thing was a rather macabre practical joke. Mystique appropriately laughs at her lover's final joke.
  • Assimilation Backfire: Even though Rogue is not an assimilator proper, her absorption power has often enough resulted in assimilation backfire, e.g. absorbing a particularly strong personality may result in her losing control of her own body to the persona she absorbed. This happened with Spiral, for instance. She also sometimes had to struggle for control of her own body with some other personalities she absorbed, especially with that of Carol Danvers.
  • Author Catchphrase: Especially during Chris Claremont's run, as seen here. Some examples and their characters:
    • "Ah'm nigh invulnerable when Ah'm blastin'." - Cannonball
    • "Bang! You dead." - Gambit when he defeats Wolverine
    • "By the white wolf!" - Colossus.
    • "Goddess!" - Storm.
    • "I possess you, body and soul!" - some mind-controlling villain (Shadow King, mostly).
    • "I'm the best there is at what I do. And what I do... isn't very pretty." - Logan.
    • "Sugah" - Rogue.
    • "Unglaublich!" [Unbelievable!] - Nightcrawler.
  • Back from the Dead:
    • Professor X was the first major character, but later on Jean Grey remains one of the first superheroines to be brought back from the dead. But if you think she was Killed Off for Real even a fraction as many times as Magneto, you haven't done your homework.
    • It has become something of a joke at how many characters have died and returned. But trying to avert this not only fools nobody, it comes across as writers using averting this to get rid of characters they don't like.
    • The entire team dies in Uncanny X-Men #227, only to come back a few pages later.
    • Characters like Psylocke and Colossus have been killed off, only to return; in the case of these two, both returned in the same year.
    • Nightcrawler is killed by Bastion during Second Coming, but returns in Amazing X-Men's first arc.
  • Backstory Invader: Inverted in Legacy with Forgetmenot, whose mutant power made people forget his existence the moment they stop actively thinking about him. He's apparently been an X-Man for six in-story years.
  • Bad Future:
    • Days of Futures Past is a major one, where Sentinels have taken over America, killed almost every superhero, and placed the rest in concentration camps or used them to hunt other superheroes.
    • Apocalypse also takes over the world 2,000 years in the future and is equally awful.
    • Bishop's future. It starts with one of the X-Men turning traitor and killing the others and gets worse from there. At some point, there was a nuclear war, and by the time Bishop's born mutants are thrown into camps. The camps eventually get destroyed, but this means a lot of mutants running around who really don't like humans, forcing some mutants to form their own police force. And then there are the marauding packs of vampire-monsters. And just to add insult to injury, no-one has a jetpack.
    • Few futures seen thus far can be considered GOOD. Cable's book sent him through what may be one timeline, or many timelines. Messiah Complex sent two clones of Madrox into two separate futures, one where humans had packed mutants into concentration camps (Bishop's time) and one where Homo superior had violently come to dominate the planet. Only the "What If: Age of Xavier" has ever produced an alternate reality that didn't completely suck.
  • Badass Family: Mutation is obviously genetic, so this tends to show up pretty often.
    • The Grey-Summers extended family is the ne plus ultra of this in superhero comics. Briefly put, that family includes two mutant paramilitary brothers Scott and Alex; their younger brother Gabriel the former space emperor, and their half-brother Adam who is an unwilling claimant to the throne; their Space Pirate father Christopher (whose second wife Hepzibah is an alien Cat Girl); Scott's demigod wife Jean, and her super-powered clone Madelyne; Scott and Madelyne's also-occasionally-godlike son Nathan, who came back from a Bad Future as an old man; Scott and Jean's also-frequently-godlike daughter Rachel who is from a different bad future, and their other occasionally godlike son Nate (from a bad Alternate Universe that isn't the future); also Ruby, who is Scott's daughter with Emma Frost from a different future; plus Nathan's evil super-powered son Tyler and evil super-powered clone Stryfe, and his messiah-like adopted daughter Hope. And they're all pretty badass.
    • The Guthries too, with the exception of Jay.
    • The Bohusk-Salvadores. Barnell and Angel stayed in the superhero game even after being depowered, and a Bad Future revealed their grandson would be the third generation of a heroic legacy.
    • Also Wolverine's Dysfunctional Badass Family. We have his long forgotten son Daken who wants to kill him, and then there's his teenage female clone/daughter figure X-23 who was a member of X-Force and has been killing people since she was a pre-teen.
    • Magneto, Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver and Polaris may be as dysfunctional as it gets, but they are all quite badass. Add in Scarlet Witch's twin sons Wiccan and Speed of the Young Avengers.
  • Badass Longcoat: Gambit primarily, though Rogue and others have been known to don the longcoat on occasion. Subverted by Jubilee, whose most iconic costume is a flashy bright yellow longcoat.
  • Bait-and-Switch:
    • During issue 100, the X-Men come under attack from... the X-Men? Eventually, Wolverine lunges at Jean Grey, we see Banshee's horrified reaction... and then we see the wires of the robotic Jean duplicate.
    • One issue ends with Bishop shooting everyone else on the team apropos of nothing. The next issue reveals they'd been infected with nanites that would've killed them in an instant had he not acted.
  • Barrier Warrior: The Blob and Unus the Untouchable are examples of these. Subverted in that they're both obnoxious Jerkasses who use their powers to bully others.
    • Cecilia Reyes is a pretty straightforward example.
    • Most telekinetic mutants tend to become this if the situation calls for it.
  • Bat Family Crossover: Very common. For a while, they were affectionately referred to by fans as "X-overs". At times, the X-Books have almost seemed like an entirely separate universe. Inferno and Onslaught averted this, however, as did Maximum Security. And Mutant Massacre (X-Men's first major crossover) featured Thor and the Power Pack in minor roles.
    • One of the major complaints of the franchise is that Marvel rarely acknowledges the oddity of mutants getting so much more flack than other superpowered beings.
      • This is occasionally partially addressed with the idea that mutants can be anyone, signified by the famous line 'It's 1987. Do you know what your children are?' and post Avengers vs. X-Men, this seems to be being addressed through the Uncanny Avengers.
    • Some of the more successful examples of this trope are Age of Apocalypse, Mutant Massacre and Fatal Attractions.
  • Betrayal Insurance: Professor Xavier has a set of plans on how to stop the X-Men, Xavier himself being the subject of the first entry; however, these have rarely been mentioned since they were introduced.
  • Betty and Veronica:
    • Cyclops choosing between Jean Grey (Betty) and Emma Frost (Veronica).
    • Jean Grey choosing between Cyclops (Betty) and Wolverine (Veronica)
    • And last but not least, Cyclops with Jean Grey (Betty) and Psylocke (Veronica).
  • Beware the Nice Ones: Storm, Nightcrawler, Cannonball, Colossus, Shadowcat, Beast, and most notably Jean Grey, are all pretty nice people, in spite of their lives being one big Trauma Conga Line. But don't push it...
    • Cyclops used to be this, but too many people pushed him too far too many times, and, well...
  • Beware the Superman: The prime source of Conflict Ball for mutants which are often fueled by the X-Men often fighting other malicious mutants or mutant-haters and causing massive collateral damage along the way. Even more so towards Omega-Level Mutants who are feared by even other mutants for being dangerous time-bombs especially since some could incinerate an entire city block at random once their powers activate and others include even X-Men who've gone crazy with power and nearly destroyed the planet.
  • Big Bad: The major evils of the X-Men universe are Magneto and Apocalypse. When Magneto goes through a Heel–Face Turn however, new big bads pop up. Bastion managed to seize the role between 2008 and 2010.
  • Big Good:
    • Xavier originally, but since being forced to take control, Cyclops has taken this role.
    • Following Avengers vs. X-Men and Cyclops being branded a criminal, his brother, Havok has with a bit of prodding tried to take up the role. Then Axis happened, and he became ineligible. After that, the role of Big Good bounced around between Wolverine, Storm and Shadowcat. This is apparently invoked in the latest arc with Nate Grey when he kidnaps what he believes to be the ultimate representatives of good and evil in the mutant race including a human representative to advise him in world domination. They include Shadowcat and Apocalypse respectively.
  • Bitter Wedding Speech: In an issue of X-Men Unlimited about the wedding of one of Emma's college friends.
  • Bizarre Alien Reproduction: The X-Men have fought The Brood, a race of intelligent Captain Ersatzes of the creature from Alien. A human implanted with a Brood egg will eventually be physically (and mentally) transformed into a Brood member, and will retain any genetic-based abilities (e.g. mutant powers) the victim had.
  • Black-and-Gray Morality: This gradually crept in ever since the late 80s Mutant Massacre, but got blatant with Darker and Edgier storylines after the mid-00s.
  • Blessed with Suck: Apparently, evolution isn't too good at telling when a mutation totally sucks.
    • There are several examples (Cyclops, Blob, Rogue; the list goes on and on) but the Gold Medal would have to go to Wither, who literally has the power to suck out life-force... which is uncontrollable, irreversible and activates at any and all skin-to-skin contact. Blessed with Suck figuratively and literally.
    • At least Rogue's damage is temporary if she's careful, whereas Wither tends to irreversibly cripple or horribly kill anyone he touches. After M-Day, he thinks he can finally hold the hand of the girl he's in love with... and promptly maims her. Poor kid.
    • Cyclops is—err, was a special case: His powers ought to be as controllable as any other energy blaster, but he suffered a concussion in his youth (his parents had pushed him out of a plane when they were attacked by the Shi'ar), which somehow lead to his inability to shut off his powers after they emerged. Emma Frost later removed a mental block to give him control of his powers, since he had apparently been subconsciously keeping his eyes on to ensure he'd never hurt anyone with his powers (her explanation). Since Status Quo Is God, no attempt to fix this ever stays fixed, and after Avengers Versus X-Men his control over his powers got worse.
    • Surge has a similar problem to Cyclops in that she needs special equipment (her gauntlets) to control and regulate the flow of electricity to and from her body. Without it, the electricity overloads her brain and prevents her from controlling it fully.
    • None of the above compares to the power of a random kid in Ultimate X-Men - when his mutant power (to release some kind of highly acidic toxin in the air that melted absolutely anything organic) triggered, he killed his whole hometown without even realizing it. Eventually he figured it out and hid in a cave. Wolverine was sent to track him down, and after a talk with him about how much life can suck sometimes (and a lot of beer, because come on, underage drinking was the least of the kid's problems), he had to kill him because that power was completely uncontrollable and very taxing even on his healing factor, so imagine how it'd have been for, say, anybody else on the planet. He'd either have committed a hideous massacre or been weaponized, had he been left alive. To the kid's credit, he himself concluded that was the best solution for everyone, himself included.
  • Blood Countess: Selene is basically a vampire in all but name (she has psychic powers, is immortal) and also has life-draining powers to stay perpetually beautiful. She was born in Transylvania, and practices blood-magic to become a goddess. She is obsessed with young girls, has a cabal of underlings, and also wears a corset outfit, reminiscent of 19th century and former aristocratic fashion. She is also a member of the Hellfire Club, a prestigious community raising her to the upper echelons of society.
  • Blown Across the Room: Cyclops' eye beams knock bad guys back, but not Cyclops himself. It's one of the ways he's immune to his own power.
  • Body Horror: Very common during Claremont's run.
  • Bouncing Battler: Several characters, most notably the Toad and Bouncing Betty.
  • Brainwashed and Crazy:
    • Practically every member of the X-Men has fallen victim to this trope at least once. (See Author Appeal.)
    • Poor Polaris spent a good chunk of Claremont's run possessed or controlled by someone.
    • Mesmero's stock in trade. In one instance, he managed to get the entire team. They were only saved via Beast (who was with the Avengers at that time) learning about what happened and investigating.
  • Brainwashing for the Greater Good: Claremont's last storyline had Magneto learn Moira had experimented on him when he'd been de-aged, in a way meant to dial down his aggression. And then Moira reveals the brainwashing wore off the minute he used his powers again (making it a jab at those wanting Magneto to revert back to villainy by handwaving his turn to good. Nope, all of Magneto's free-will).
  • Broken Aesop: Many.
    • Despite trying to lecture the world about how great mutants were and how they should be allowed to embrace their identities, Xavier spent most of his life masquerading as a normal human who just happened to be a mutant expert. Xavier only involuntarily 'outed' himself during Grant Morrison's New X-Men run when he was possessed by his evil twin.
    • James McAvoy said he actually kept this in mind while portraying Xavier in X-Men: First Class. He pointed out that Xavier is a well-meaning, but ultimately misguided liberal, as he still has tons of societal advantages given that he's white, heterosexual, male, and extremely wealthy. He certainly doesn't have to put up with the same bigotry many mutants face (hell, the same bigotry many real world minorities still face), which causes his message of peace to ring if not false, at least simplistic to many.
      • Also, compare Xavier's powerset to those of characters like Rogue, Toad, or Cyclops. Xavier has telepathy, a power that he can control perfectly, that has absolutely no negative effects on him physically or mentally, and that is a massive benefit to his life. In comparison? Rogue's powers render unconscious anyone she has physical contact with. She cannot control this or stop it in any way, and has resigned herself to being isolated from her peers. Her powers have drastically injured her self-esteem and social life. Toad's mutation turned him into an ugly, lizardlike humanoid and made him the subject of severe bullying from other children. Cyclops projects a continuous wave of destructive energy from his eyes and relies on special glasses just to live a normal life. Even Phoenix, another telepath, is often overwhelmed by the thoughts of others, to the point of mental instability. Looking at the general trend of mutant powers, it's hard not to think that Xavier really lucked out where the Superpower Lottery was concerned.
    • In general, the X-Men books have a theme of how regular humans and mutants should coexist peacefully. The problem with this? Exactly how often did they try to have regular humans around them? How many regular humans were at the institute? How often did the X-Men go to Washington to try to convince legislators to accept mutants? The aesop seems more 'mutants should band together into militant groups to protect themselves', in other words Magneto's message. To make it even worse, the first comic featuring the X-Men had them casually push around regular human soldiers with their powers because the soldiers didn't want to let them enter a military base.
    • There's also a dissonance where the fear of mutants is portrayed as prejudice and fear of what's different, but there have been times when mutants - even fully-trained adults — have lost control of their powers without meaning to and caused a lot of damage. In the '90s X-Men cartoon, Storm was claustrophobic, causing her to freak out with her powers whenever she was triggered. Mutants are a danger to the normal humans around them no matter how good their intentions are and that is a perfectly valid reason for fear.
    • Marvel got a ruling saying mutants weren't people for purposes of taxes and tariffs on merchandise. See here.
    • Also, after decades of using mutants as a metaphor for an oppressed minority that we should love and respect, Joe Quesada mandates the Decimation event, in which a vast majority of the Marvel universe's mutants are depowered and there are in the low three digits of mutants left.
    • Since their move to Utopia, the X-Men have been almost exclusively devoted to the survival of the dwindling numbers of their race, up to and including fighting the Avengers over a potential threat that might possibly re-ignite the X-gene worldwide. Even those who ended up siding with the Avengers to stop the Phoenix Five seem to have long forgotten that Xavier's dream was to have peaceful co-existence with humans, not complete segregation for the sake of safety (admittedly, this last one is done out of absolute necessity, but even Wolverine points out how far away from Xavier's vision the X-Men have moved).
    • House of X asserts that coexistence with humanity is impossible and that mutants are better off embracing the Super Supremacist mindset the books have always spoke out against. Krakoa, the new mutant nation, not only offers resurrection to dead mutants but also miracle drugs that mutants can monopolize to effectively coerce the world's governments into giving them whatever they want. This the means that Marvel's allegories for oppressed minorities are now immortal beings who believe equality is a lie, preach genetic supremacy and have taken control of the worldwide economy.
    • The X-Men was originally supposed to be a statement about general tolerance, peaceful coexistence, and opposing all forms of supremacism. Admittedly, the essential concept of an inherently "superior" race of superhumans being oppressed by the "inferior" normal humans sounds rather far-right supremacist in itself, but nevertheless, the original idea seems to have been a well-intended if clumsy allegory. However, as of the Krakoa storyline, genocidal sadistic supremacist psychopaths like Apocalypse, Mystique, Mr. Sinister, and Exodus are among the main decision-makers in the council of the community, as is Emma Frost, who has a long history of torture and mind-rape, and none of them have been taken to task for their past transgressions.
  • Brought Down to Normal: The Decimation event mentioned above did this to nearly the entire mutant population. There were only roughly 300 mutants left with powers after everything was said and done and it stay that way for over a decade.
  • Brought Down to Badass:
    • In Astonishing X-Men, Emma's mind rape of him turns off Cyclops' powers, causing him to take a gun and start shooting mental images, to make a point.
    • This also happens to both Rogue and Gambit for the second half of X-treme X-Men. An incident involving getting hooked up to a portal streaming in countless alien warships, and subsequently getting stabbed through the chest to bring the portal to a halt, resulted in the two of them losing their powers; for Rogue, she still had them for another issue, but lost them after that. Rogue and Gambit then go away for ten issues or so, trying to settle down for a bit and have a life together now that they can, you know, do it. Eventually though, they rejoin the team, but still without their powers. Does this make them any less effective in the field? The answer to that, is: Hell no. Rogue stops a bomber from blowing up over 70 people by taking the bomb off in the freaking air, and manages to kick a few mutant's asses with just some good old fashioned brawling, while Gambit is able to take down a mind-controlled Bishop, who has access to a bunch of fancy future-tech. Gambit, however, manages to use some of that tech against Bishop. In the end, the two of them both prove that they don't need their powers at all; in fact, not having their powers only makes them seem more Badass.
  • Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie: Destiny gives Mystique a precise request on where and when to scatter her ashes because she knows the future. As it turns out, Destiny has quite the sense of humor. When Mystique goes to honor Destiny's request, the wind changes direction, and throws the ashes right into Mystique's face; she gets the joke and doubles over laughing.
  • But Not Too Foreign: Storm has an African mother, and grew up in Egypt, but her father was an American, and she was born in New York (they moved to Cairo when she was an infant).
  • Butt-Monkey: Ord started out as the Big Bad of the Breakworld arc, only to get demoted to The Woobie after his failure.
  • Cannot Tell a Joke: Colossus by his own admission in Astonishing X-Men #19, after being told of a prophecy that he is destined to destroy the Breakworld:
    Colossus: I have been planning on destroying the Breakworld ever since I was a child.
    [the X-Men look at him in shock]
    Colossus: This is why I don't make so many jokes. I never know when is good.
  • Canon Immigrant: The Mutant Response Division, a government organization devoted to imprisoning mutants, started off in Wolverine and the X-Men (2009), making the transition in 2010 due to Bastion's evil scheme.
  • Captain Ethnic: They tend to be well written and popular characters, but many mutants skirt the line. Sunfire is the only one who fits both in powers and heroic identity and also manages to be Captain Geographic.
  • Cerebro Electro:
    • Recurring antagonist (and sometimes ally) Magneto is the Master of Magnetism with near-complete control of the entire electromagnetic spectrum. In addition to his vast command over all things magnetic, he is a brilliant geneticist, physicist, engineer and tactician who is an intellectual equal to Charles Xavier, the leader of the X-Men.
    • While not as powerful or smart as her father, Polaris also possesses control over electromagnetism and is an expert in geophysics.
  • Cheated Angle: Artists' notes on how to draw Nightcrawler say that they must draw his tail with a curve in it (when character is drawn from the front, with legs apart) so the tail wouldn't look phallic.
  • Chekhov M.I.A.: Professor X went missing at the end of House of M, and couldn't be found despite the X-Men's searching. He finally reappears during Deadly Genesis, when it turns out he's been depowered (and apparently was in Scotland the whole time).
  • Chrome Dome Psi: Professor X
  • Chuck Cunningham Syndrome:
    • Remember Peter Corbeau? Long-time friend of Charles Xavier? No? Neither do the writers.
    • Nurse Annie and her son were shoved onto a bus after Chuck Austen's run, and never heard from again. Not that anyone was necessarily complaining in this case.
    • Neel Shaara and Cecilia Reyes just vanish after House of M. In the case of the later, she has a brother show up looking for her, but none of the X-Men seem to particularly give a damn.
  • Clash of Evolutionary Levels: The X-Men, and mutants in general, embody all three modes of this trope. While the X-Men strive for peaceful co-existence, they tend to hide themselves from normal humans, and there are mutant extremists who want to subjugate or destroy normal humans. And of course, the X-Men seem to bear the brunt of attacks against mutants by normal humans.
    • Specifically, the Brotherhood (sometimes exemplified by Magneto) is all about subjugating or destroying humans, while the Morlocks decided to just hide out in New York's sewers and ignore the conflict.
  • Claustrophobia: Storm, on account of a plane falling on her parents' house during her childhood, and having to spend several days next to her mother's corpse.
  • Clip Its Wings: Angel has large wings: during the Mutant Massacre storyline, his wings are mutilated and later develop gangrene so they're amputated. For a while, he uses artificial wings; later, real wings grow back.
  • Cloning Blues: Jean Grey and Madelyne Pryor. Cable and Stryfe. Magneto and Joseph. Wolverine and X-23. Apocalypse and Genesis. Literally everyone in X-Men (2019).
  • Clothes Make the Legend: Averted for most characters, with all the costume changes. Magneto is one of the few who's kept the same general costume. Wolverine, possibly due to Wolverine Publicity, is probably the character whose costume has changed the least. He wears black leather like everyone else in the movies and the Ultimates line, and in the main continuity his costume has gone through a slight color shift and ragged phases, but that's nothing compared to the variations every long-running main team member goes through. He did have a brown and orange costume for a while, though, but returned to his old colors soon enough.
  • Comic-Book Fantasy Casting: Many times over the years. John Byrne in particular based all his characters on actors - a full list can be found on that page. For example, Byrne based Kitty Pryde on his conception of an adolescent Sigourney Weaver. During his run on Excalibur, Alan Davis based his version of Kitty Pryde on a young Katharine Hepburn.
  • Comic-Book Time: Heavily in effect. A good number of characters have origins connected to actual historical events. Just for example, remember how Professor X was a Korean War vet whose parents were involved in the Manhattan Project? Admittedly, his mind getting transferred into a clone back in the 80s helps with some of that.
  • Conservation of Ninjutsu: The original Nimrod was a veritable juggernaut, capable of taking on the X-Men and matching them. In Second Coming, an army of Nimrods are sent to kill the X-Men, with much less luck. Justified, given the expansion of them X-Men's numbers in the years between, at that point including people like Magneto and Legion.
  • Continuity Snarl: Everything from the pasts of many characters to the origin of mutants.
  • Convenient Terminal Illness: A flashback explaining how Professor X could come back from the dead uses this: a terminally ill mutant scallywag calling himself the Changeling offered to pose as Xavier so the Prof could prepare for an imminent invasion.
  • Corrupted Contingency: The Xavier Protocols are a set of plans designed by Xavier to take out the most powerful mutants in the event they become a threat to the world. X-Men Volume 2, #84 has Cerebro gaining sentience and carrying out its purpose of scanning for and cataloguing mutants in a harmful manner. When the X-Men try to stop it, Cerebro intends to use the Xavier Protocols against them.
  • Crapsack World: The Marvel Universe verges on this for mutants. Let's face it, if a mutant exists somewhere, a lynch mob can't be far behind.
  • Curb-Stomp Battle:
    • The first time the New X-Men faced Magneto, freshly rejuvenated and restored to sanity, he beat them without breaking a sweat.
    • During the climax to Second Coming, the revived Graydon Creed and Steven Lang are turned into Sentinels and sent to kill the X-Men when Bastion fights Hope Summers. Given the X-Men have just gone through a battle with dozens of Nimrods, Creed and Lang don't have a chance. Their defeat isn't given any real attention, being the subject of one panel.
  • Cute Monster: Lockheed the dragon. Most of the time. He's a purple dragon, but the size of a dog or even just a housecat. He's treated as a pet by Kitty Pryde, and he's fine with that.
  • Danger Room Cold Open: Trope Namer.
  • Dark Lord: Apocalypse does this in Cable's future and during the Age of Apocalypse.
  • Dead Alternate Counterpart: There's an alternate universe in which hundreds of alternates of the X-Men the readers know have been killed for an arguably greater good.
  • Deadly Training Area: The Danger Room, which is probably the Trope Maker and definitely the Trope Codifier, at least for the superhero genre.
  • Death Is Cheap: Comic books, folks. By the 90s, the X-Men had gotten pretty wise to the fact that almost no-one, good or bad, stays dead for long, prompting the remark "there are no pearly gates in Mutant heaven, only revolving doors." And that might be an understatement...
  • Dehumanization: During the climatic confrontation in the graphic novel God Loves, Man Kills, Rev. Stryker points to Nightcrawler and exclaims:
    Stryker: Human?! You dare call that... thing—HUMAN?!?
  • Defacement Insult: "Mutie", the go-to slur for mutants, is a common thing to get graffitied when mutants' property is vandalized.
  • Defends Against Their Own Kind
  • Demonic Possession:
    • The Shadow King is a recurring X-Men villain with the psychic powers, who does not have a physical form. To compensate, he possesses the bodies of others.
    • Proteus has to possess people, as his Reality Warper powers burned out his original body, and does to those he possesses.
  • Demoted to Extra: Cyclops in The Movie. Kitty Pryde gets this in most adaptations, despite spending years as one of the central characters of the series.
  • Depending on the Writer:
    • Many of the characters, since there are a lot of them and have been a lot of writers.
    • You'll also notice a subtle difference in the way sympathetic characters use the word "human" as a blanket term for both mutants and ordinary humans, but occasionally use it to mean just ordinary humans when it's clear from context they're not implying a value judgment. Under some writers, though, they'll avoid the second usage or use the word "human" exclusively for non-mutants (e.g. specifying "humans and mutants" when talking to aliens). For a long time, this didn't vary from character to character, except for villains: the anti-mutant racists inhuman freaks unworthy of being part of humanity while evil mutants are emphasizing the supremacy of homo-sapiens-superior over mere Muggles. However with the recent Decimation and Endangered Species events, everyone is referring to mutants as a separate species from humans without regard to the good/bad implications.
  • Derivative Differentiation: The early Lee-Kirby issues of X-Men were very obviously a spin on Fantastic Four: the character and team dynamics are very similar, as is the shared origin and the use of uniforms, and Magneto comes across as very Doctor Doom-esque. Post Giant-Size, though, the team became very much its own thing.
  • Diabolus ex Nihilo: Though their mission statement is to fight against human racists and mutant terrorists, at least a third of Chris Claremont's run had them fighting against random evil aliens and demons.
    • Peter Milligan's Golgotha seems like a literal interpretation of the video game version of this trope, being a giant space flea... and it was literally from nowhere. Especially when you realize you expected the hangar without seeing anything suspicious... and a few moments later you come back and see there's a ginormous squicky creature on top of the Blackbird.
  • Differently Powered Individual: Mutants are classified as Omega (potentially limitless power), Alpha (can turn their powers on or off), Beta (always on) and other lower-tier classes. Besides mutants, there are the Mutates, the Neo, the Children of the Vault, and plenty of other named "subspecies" of superpowered folk that are just like mutants, except—not.
  • Disproportionate Retribution: In order to get to Muir Island from Scotland, the X-Men purchase a boat, which in short order gets totalled by Magneto. What does the boat's owner do in response? Sneaks over to Moira's facility and tries to blow it up. He even says that if anyone's killed then 'so much the better'. Laser-Guided Karma comes in the form of Proteus, who takes over the man before he can do anything.
    • Before he mellowed out, this used to be Wolverine's thing. Someone would do something and he would respond with violence or threats. For example, Colossus sees a steel beam falling towards Wolverine (this was back in the days before Wolverine had an established healing factor) and pushes him out of the way. Wolverine's response? He tries to kill Colossus for "cramping (his) style".
  • Dolled-Up Installment:
    • The Civil War: X-Men mini-series has nothing to do with the events of Civil War. It's more of a sequel to the 198 mini-series.
    • The mini-series X-Men: Die by the Sword has little to do with the X-Men. It's actually an Exiles and New Excalibur crossover, also serving as a Fully Absorbed Finale to the later.
  • Do Unto Others Before They Do Unto Us:
    • One of the key differences between Magneto's and Xavier's viewpoints - Magneto believes this, Xavier doesn't.
    • There's more than one human villain who believes mutants want to wipe out all mankind, so the obvious solution is to kill them all first.
  • Does This Remind You of Anything?:
    • "Mutant = black" was a major theme in The '70s and The '80s, now more-or-less abandoned for "mutant = gay".
    • Which brings us to Have You Tried Not Being a Monster?. X-Men is one of the Trope Namers. Mutant = being gay but with superpowers of varying usefulness/appeal, and no marriage controversy, but giant robots want to kill you. Unless you're a gay mutant. Poor, poor Northstar, who is both of those things, and French-Canadian on top. It's a lot more obvious in The Movie. It helps that the director, Bryan Singer, and the star, Ian McKellen, are both openly gay.
    • Additionally: In the book Who Needs a Superhero?, H. Michael Brewer uses the X-Men (and mutants in general) as an illustration of how Christians are to be "in the world, but not of the world." He discusses the four basic ways mutants deal with being hated by humans (peacefully coexisting [Xavier], attacking back [Magneto], compromising to fit in (Nightcrawler's holographic disguise), or withdrawing entirely [the Morlocks]) and how each fails to capture the entirety of the Christian's duties. (Better solution, says Brewer: a cross-over.)
  • Dominatrix: X-Men writers LOVE this trope. Emma Frost is the most obvious example. But then there was also Jean Grey as the Black Queen in The Dark Phoenix Saga. More recently, Red Queen◊ took it up to eleven in the "Manifest Destiny" arc.
  • Doppelmerger: In X-Men: The End, it is revealed that Madelyene Pryor isn't just a clone of Jean Grey, but also the aspect of Jean that truly loved Scott, and her no longer being part of Jean is why her and Scott's marriage failed. Madelyene transforms into energy and fuses with Jean, resurrecting her yet again.
  • Dressed Like a Dominatrix:
    • The Hellfire Club's Black Queens and White Queens wear outfits like this. Emma Frost, even after leaving the Hellfire Club, continues wearing variations of her White Queen outfit, transforming it into her own identity. She's of course an Anti-Hero.
    • When Madelyne Pryor became the evil Goblin Queen, she wore a skimpy cropped black leather shirt, a leather loincloth, and thigh-high boots. In a rare male version of this trope, the same happens to her partner Havok who becomes Goblin King, complete with thigh-high boots.
    • Some versions of Madame Hydra's costume feature a skintight green sleeveless catsuit, opera gloves, and high heels. She's often portrayed wielding a whip.
    • Illyana Rasputin/Magik also tends to wear the all black leather bondage gear.
  • Dropped a Bridge on Him: Sentinel Squad O*N*E were introduced during Decimation, treated as major recurring characters, even given their own miniseries, and then during Messiah CompleX they're all killed to a man by nanosentinels.
  • Early-Installment Weirdness: The original series can serve as this when comparing its teenage heroes, uniforms, mundane crime-fighter missions, and Beast's human form to modern comics' grown-up cast, colorful costumes, phenomenal cosmic adventures, and the furry blue Beast.
    • The first two issues alone can serve as this even compared to the other more adjacent issues, with Beast being a lot more Hot-Blooded and not nearly as intellectual, and the first page making it look like Xavier is completely paralyzed, instead of just crippled.
    • Some of the earliest issues even had Magneto having some sort of mental powers, not too dissimilar from Xavier's telepathy. This was dropped later, but it can be quite jarring to anyone used to Mags usual powerset of magnetic mastery.
  • Elemental Baggage: For Storm and Iceman's powers sources of water and ice, respectively.
  • Elemental Shapeshifter: Several.
    • Magma can transform into magma and rocks.
    • Dust can turn herself into a sandstorm.
    • Rockslide and Onyxx are big guys made of rocks.
  • End of an Age: The Dream's End storyline, which ran through several titles and massively shook up the status quo, including the deaths of several supporting characters. Decimation also served as this; mutants were a thriving minority numbering in the millions, and even making great strides at integrating into human society. Then House of M happened, and in its aftermath all but 200 mutants were stripped of their powers.
  • Evil Costume Switch: Dark Phoenix, going from a mainly green outfit to dark red (and the phoenix symbol on her chest getting larger).
  • Evolutionary Retcon: The X-Men costumes have undergone numerous changes when retelling stories set in the early years of the yellow and black outfits. The film, X-Men: First Class, for example, retcons those costumes as military flight suits and the yellow is somewhat understated.
  • Exact Words: Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters.

    Tropes - F to O 
  • Face–Heel Revolving Door: Magneto. In his backstory he was a friend of Xavier until they split over disagreement about how to best help mutants and almost all versions of Magneto are Well Intentioned Extremists, so it's a relatively small jump to a What Have I Done moment leading him to moderate his methods or an Enemy Mine situation forcing the X-Men to put up with him despite them. Circumstances don't let him stay that way, however. Depending on the Writer comes into play, as well, both in how far off the deep end he can go and whether he should be antihero or arch nemesis.
  • Face–Heel Turn: Gambit, Bishop. Gambit, especially has turned this into a revolving door.
  • Family Extermination: One story-arc had a group of Shi'ar decide to wipe out the entire Grey family due to the association between Jean Grey and the Phoenix Force. Jean was dead at the time, so the only two survivors were Rachel and Nate (who, admittedly, was dead at the time this happened anyway).
  • Fanservice Model: In an early arc the team has to go undercover in New York, and Jean Grey gets a job modelling swimsuits.
  • Fantastic Racism: Probably THE most iconic example of this trope in fiction. The X-Men protect a world that fears and hates them.
  • Fantastic Recruitment Drive: Professor X uses the Cerebro computer to locate mutants so he can recruit them into his school.
  • Fantastic Slurs:
    • "Mutie", "Genejoke" and "Genefreak" are a few of the more common anti-mutant slurs.
    • Meanwhile, the Mutants have "Flatscan" for humans.
  • Fastball Special: The Trope Namer, classic is Wolverine and Colossus.
  • Fight Off the Kryptonite: Usually, with telepathy.
    • Which is about the only thing keeping that particular power out of Deus ex Machina territory in this universe...
  • Fights Like a Normal: Several have powers which are either not directly applicable to combat or are too dangerous to fling about willy-nilly, and rely primarily on combat training instead.
  • Fire-Forged Friends: Wolverine and Rogue are particularly notable.
    • Given enough time, every team develops this. It's the main reason the "All-New, All-Different" crowd is as tight as it is.
  • Fire/Ice Duo: This is part of what solidifies Cyclops' two love interests, Jean Grey and Emma Frost, as diametric opposites of one another.
    • Jean is a red-haired woman who has gone by the codename "Phoenix" for a good bit of her career, wears a flaming bird insignia as part of her costume, and has psychic powers that frequently manifest themselves as flames. Appropriately, she's known for her warm, compassionate personality and (on darker occasions) for her unpredictable fiery temper.
    • Though she doesn't actually have ice-based powers, Emma is frequently visually associated with ice and the cold because of her surname "Frost", her all-white clothing, and her diamond-based form that makes her resemble an ice sculpture. Appropriately, she's known for her icy demeanor, and her coldly cynical attitude towards life.
  • Flight of Romance: This trope is taken to a extreme when Angel has sex with Husk in mid air in front of her mother, Nightcrawler, and several other people.
  • Flying Firepower:
    • Sunfire: Sun-related array of powers, and flight.
    • Sunpyre: Sunfire's younger sister possesses the same powerset.
    • Alternate, female version of Sunfire from Exiles
    • Sunspot from New Mutants, often described as a "living solar battery." He turns solar energy into Flying Brick powers with energy blasts.
    • Jean Grey with the power of The Phoenix Force.
  • Follow the Chaos: Sort of a running gag, except they don't find it funny.
  • Forced to Watch: Professor X, being forced by Mojo to watch his students compete in his twisted gameshow.
  • Foreshadowing: During Whedon's "Astonishing" arc, Agent Brand mentions that Breakworld had a bullet pointed at Earth's head. Except for the "head" part, this turns out to be literally true.
  • Forgotten Fallen Friend: It happens.
    • Nobody tends to think about Changeling, who gave his life imitating Professor X to save mankind.
    • Deadly Genesis reveals between the original team and the All-New team, there was a squad of four sent to Krakoa, two - Petra, a geokinetic, and Sway, who could manipulate time - died. Despite this, they almost never get brought up after the miniseries is over (slightly justified by the fact that only Professor X knew about them, and their other squadmate Vulcan in an Ax-Crazy maniac, so he's not about to shed any tears for them).
    • While "friend" is pushing it, after Decimation the X-Men had Sentinel Squad O*N*E hanging around, until Messiah Complex where all the pilots are killed and turned into nano-Sentinels. Afterward, no-one, not even their boss, spares the poor bastards a second or even first thought.
  • Friendly Tickle Torture: Nightcrawler has done this to, on various occasions, Rogue, Phoenix (Rachel), and Meggan (of Excalibur). Between his teleporting ability and his prehensile tail, he's apparently quite good at it. Of them, Rogue didn't find it all too friendly — although Nightcrawler was intending to get her to laugh, it pointed out to Rogue in sharp relief the one thing she desperately wanted to do but couldn't — touch another human being.
  • From a Single Cell: Wolverine, on one occasion, which the writers have since thankfully Voodoo Sharked out.
  • Fusion Dissonance: Bastion was originally two separate characters: Master Mold and Nimrod. The former being the leader of the Sentinel robots and the latter being an advanced Sentinel from the Bad Future of Days of Future Past's Alternate Timeline. The two of them were pushed into a mystic gate called the Siege Perilous at the exact same time and eventually reappeared as a normal-looking (albeit superpowered human) man who retained both machines' hatred for mutants.
  • Gang of Hats: The Hellfire Club (the mutant mafia, essentially) all dress themselves as 18th Century British aristocrats and take on the titles of chess pieces.
  • Generation Xerox: Wolverine and X-23, Emma Frost and the remaining Stepford Cuckoos. Subverted with Cyclops and Surge in that they're not related in anyway. Other than that however, Surge is effectively a younger Cyclops, complete with crippling self doubt and a power that needs to be kept in check by an external device (in this case, her gauntlets). Her relationship with X-23 is also starting to mirror that between Scott and Logan, right down to the love triangle.
  • Genre Blindness: Parallels between anti-mutant bigotry and historical racism (especially that of Hitler and the Nazis) are repeatedly emphasized, especially by Magneto. Despite that mutants, including even the X-Men themselves, have become increasingly prone to emphasize how they are a separate "species" from the rest of humanity, in many ways validating the position of their ideological opponents. This was lampshaded in an argument between Scott Summers and Jamie Madrox. The latter, who favors living in New York City and running his team, X-Factor, as a private detective agency argued that the real problem was that normal humans could not tell the difference between good mutants and evil mutants. Scott insisted that was ridiculous, and at that exact moment Magneto, Emma Frost and Namor appeared to welcome Jamie to their "Brotherhood" (a reference to Magneto's old Brotherhood of Evil Mutants). Layla Miller, who was following them while they argued, promptly doubled over in laughter to Scott's chagrin.
  • Getting Crap Past the Radar: There's a lot of naked Storm in the 70s. The Code was on its second revision, which did not allow any form of nudity.
  • Giant Mecha: The Sentinels, the giant robots which are programmed by mutant-hating humans to hunt down mutants
  • Girlfriend in Canada: In the first Heroic Age one-shot, Beast gets stood up on a date. When he mentions this to Molly Hayes of the Runaways, she makes a joke about imaginary Canadian girlfriends, but Beast is quick to correct that his girlfriend is actually from space, which doesn't help his credibility in Molly's eyes. (She's real.)
  • Glamour: Gambit's charm is officially part of his power. Gambit had this power in his first appearance and even had it listed as a power in TSR role-playing modules.
  • Gondor Calls for Aid: During the Juggernaut's first appearance, Professor X called in the Human Torch for help.
  • Good is Not Nice: Wolverine is the most notable example, thought Cyclops has recently faded into this area due to the dark age forcing him to take command and become Nick Fury with eye beams. Since the switch to the Heroic Age, he's reverted to a more well rounded, no-nonsense leader type and Big Good.
  • Grade-School C.E.O.: The villains of Schism are a quartet of obscenely rich kids around 12 years old, the leader of whom takes over for his late father as CEO of the company that manufactures Sentinels.
  • Gratuitous Foreign Language: A hallmark of the writing since Claremont's days, when the team went international: almost every character from a non-English-speaking country will sprinkle their speech with words in their native language.
  • Greater Need Than Mine: When Rogue first joined the team, and was mortally injured, Wolverine forced her to absorb his powers, despite his own injuries, and the fact that 25 pages/half a day earlier, Wolverine literally wanted to kill her himself. Her noble sacrifice on behalf of Wolvie, and more important Wolvie's fiancee, Mariko Yashida, convinced him that she was worthy of mercy.
  • Greater-Scope Villain: Sublime, a sentient colony of bacteria almost as old as the Earth itself, definitely qualifies. In "Here Comes Tomorrow", it was revealed to have orchestrated many events in the X-Men's past, including the creation of the Weapon X program, all in a centuries-old campaign to wipe the mutant race from the Earth (as they are the only species immune to its mind control). It's implied that it may have even manipulated humanity to create the very idea of anti-mutant prejudice in the first place.
    • The Celestials also qualify. The very-abridged-and-not-entirely-accurate version is essentially that Sublime invented anti-mutant prejudice and the Celestials invented mutant supremacism.
    • Apocalypse of course qualifies as well. A lot of stories set him up as this.
    • Weapon X too.
    • In the past, Magneto was this for a few stories as well.
    • Grant Morrison's New X-Men revealed not only that Weapon X is in fact controlled by an organization of greater scope villains called Weapon Plus¸, a secret governmental organization hellbent on eradicating mutants, who is responsible (directly or indirectly) for a LOT of the crappy stuff that Wolverine went through in his life, but also that they are (directly or indirectly) responsible for the existence of many heroes and villains of the Marvel Universe, not just Wolverine himself. They created Project: Rebirth, which makes them indirectly responsible for the creation of Captain America and Isaiah Bradley (or to be more specific, the super soldier serum, AKA Weapon I). They also created Weapon II(a weird squirrel with Wolverine's powers), The Skinless Man (Weapon III), Nuke (One of Daredevil's villains and Weapon VII), X-23, Deadpool, Huntsman (Weapon XII), Fantomex (Weapon XIII), The Stepford Cuckoos (Clones of Emma Frost and Weapon XIV), Ultimaton (Weapon XV), Allgod (Weapon XVI) and according to Word of God, they are also responsible for creating or empowering many more unknown characters, both heroes and villains. They are also responsible for creating Project: Gladiator, which makes them indirectly responsible for creating Man-Thing. In some comics, it's also implied that they might have been involved with the prison experiments that gave Luke Cage his powers, the program that created the Sentinels and the Red Room Black Widow Ops organization that created the multiple Black Widows (like Natasha Romanoff and Yelena Belova). The organization has also been known to work with and provide money and resources to other villainous organizations (especially those that hate the X-men) like A.I.M., HYDRA, The Hellfire Club, ROXXON, The Purifiers, OSCORP, ect...Later on, it's revealed that Weapon Plus was created and controlled by an even GREATER greater scope villain known as Romulus. He claims to be responsible for EVERYTHING that happened in Logan's life and more, with plenty of evidence to back up said claim (Such as immense intimate knowledge of Wolverine's life, for example). The aforementioned John Sublime was pulling strings in the program as well, and to make things even more confusing, Word of God from the writer of the very first Weapon X story indicated that the original greater scope villain was going to be the aforementioned Apocalypse, but this never saw print for unknown reasons.
  • Grey-and-Gray Morality: Except for the occasional Omnicidal Maniac, this runs very strong as far as mainstream superhero titles go. It's rare to find a guide list that even tries to separate the non-X-wearing cast into allies and villains, and quite a few stories end with the villain talking the X-Men down.
  • Guile Hero: Xavier loves sneaking around and setting up long-term schemes, going back to the first time he faked his death in the Silver Age.
  • Hair Memento: In the "Sisterhood" arc (Uncanny X-Men #508-511), Madelyne Pryor and her female-only Sisterhood attack the X-Men in San Francisco so she could find a lock of Jean Grey's hair that Wolverine kept for himself as a memento (during this period, Jean Grey was dead since New X-Men #150 (2004)).
  • Hand Blast: A common manifestation of mutant powers. For example, Havoc fires concussive beams from his hands.
    • The Sentinels typically fire Hand Blasts in their mutant-hunting endeavors.
  • Hate Plague: The Muir Island Saga has the Shadow King spreading one across the planet, via a possessed Polaris.
  • Have You Tried Not Being a Monster?: See Does This Remind You of Anything?.
    • There was a beautiful use of this during Joss Whedon's Astonishing run. When a "cure for the X-gene" is found, Beast wants to investigate it and see if it works, and Emma Frost explicitly asks him if he'd feel the same if it were a "cure" for homosexuality. Emma is a beautiful, rich white woman whose powers are telepathy and turning into nigh-invulnerable diamond. Beast is a random guy from Illinois who was turned into an agile catperson who is blue, and has had more and more trouble controlling his instincts. The implication is that it's easy for Emma to say she doesn't need to be "cured", but not so much for Beast.
  • Heel–Face Turn:
    • Gambit, Magneto during his "headmaster" phase, Emma Frost, Juggernaut, Rogue.
    • The Sentinels: after Decimation, they were a human-piloted peacekeeping force to protect the remaining mutants. Well, in theory at any rate. They turned on the X-Men soon enough.
  • Heel–Face Revolving Door: Everyone, but special mention goes to Mystique. To be a bit more specific; Mystique joined the X-Men and left, Sabretooth joined the X-Men and left, Juggernaut joined the X-Men and left, Lady Mastermind joined the X-Men and left, Magneto joined the X-Men, left, and joined again, Sebastian Shaw joined Hope's Lights and left... Really, about the only three Heel Face Turns to have stuck are Rogue, Tessa/Sage, (who turned out to be Good All Along) and Emma Frost (except Emma Frost). Every other villain that's joined eventually just stabs the group in the back. (Either that, or they just up and leave.) Given that, as of X-Men (2019) perennial X-foes Apocalypse, Emplate, Exodus, the Gorgon, Greycrow, Magneto (still), Mister Sinister, Mystique (again), Selene, and Toad are all currently (at least nominally) on the side of the angels…
  • Heroes Gone Fishing: Mutant baseball.
  • Hero Killer: Nimrod, the Ultimate Sentinel from the Days of Future Past who can adapt on the fly to any mutant power and rebuild himself from total destruction and requires at least half a team of X-Men to put down. Despite this, he's never actually killed any X-Men.
  • Heroes Want Redheads: It's gotten less frequent since Joe Quesada became editor-in-chief, though.
  • Hidden Depths: Back during the 70s, Wolverine was the Token Evil Teammate, so the X-Men were surprised whenever he showed any depth beyond "murderous rage", like when he revealed he could speak and read Japanese (for the record, Logan angrily retorted that no-one bothered asking him about that).
  • Holding In Laughter: X-Men #30, which saw the marriage of Scott and Jean, at the end of the issue, Xavier finds an envelope amongst his papers, addressed to him. It's from Logan, making Xavier one of only three people Logan had left letters for after he left the X-Mansion (the other two being Jubilee and Jean). Xavier's is the shortest of all the letters that Logan left,and it's direct and to the point. "Dear Chuck, Lighten up. Your old pal, Logan." Xavier frowns and gives a "humph". Then a "heh heh". The issue closes out with Xavier laughing loudly and longley at the sentiment.
  • Holy Water: During an encounter with an army of vampires, Cyclops arranges for a priest to bless Iceman, reasoning that any ice constructs he manufactures would then be made of frozen holy water.
  • Homosexual Reproduction: One proposed origin of Nightcrawler, as Destiny and a temporarily male-morphed Mystique's son. Though canon now states that Nightcrawler is the son of Mystique and Azazel. OTOH, canon as laid down by Chuck Austen, so expect Fan Discontinuity and perhaps in the not too distant future Canon Discontinuity as Austen has pretty much made himself persona non grata with both comic readers and the comics industry as a whole.
  • Homosocial Heterosexuality: While Wolverine and Cyclops occasionally have heartwarming moments it's rare, as most of their interactions are tense due to their shared attraction to Jean. Even when they are in danger, or have more pressing things to fight about, or even of she's currently dead, it's always about Jean. Right down to the morning Logan finds Scott in bed with Emma Frost. Remember, Jean's already dead at this point but for some reason her memory is reason enough for Logan to take a personal interest in Scott's... personal interests.
  • Hufflepuff House: A staple of the series in the last few years is to have a group of C-list mutants hovering around the X-Men's periphery, such as the X-kids not currently on a team, The 198, or the other mutants living on Utopia. Sometimes they'll get A Day in the Limelight or become an Ensemble Dark Horse, but usually their purpose is to serve as background color and to provide cannon fodder should the story need it.
  • I Just Want to Be Normal:
    • A number of mutants, thanks to the aforementioned Fantastic Racism and being Blessed with Suck. Rogue is the poster child for it; her powers make her an outcast among her fellow outcasts.
    • Interestingly, a lot of human parents feel this way about their mutant children but when a lot of the students were Brought Down to Normal, Put on a Bus and the bus blew up, they never bothered to collect their remains.
    • Surprisingly averted with some characters who have obvious physical mutations, like Nightcrawler. He's perfectly happy with the way he looks, even though, resembling a blue demon, he actually would have some legitimate reasons to complain. If such a character were written by another writer and not Chris Claremont, he likely would've fallen into this trope.
  • I Just Want to Be Special:
    • The U-Men are a bunch of humans who want to be Mutants. So they go around killing mutants and harvesting their organs to try and gain superpowers.
    • Donald Pierce turned himself into a cyborg because he hated being weak compared to Mutants.
  • An Ice Suit: Bobby/Iceman usually only wears briefs when going into his ice form.
  • An Ice Person: Founding member Iceman is one of these.
  • Idiot Ball: For some reason, the O*N*E builds a fleet of manually-operated Sentinels (built by Tony Stark), and decide to have them police Mutantkind. That'd be dumb enough given the shaky nature of Sentinels and Starktech, but they also put a blatant Mutantphobe in charge.
  • Implacable Man:
    • Nothing can stop the Juggernaut!
    • Nothing moves the Blob!
    • Chris Claremont's third run on Uncanny introduces a small-time mobster mutant who applies. Somehow, none of the highly trained and experienced X-Men can take him down until his boss's daughter shows up and scolds him.
  • Implicit Prison: In Marvel Comics Decimation event, the Xavier Institute was called a "Haven" for remaining mutants, but was really an internment camp for them.
  • Improvised Lockpick: Gambit does this while trapped by Cameron Hodge. He is hanging by his hands trapped in manacles and frees himself by curling up, using his teeth to pull out a metal spike that had been shot through his leg, and using it as a lockpick — with his feet.
  • Informed Ability: Due to the number of characters the series have mounted over the decades and the Popularity Power, Pandering to the Base, Running the Asylum factors might guide the course of the story, many mutants suffer the case of poorly expanded and very limited use of their powers, it's more common to see these renegated characters, or someone other than, stating what they could do instead of actually doing it, not even once at least in one of the many alternate universes and continuities. The most prominent examples are the Omega Level mutants, the term itself is not properly fleshed out, but it's clear that the mutants under this class are likely to be a Person of Mass Destruction, Physical God, Reality Warper, etc. etc. Arguably only Jean Grey/Phoenix, Franklin Richards and Nate Grey a.k.a. X-Man (before his sudden De-power) have shown what a Omega is truly capable of; Elixir, Vulcan, Legion have at least shown a little of their magnificent powers; but Iceman, Mister M, Rachel Summers and Torrent are really, really kept in the dark.
    • Iceman has gotten a major upgrade in the new Wolverine & The X-Men comic. In issue #2, he defeats an army of flamethrower-wielding Frankenstein clones by activating the sprinkler system and spawning dozens of autonomous ice duplicates. It's pretty much exactly as awesome as it sounds.
      • Or the time he fought a bunch of vampires by having a priest BLESS HIS ICE FORM.
    • On a smaller note, Wolverine is supposed to be a Grandmaster-level martial artist, Olympic-level gymnast, has high caliber tactical acumen, and is a complete and total badass with weapons (go figure). While his combat ability has actually made some appearances, those appearances NEVER show anything that really resembles the level of combat badassery he supposedly has.
  • Jerkass Ball: When he returned from Shi'Ar space, just before the Dark Phoenix saga, the Professor quickly set about treating the X-Men like children. Wolverine quickly stormed out of a Danger Room session because of this. Cyclops' attempts to point out to the Professor that the new X-Men aren't like the original class only results in the Professor saying this is somehow Scott's fault.
  • Joker Immunity: Mr. Sinister, the Sentinels, Donald Pierce, Selene. None of them ever stay gone for long.
  • Joker Jury: Factor 3.
    • Also Magneto, to Gambit.
  • The Juggernaut: Arguably the Trope Namer... Bitch!
  • Kids Play Matchmaker: In one issue Carter Ghazikhanian used his psychic powers on a comatose Alex Summers, in order to make Alex fall in love with his single mother.
  • Killer Robot: The Sentinels
  • Kudzu Plot: Claremont's uncannily long stint on Uncanny X-Men.
  • Lampshade Hanging: Often, especially during the later part of Claremont's run, when the X-Men get pretty savvy as to just how weird their lives are.
  • La Résistance: The resistance on Breakworld, who are some of the few Breakworlders who actually feel compassion, and believe caring for the weak and wounded is not a sin. So much compassion, in fact, that their Prophet wants to destroy the planet to end everyone's suffering, and set up the whole prophecy in order to manipulate Colossus into it.
  • Laser-Guided Karma: X-23 was introduced to X-Men proper slicing up a group of frat boys who were trying to kill a young woman for dating a mutant.
  • Left Stuck After Attack: The Blob is a giant fat guy who literally absorbs punches into his massive belly, leaving his attackers stuck in him (in some incarnations).
  • Leotard of Power: Storm and Psylocke traditionally wear these, though there are several others.
  • Less Embarrassing Term: In one comic, Jean Grey asks Jubilee if she still has nightmares. Jubilee responds that nightmares are for babies; she has "traumatic evening episodes."
  • Let X Be the Unknown
  • Lethal Harmless Powers: Nightcrawler's teleporting.
  • Limited-Use Magical Device: Ink is a mutant whose power is related to the tattoos he has on his body. He can "activate" the tattoo to use its power, but afterwards it'll disappear. He has multiple kinds of tattoos, from one shaped like lightning bolt (allowing him to wield lightning and move super fast for a while) to even the logo of the Phoenix (allowing access to Phoenix Force's godlike power). It's revealed that that guy is not a mutant - rather, his tattoo artist is the real mutant who never knew his own ability.
  • Load-Bearing Hero: Colossus.
  • Look Ma, No Plane!:
  • Lotus-Eater Machine: The "Ages of Apocalypse" storyline was about the X-Men being stuck in one of these by Apocalypse, while he tried to drain their powers for himself, with multiple scenarios.
  • Loves the Sound of Screaming: Sabretooth. In spades.
  • Lost Aesop: Is being a mutant supposed to be a good thing or a bad thing? Many X-Folks have pointed out how the X-Men don't do much beyond fight other mutants or mutant-haters. Then there's Blessed with Suck mutants like Rogue who want to lose their mutant "gifts" altogether. Muggles want to gain those same gifts because mutants are special. But anytime either side tries to change their situation with the best intentions in mind, things go wrong real fast and status quo reasserts itself.
    • Perhaps it's a case of "be yourself," which in the real world is the best solution.
    • As a general rule, the more powerful they are, the more likely they are to actually be a threat to humanity. This is especially true of Omega-level mutants. Even in a best case scenario, you have instances like Franklin Richards and the Scarlet Witch. On the more deliberately villainous side of things, you have Apocalypse, Dark Phoenix, Magneto (though less so following House of M), Proteus, Onslaught, Vulcan and others. Is it really irrational that regular humans might be just a tad bit disconcerted by this state of affairs and feel that it could be prudent to do something about it? For the most part, the writers have made such a point of creating dangerous and/or evil mutants, and then hurling them at the general public, that one would think humanity would have to be insane to not be terrified for their lives! Which unfortunately makes their attitude towards mutants seem more than a little bit justified.
    • The recurring nature of world-smashing conflicts initiated by mutant villains (and sometimes heroes), combined with the fact that most of the alternate future timeline's we have seen are of the Bad Future variety could leave a reader with a sense that the anti-mutant crowd makes sense. The writers seem to revel in the notion that the rise of mutants is setting the world on a path to a horrific future, and yet it is still supposed to be seen as a positive thing. On the other hand, a few of the truly bad timelines (think Days of Futures Past here) have been the result of muggles attempting to exterminate mutants, so it seems like the future is screwed either way.
  • Magic Fire: The flames generated by the Phoenix Force are capable of sustaining themselves in outer space. They're also hotter than the stars.
  • The Magic Touch: Gambit has the power to turn anything inorganic he touches into an explosive.
  • Make Them Rot: The mutant Wither has the power to decay any organic material his skin comes in contact with. Power Incontinence leaves his power permanently on. Especially heartbreaking is when the majority of mutants in the world lose their ability, Wither mistakenly believes he has too. He grabs the wrist of the girl he is in love with and her hand withers away.
  • Make Way for the New Villains: Just after Claremont left X-Men after his seventeen year run, new villain Trevor Fitzroy killed off the Hellions, one of the more infamous examples in comics.
  • Male Might, Female Finesse: Colossus, the Husky Russkie with metallic skin, is often paired with Kitty Pride, an Intangible Woman who has trained in ninja skills.
  • Manipulative Bastard:
    • Mr. Sinister, resident Evilutionary Biologist.
    • Sebastian Shaw and Emma Frost also qualify.
    • Even Professor X has his moments.
    • Cyclops lately has also been taking a page or two from Xavier's book.
  • Married in the Future:
    • In Days of Future Past, Wolverine and Storm are a married couple, as are Colossus and Kitty.
    • In The End, Beast and Cecilia Reyes are a married couple. So are Sam Guthrie and Lila Cheney. And Scott and Emma.
  • Mass Super-Empowering Event:
    • The detonation of the atom bombs drastically increased the number of mutant births.
    • Inverted with the (incorrectly named) Decimation Wave created by the Scarlet Witch, which depowered 90% of all mutants.
  • Meaningful Gift: After the Fatal Attractions story arc, Wolverine leaves the Westchester mansion to go on a healing journey. He leaves behind letters for three people, Jean, Xavier, and Jubilee. Jubilee got one extra gift, Wolverine's Stetson. Since Wolverine survives, and he and Jubilee were able to reunite later, it averts Tragic Keepsake, but the hat remains one of Jubilee's most treasured possessions.
  • Meat-Sack Robot: The storyline "Operation: Zero Tolerance" introduced the Prime Sentinels: ordinary humans who were roboticized and then released back into their normal lives as Manchurian Agents unaware of the cybernetics under their flesh. Their bodies are constantly scanning for the X-Gene and when they come in contact with a mutant, their programming involuntarily activates, where they will attempt to eliminate them with extreme prejudice. They also carry the ability to roboticize ordinary people and thus create more Prime Sentinels.
  • Memory Jar: The Shi'ar gave Jean's family a crystal ball full of their and other people's memories of Jean after she saved the universe, but before the Dark Phoenix Saga.
  • Mental Affair: Scott and Emma. It's not entirely surprising that Jean, a fellow telepath, catches them in the act.
  • Meta Origin: The X-Gene causes all sorts of different physical changes.
  • Mind over Manners: Preached more than practiced, particularly by Xavier. It could be argued that he takes the trope name more literally than most; it's not a rigid ethical code, but simple etiquette, and he'll sidestep his "principles" with all the sincere regret he'd give an ill-timed belch at a formal dinner. However, he's only gotten particularly Jerkass about it with recent attempts to make him more flawed or something.
  • Mind Rape:
    • What Jean does to Emma to wipe the smug look off her face after having been caught with Scott.
    • Jason Wyngarde used Dark Phoenix to become more powerful, so she returned in kind... by granting him omniscience to drive him insane.
  • Monster Modesty: Beast started off as looking mostly-human and was covered head to toe actually to shin, since his original costume left his abnormally large hands and feet exposed (his original costume is depicted in the page image). Once he turned into a blue ape-man, he took to wearing black underwear and nothing else. His current costume averts this a bit more.
    • In fact, Hank plays it straight or averts it depending at what point is his mutation today. He's currently reverted to black shorts only.
  • Morality Kitchen Sink: Xavier, Cyclops, Wolverine and Cable all have different ideas about when its right to cross certain lines. To say nothing of when people like the White Queen or Magneto himself join the group. There are the outright villains like Apocalypse and Mister Sinister or the Sentinels, but much of the drama of the stories' most famous arcs deals with internal divisions and inner conflict, most painfully during the The Dark Phoenix Saga where the X-Men, the Shi'ar Imperium, and Jean Grey have differing and believable reasons and arguments, and the only resolution is tragedy.
  • More Diverse Sequel: The comic was originally launched with five white characters: four men and one woman—all American. After being completely revamped in the 70s as the "All-New, All-Different X-Men'', the team's roster expanded to both different ethnicities and different nationalities, including Nightcrawler (German), Storm (African, raised in the US), Wolverine (Canadian), Colossus and Thunderbird (Native American). They were later joined by Kitty Pryde (Jewish) and have only become more diverse over the years.
  • More Hero than Thou: Wolverine and Scott Summers used to get into this all the time.
  • Ms. Fanservice: Emma Frost, full stop.
  • Muggle Power: For Magneto and his bunch. The X-Men, naturally, oppose both sides.
  • Multinational Team: One of X-Men's defining traits is the incredibly diverse cast, being quite possibly the popularizer for it. It was part of Chris Claremont's desire to show that being a mutant is a world thing, not just an American one, and it's been that way ever since. In fact, the early run of Stan Lee where the entire cast was completely homogeneous now looks like Early-Installment Weirdness because of it. 1975's "All-New, All-Different" X-Men is what began this trope. It saw the inclusion of Wolverine from Canada, Storm from East Africa, Nightcrawler from West Germany, Banshee from Ireland, Sunfire from Japan, Colossus from Russia (Eastern Siberia, to be precise), and Thunderbird, an Apache. The success of this initiated rosters to always be diverse, and to give readers multitudes of different characters to latch onto. Since then, it grew to further include Kitty Pryde (later called Shadowcat, Jewish), Rogue (from the Deep South, but raised by a lesbian couple and fluent in French since childhood), Psylocke (British), Forge (Cheyenne), Longshot (an alien rather than a mutant), Jubilee (Chinese-American), Gambit (Cajun), Bishop (Black, at least partly of Australian Aboriginal descent), Maggott (South Africa), Thunderbird III (Indian), and so on.
  • Multistage Teleport: Nightcrawler has had to travel long distances quickly on several occasions and in different incarnations. Since he can only teleport along a line-of-sight, he does this by teleporting over and over in rapid succession, similar to how he does Teleport Spam in combat, but in a straight line. Eventually the line-of-sight requirement turns out to be more of a mental block that he overcomes, by which point he no longer fits the trope.
  • Must Make Amends: This happens to Magneto. He's always been opposed by the X-Men, so by now he often attacks them at full power (which is a lot) instinctively. Sadly, the X-Men are mutants... some of the people Magneto wants to protect. Even worse, the one he accidentally hurts is the newest recruit, a 13-year-old (mutant) girl. "What have I done?" is the short version of his monologue, when he realizes what he has done. Follow his Villainous BSoD and his first Heel–Face Turn as The Atoner.
  • Mutants: Of course.
  • My Skull Runneth Over: A plot line just before Adjectiveless' 200th issue has Rogue encounter a living weapon that absorbs the mind of anything it comes near, and has been travelling across the universe for hundreds of years. As a result, it has several billion minds in there. And then Rogue absorbs them all. It takes coming into contact with Hope Summers to wipe them out of her.
  • Nazi Hunter: Magneto tracked down the Red Skull due to his past as a Holocaust survivor. He also served in this role briefly for the CIA, resigning in a rather...spectacular fashion when agents killed his then-girlfriend because he had gone after a Nazi who, unknown to him, was working for the United States.
  • Nested Mouths: Bliss the Morlock has an extra mouth on her tongue.
  • Never Hurt an Innocent: Magneto, Depending on the Writer. Sometimes it's just never hurt a mutant innocent.
  • Never the Obvious Suspect: A mid-00s storyline has several thugs apparently murdered by Wolverine, who doesn't have much of an alibi since the only witness has gone missing. But the coroner notes the claw marks on the thug's car don't match Logan's. For one, the distance between the claws is too small. It's actually X-23's work.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: According to Deadly Genesis, Xavier nearly recruited Emma Frost before he found the All-New team, but reconsidered and wiped her memory just as she was thinking of going with him. While this did spare Emma from the fate of the interregnum team, it also meant Emma became the White Queen, and one of their nastiest foes.
  • '90s Anti-Hero: Cable and Bishop are both very rare successful examples of this trope, having managed to develop a level of characterization and depth that's usually not applied to characters covered by this trope.
  • Noble Male, Roguish Male: Cyclops (Noble) and Wolverine (Roguish) in some depictions.
  • No Fourth Wall: Deadpool. His entry at the top should really tell you all you need to know, but if you're still in doubt you can just go ahead and check my- I mean HIS awesome main article... Uuh... I have to go now. Ciao!
  • Obstructive Bureaucrat: Valerie Cooper, who genuinely means well (most of the time) but often takes the most counterproductive choice possible. Like protecting the X-Men by basically turning the school into an internment camp and putting giant sentinels on guard, before getting annoyed when the X-Men are offended by this.
  • Oddly Common Rarity: Omega-level mutants. Mutants in general are supposed to be rare. Mutants whose potential and/or actual power levels are so great as to be difficult to measure should therefore be almost unheard of. Only they are not. During the Silver Age and the Bronze Age it was generally held that Professor X and Magneto were the most powerful mutants in the world. But in recent times, mutants whose power equals or exceeds theirs are surprisingly common, and with the recent reduction in the size of the overall mutant population they stand out even more.
  • Oh, Crap!: The Shi'ar ship that chases Lilandra to Earth is very blasé about the planet's recent history as they check it. The science officer casually points out they've already fought off Skrulls and the Kree, and that they've met the Celestials. Then she finds out that Earth has fought off Galactus twice. The Shi'ar immediately freak out and run.
  • One Super One Powerset: Unlike most examples of this trope, Professor Xavier has tried many times to restore the use of his legs, but when he does succeed, he becomes crippled again before long.
  • Opening a Can of Clones
  • Oppressed Minority Veteran: Jakob Eisenhardt is another German-Jewish example, who was a decorated veteran of World War I. His family's persecution by the Nazi regime provides a substantial portion of his son Erik's Freudian Excuse.
  • Outcast Refuge: The premise of the franchise is that mankind's children can develop powers that separate them from normal humans, so they are shunned, hunted and, worst case scenario, exterminated. To protect themselves, many people of interest begin to form mutant refuges:
    • American professor Charles Xavier (a mutant himself) founds the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning as a front to recruit mutants to train them in developing their powers.
    • His archnemesis and former friend, Magneto, also created his own mutant refuge named Avalon, although of a nearly religious nature, since his second-in-command was a powerful telepath named Exodus and his followers were the Acolytes.
    • The Morlocks were a group of outcasts among the outcasts, since their powers manifested in physical transformations. Their hideout were the Morlock Tunnels or the Morlocks' Alley under New York.
  • Outside-the-Box Tactic: Sebastian Shaw absorbs any kinetic energy directed at him, even a bullet, so Storm covers him in snow, which actually saps his energy, due to cold being a lack of said energy. note 

    Tropes - P to Z 
  • Painted-On Pants: Nearly every female X-Man wears these at least once (but all the costume changes mean none have worn them constantly).
  • Passion Is Evil: Several Face Heel Turns are caused by emotional overload throughout the series—but the most shining example is the Dark Phoenix. The Dark Phoenix itself only came to exist because Jean Grey was fed decadent and hedonistic desires which corrupted the cosmic entity.
  • Pay Evil unto Evil: During God Loves, Man Kills, Magneto finds a group of Mutant children have been lynched by racists. He finds the ones responsible.
  • Personal Hate Before Common Goals: In one arc of the comic, Magneto and Red Skull apparently joined forces to take over the world, which concerns everybody because their combined might is extremely dangerous... but then The Reveal happens: Magneto utterly loathes Red Skull because the latter is a Nazi and Magneto is a Holocaust survivor, and he pulled off this "alliance" charade so he would get close to the Skull and unleash his full fury on the guy (bringing down a whole mountain complex on his head).
    • Something similar happens during the Acts of Vengeance event. The two of them, among other major villains, are convinced by Loki to work together, and use other supercriminals to interchange their common enemies and attack them. Hoping the unfamiliarity of the superheroes with the villains will work in their favour. Both of them initially agree to collaborate, even while having their tensions, due to Loki's mental manipulation. However, this alliance also comes apart when Magneto captures the Red Skull and puts him in a subterranean vault. Leaving him with no means of escape, and only a few gallons of water. Hoping to make him suffer as much as others have done at his hands.
  • Phlebotinum Battery: Cyclops' red optic blasts are charged by solar power. In a pinch, they can be charged by Storm's lightning (which turns them white), but it is not at all pleasant for him.
  • Phlegmings: Often exhibited by Wolverine, the Brood, and many others.
  • Pinball Projectile: Cyclops' optic blasts have a habit of doing this.
  • Playing with Fire: Longstanding villain Pyro was one of these, although he couldn't actually create fire. Other villains like Fever Pitch also exemplified this trope. Heroic examples include Sunfire and Neal Sharra.
  • Playing with Syringes: The Weapon X project.
  • Plot Hole: Gambit & the X-ternals reveals that, since in the Age of Apocalypse Jean Grey never saved the M'Kraan crystal, the entire multiverse (i.e. every single continuity in every single Marvel book ever) is on the point of collapsing. Not only does this contradict how time travel works in the Marvel universe (each change to the past creates a tangent timeline instead of overwriting the old one), it's also never been an issue in any other alternate timeline story before or since.
  • Plot-Relevant Age-Up: During the early 70s, Magneto (and the rest of the Brotherhood) was aged down to a child by Alpha the Ultimate Mutant. When Erik the Red needed a distraction, he re-aged Magneto to adulthood.
  • Plot-Triggering Book: Kitty discovers Destiny's diary predicting the upcoming Apocalypse's ascension at some point in the 90s. In 2001, author Chris reutilizes this plot point for his series X-Treme X-Men and expands it to a series of 13 volumes written by precognitive mutant Destiny. The books reportedly map out the future for mutant-kind, and Storm and some other X-Men members hunt for them around the globe to keep them from falling in the wrong hands.
  • Possession Burnout: Proteus possessing a person causes their body to burn up.
  • Power Creep, Power Seep: The powers of several characters have been inconsistently portrayed.
    • Magneto is the most notable example, with his power level depending heavily on which side of the Face–Heel Revolving Door he is on at any given time. As a rule, when he is being a villain he has practically unlimited power. When behaving more benignly his powers are usually dialed back substantially.
    • Professor X also tends to drift around a bit, usually in response to how much he might mess up the plot. Back in the early days, he could telepathically mindwipe an entire town. More recently, even a little bit of Psychic Static can give him a headache.
    • Wolverine's healing factor was not nearly as invincible in earlier stories as it is of late.
  • Power Incontinence: Most mutants start out with little to no control over their powers when first activated. Mutants not Blessed with Suck can gain control through careful practice.
  • Power Levels: The 6 classes of mutation.
    • Epsilon Mutants are unfortunate mutants. Epsilon mutants pretty much have no chance of having a regular life in society due to their major flaws like an inhuman appearance or their mutation makes it impossible for them to function normally. If that isn't bad enough Epsilon mutants also only have minor "superpowers" that are next to useless.
    • Delta Mutants are like Alpha mutants in that they don't have any significant flaws. The only problem is that Delta mutants don't have powers that match an Alpha mutant, or even a Beta or Gamma mutant. They have a normal human appearance, but their mutagenic powers are weaker or only narrowly applicable, though still controllable.
    • Gamma mutants have very powerful mutations, but they have flaws. Unlike the Beta mutants a Gamma mutant's flaw is a major flaw that makes his or her life very hard. Also, while Alpha and Beta mutants can pass as regular looking humans, many Gamma mutants cannot because they have physical deformities.
    • Beta Mutants are on the same level as Alpha-level mutants as far as how potent their powers are. But the difference between Beta Mutants and Alpha Mutants is that the Beta Mutants have flaws, albeit very small flaws. They have a normal human appearance (or close to it) and their mutation is powerful, useful, but less controllable but can still lead a normal life with only minor preparation.
    • Alpha Mutants are the second most powerful and feared mutants. Alpha mutants have extremely powerful mutant traits without any significant flaws. They have a normal human appearance and their mutation is powerful, useful and controllable (i.e. turn it on and off, direct it at will.)
    • Omega Mutants have a single, dominant power with an undefinable upper-limit of that power's specific classification, meaning that power cannot be surpassed by any measurable degree. For example, Forge is the best mutant engineer alive but his power has been surpassed by the likes of Mr. Fantastic and Iron Man. Magneto's ability to manipulate magnetic forces has not and cannot be, thus he is an Omega Mutant. No firm definition had been offered in comics until X-Men (2019) gave the above explanation, previously leading to a ton of Depending on the Writer.
  • Power Loss Makes You Strong: Storm, back in the 80's. She lost her powers at the hands of Forge and ends up with a mohawk and boss of the Morlocks, she also Cyclops without powers to retain leadership of the X-Men. She was the primary leader until the teams split into Gold and Blue...then different books...and then she got married so she never actually was out of a command position.
  • Power-Strain Blackout: Nearly all the female characters, especially telepaths like Jean Grey, have done this at least once across many incarnations.
  • Pre-Asskicking One-Liner: In an earlier issue, Sabretooth had Jubilee pinned and asked if she had any last words. Her response was too tiny to read, even with a magnifying glass...
    Sabretooth: Wussat? Ya gotta beg louder!
    Jubilee: Yu-yeah sure... I s-said... 'EAT HOT PLASMA BURSTS'!
  • Pretty in Mink: Some of the ladies will wear fur at some points. Even those not rich might wear a fur-trimmed coat.
  • Psychic Glimpse of Death:
    • Jean Grey's telepathic powers first kicked in when she and a friend were in a car accident and her friend died, causing her to experience the death mentally. That led to years of therapy with Professor Xavier.
    • Minor villain Mr. X (not to be confused with Xavier) had his telepathy awaken in a similar manner, but he never received any help from other telepaths and developed an addiction to the sensation, becoming a serial killer.
  • Psychic Powers: Professor X, Jean Grey (and all of her time-traveling offspring), Psylocke, Emma Frost... the list goes on.
  • The Purge: The Shi'ar are so scared of the Phoenix that if someone becomes its host, they'll throw out all the stops to kill that person and their entire family, as Rachel Grey learned first-hand. We later meet a Shi'ar who was on the receiving end of the same treatment as Rachel. The only reason he's alive is because the resident Evil Chancellor knows that someone with the power of a cosmic entity can be useful.
  • Purple Prose: Claremont's run frequently delved into it. Tropes Are Not Bad, though.
  • Random Power Ranking: In the comic, they have Greek letters for a mutant's power level. Omegas, the highest, can manipulate matter on the atomic level.
  • Randomly Gifted: The X-gene has complicated heredity.
  • Reformation Acknowledgement: Reeling from the affects of Carol Danvers personality in her head, Rogue leaves the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants and joins the X-Men. Most of them threaten to quit if she's allowed in, but Xavier convinces them to stay. When Logan's fiance, Mariko, treats her more kindly than her own team, Rogue takes a blast meant for Mariko. This earns her Logan's respect and trust, and he offers to let her "borrow" his Healing Factor with her power. She refuses, pointing out that it could hurt him. This only further convinces him that she's sincere in her efforts to redeem, and he touches her, loaning her his power, anyway. It took a little longer for the rest of the X-Men to trust her, but she had a good and faithful friend in Wolverine from that day forward.
  • Relationship Revolving Door: Rogue and Gambit have been in a constant state of ‘on-and-off' ever since Gambit first joined the X-Men, to the extent that it's practically a permanent sub-plot. While they both have declared love and devotion for one another on multiple occasions, the relationship never lasts too long before something happens and they end up separating again, only to reconcile at a later stage. This is partially due to the strain on the relationship caused by Rogue's mutation, meaning the pair can never make physical contact, but also both partners carry some serious emotional baggage which surfaces every so often, sometimes leading to a break-up, whilst other times bringing the pair together
  • Re-Power: This actually has an In-Universe term; "Secondary Mutation". In effect, any given mutant may potentially, in the right circumstances, develop one or more entirely new powers. This may alter, replace or add to original powers. For two of the most iconic example, Beast's transformation from "somewhat ape-like man" to "talking gorilla" to "ape-cat" over the years as his powers have strengthened, and Emma Frost's developing the ability to assume a crystaline "diamond form" that makes her Nigh Invulnerable and gives her Super-Strength at the cost of being unable to access her psychic powers in that form.
  • Retcon: Absurdly common, especially with characters with mysterious pasts.
  • The Reveal: It isn't until issue 98 that we learn Wolverine's claws are a natural part of him.
  • Robot Hair: In Joss Whedon's run, the Danger Room developed sapience and (after creating a body from an old Sentinel) became Danger◊. "She" has cables coming out of the back of her head that resemble hair.
  • Rogues Gallery: Magneto and the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, Mister Sinister and the Marauders, the Friends of Humanity, the Sentinels, Gene Nation, Humanity's Last Stand, the Brood, the Phalanx, the Shadow King, Nimrod, the Juggernaut, Black Tom Cassidy, the Hellfire Club, Apocalypse and his Horsemen, the Acolytes of Magneto, Sublime, the Reavers, the Mutant Liberation Front and the Weapon X project (* whew!* ) have all functioned as recurring enemies for the X-Men as a group.
  • Round Hippie Shades: In one X-Men storyline (X-Men: Divided We Stand), the X-Men are tracking down a group of hippies. The latter have used Lady Mastermind's mind control powers to turn the Haight-Ashbury area back to the way it was in the '60s. Emma Frost mentally alters their clothing◊ to fit in. And Cyclops' visor turns into ruby-quartz Lennon specs.
  • Rule of Drama: Common. For example, Rogue and Gambit. Every time a writer tries to resolve the angst of their relationship, the next one will find a way to stir it up again. Ditto for Polaris and Havok; the writers have used actual black holes to keep them apart.
    • A few years back the lineup of one team consisted of Gambit, Rogue, Iceman, Polaris, and Havok. With Iceman and nurse Annie being part of a big love quadrangle with Polaris and Havok.
  • Running Gag: During Astonishing X-Men, Wolverine's obsession with beer. It actually becomes a plot point: a can of beer falls on his head and snaps him out of his mental reversion to James Howlett.
  • Sapient Ship: The Brood used lobotomized Space Whales for transport, and the surviving ones at liberty were both sentient and not happy at all about the situation.
  • Scary Dogmatic Aliens: The Brood exist to mutilate and enslave other races, transforming them into still more of their depraved kind. The Phalanx exist to convert all other entities in the universe into part of their race of living circuitry. Both have clashed with the X-Men.
  • Self-Duplication: Jamie Madrox, aka Multiple Man. If he leaves his duplicates separated for too long, they start to become more independent and develop their own personalities. Sadly making a Me's a Crowd plot difficult for too long but an Evil Twin incredibly easy.
  • "Shaggy Dog" Story: The "Endangered Species" backup strips running through the main titles (X-Men, Uncanny, New X-Men and X-Factor) in 2008 revolve around Beast trying to find a way to undo Decimation. He fails.
  • Space Pirates: The Starjammers, introduces during the first "Phoenix" arc in the late-1970s, is a crew of space pirates. They usually appear whenever the X-Men go to space and/or meet the Shi'ar Empire.
  • Spontaneous Weapon Creation: Psylocke's "focused totality of her psychic power".
  • Spotlight-Stealing Squad:
    • Wolverine is the poster boy.
    • Emma Frost is now the most prominent woman on the team, over all the others who've been there longer.
  • Status Quo Is God: Mutants will never be accepted no matter how much progress in mutant rights occurs or how commonplace non-mutant superhumans become in the Marvel Universe. The X-Men will also never stop being feared and hated no matter how much good they do for the world. Small steps toward mutant equality will often happen but any major attempts at progress will almost always result everything being regressed in the most dramatic way possible. Which can be annoying for readers.
  • Still Wearing the Old Colors: Nightcrawler wears his circus costume for years after joining the X-Men. His later costumes still take influence from the design.
  • Stripperiffic: Dear God, this trope.
    • The worst offenders in the X-Men are probably Emma Frost and Psylocke. Emma Frost is so bad that a lingerie teddy was her original costume and it got worse from there. They've even lampshaded it in one comic, where the students are glad she wears pants now. Psylocke is noted that its not so much that her costume is revealing as it is a thong and might as well be painted on.
    • Well, she was part of a club which prided itself on "going back to a purer time where money ruled without sexual inhibitions".
      Emma Frost: This, children, is Kitty Pryde, who apparently feels the need to make a grand entrance.
      Kitty Pryde: I'm sorry. I was busy remembering to put on all my clothes.
      Emma Frost: So gushingly glad you could join us.
    • Doctor Nemesis lampshades this even further by finding new ways to non-stop insult Frost about this during an entire story, culminating in telling her that if she doesn't immediately follow his orders he will personally destroy every fetish wear store on the planet.
    • Storm, of course, used to go without her costume entirely.
    • Colossus is a rare male version. Its not as noticable as other examples because hes usually wearing it in his steel form but his costume is extremely revealing. Besides his boots and armbands, it consists of a red speedo and a leotard that opens up at the sides.
  • Sunglasses at Night: Cyclops, to keep control over his powers.
  • Super-Empowering: Sage, but only for those with latent mutations.
  • Super Family Team: For various related X-Men.
  • Super Registration Act: The first ever, in fact. A thorn in the X-Men's side during the eighties, it disappeared once Claremont left the books.
  • Superhero School: (Trope Maker) Xavier Academy, especially right in the beginning and in recent years.
  • Superhero Team Uniform: The X-Men originally wore matching navy blue and yellow outfits that made them instantly recognizable to the public eye. But as the cast grew, the team moved away from this trope, with many X-Men possessing unique outfits separate from their compatriots, such as Jean Grey donning green and yellow as Phoenix, or Cyclops going with all black.
  • Superhuman Trafficking: A recurring plot point. Some storylines deal with governments and private individuals/corporations trafficking mutants and exploiting their abilities.
  • Super-Power Meltdown: A common problem for newly-manifested mutants, who typically have no idea that they are mutants, no prior knowledge of what their powers may be and are frequently teenagers or younger. Also tends to happen to those suffering from severe psychological issues.
  • Superman Stays Out of Gotham: Why the Avengers and other non-mutant heroes on friendly terms with the X-Men don't get involved in their Fantastic Racism troubles: because they don't have to deal with it themselves. Lampshaded during the Civil War when Emma Frost gives a What the Hell, Hero? speech to Tony Stark asking why the X-Men should care about Stamford when none of the other heroes got involved after the destruction of Genosha.
    • It's starting to get averted since the Heroic Age rolled by: the Avengers tried to help the X-Men out in dealing with Bastion (but predictably, couldn't do a thing, since Bastion raised a force field around Utopia so strong that not even Mjolnir could break through it; by the time it was gone, it was when Hope had already blown Bastion to smithereens). The idea behind the Uncanny Avengers is also an effort to avert this following the Avengers vs. X-Men crisis: ostensibly, it's half veteran Avengers (Captain America, Thor and Scarlet Witchnote ) and half veteran X-Men (Wolverine, Havok and Rogue).
  • Super Supremacist: The mutants usually have to deal with Fantastic Racism directed at themselves by humans, but some mutants conversely believe that Homo Superior was designed to rule over regular humans.
    • Magneto, from his experiences in a Nazi concentration camp, believes that humans rightly fear mutants because mutants are their evolutionary replacements. Depending on the Writer, he believes that fear and prejudice are a product of their innate inferiority and that the inherent diversity within the mutant species would allow them to overcome said prejudices if freed from humanity's chains. He is unable to see the irony in how being a mutant supremacist makes him no better than a human supremacist. (But again, this depends on the writer.)
    • Apocalypse is Magneto's philosophy taken to an even more frightening conclusion. Apocalypse not only believes that humans are obsolete, but also that there is no room for mutants who lost the Superpower Lottery and got Blessed with Suck. To Apocalypse, survival of the fittest is all that matters, which means that there is no difference between a Muggle and a weaksauce mutant. Both equally deserve extinction.
  • Super Wheelchair: Professor X frequently gets this though it is Depending on the Writer. Hovering is common.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute:
    • Jean Grey gained a few of these after her original death. Let's see: her daughter Rachel Grey, her clone Madelyne Pryor, and her possible reincarnation Hope Summers are all Significant Green Eyed Redheads that can manifest the Phoenix Force.
    • Since Kitty Pryde left the team, it becomes a rule that the roster has to include one plucky teenage girl who latches onto Wolverine as a Big Brother Mentor. Over the years, the replacements have included Jubilee, Marrow, Armor, Pixie, and X-23. They shook up the tradition a bit with Marrow by making Gambit her mentor instead, but they cut out the middleman with X-23 by making her Wolverine's female clone (the closest thing to an actual little sister he's ever gonna get).
  • Take That!: In one Generation M comic, the main character is an alcoholic reporter. A suspiciously-familiar guy calling himself Tony S attends one of her AA meetings. At a later point, after being beaten up she refers to herself as "looking like one of Hank Pym's girlfriends".
  • Tangled Family Tree: The Summers family is a massive Continuity Snarl to itself, and is so convoluted that at this point Scott Summers may in fact be his own grandfather. No fewer than four characters in the main continuity of the X-Men comics can be said to be the child of Scott Summers, only one of whom (Cable) was actually born during the timeline of the main Marvel Universe, and none of whom are more than about ten years younger than their parents (including Cable, who is, due to the massive amount of Time Travel in his backstory, at least ten years older than his parents). Add to that Scott's brother Alex, their long-lost father (the space pirate Corsair), and the supervillain-ruler-of-a-galactic-empire Third Summers Brother (Vulcan), and the whole thing is just one big mess. Ironically, Scott started out as an orphan with no known family.
  • Tank-Tread Mecha: Bonebreaker is a cyborg with a missing lower half. In its place are a cluster of cybernetics attached on top of a tank platform. Besides the comic books, he has also appeared in the animated series as well as a few video games such as the Punisher arcade game.
  • Thematic Rogues Gallery: Most of the X-Men's enemies can be put into one of four broad categories:
    • Human bigots who want to murder or enslave every mutant on Earth
    • Mutant radicals who want to murder or enslave every human on Earth.
    • Assorted Evil Overlords who want to murder or enslave every mutant and human on Earth.
    • Scary Dogmatic Aliens who want to convert every mutant and human on Earth into more of their own kind.
  • There Are No Therapists: The members of the various X-teams could really benefit from regular therapy.
    • In Claremont's run alone the main team members were repeatedly (and painfully) devolved into primates by Sauron and then evolved back, they lost Thunderbird, there was The Dark Phoenix Saga, the Mutant Massacre, Inferno (1988), being the captives of the Brood, Cyclops and Storm and Xavier all being tortured by William Stryker, Wolverine being tortured by the Reavers until he went partially insane, and more! It's amazing that the entire team didn't just break down sobbing and curl up into the fetal position after all of that. Apart from the members of X-Factor going to see Doc Samson a couple of times, we've never seen any of them receive any sort of treatment.
    • Rogue, in particular, is a psychiatric marvel in that after all the psychic and psychological trauma she endured before and after joining the X-Men she didn't have to end her days committed to a mental hospital for life.
  • Time Travel: Starting with "Days of Future Past" and going from there. The X-Men have been involved in so many Time Travel incidents that it has begun to be Lampshaded by nearly everyone after the ANAD relaunch.
  • Too Dumb to Live: One fitting most X-Men media, the military and police's attempts to stop evil mutants, but particularly ones like Magneto. How many times must they throw metal tanks, missiles, bullets, etc. at him only to have them effortlessly stopped and often turned against them before they realize that is not ever going to work?
  • Traumatic Superpower Awakening: How several powers are attained, combined with Puberty Superpower.
  • True Love Is Boring: Don't expect many couples to last.
  • Tsundere: Hellion is type A towards X-23.
  • Uniqueness Decay: An increasing criticism about mutants being an allegory for minorities is the fact that the discrimination they face becomes harder to swallow when there are currently hundreds, if not thousands, of non-mutant superbeings living in the Marvel Universe and they, for the most part, don't suffer the same prejudice for their powers and appearances. This is something that writers in recent years have finally started addressing.
  • Unstoppable Rage: When Steven Lang kidnaps the Professor and Jean Grey, Cyclops gets angry. Angry enough that he nearly beats Steven Lang to death. The only reason he doesn't is because of Jean and a Sentinel. Even imprisoned, Cyclops is so angry he manages to break free of his restrains, and tries all over again.
  • Useless Without Powers: This happens to Storm when she loses her powers. She eventually overcame this by learning various martial arts techniques in order to compensate for her loss and become a Badass Normal for a few years real time. Afterwards when she got her powers back the experience of being depowered made her even more powerful.
  • Use Your Head: The Juggernaut
  • Vocal Minority: invoked An In-Universe version. Most mutants that are seen are usually relatively powerful, but its been said that most mutants are either relatively weak, or even completely harmless, but are still treated to the same stuff the actual dangerous ones are, and is usually the reason the Mutants are a minority metaphor works. But of course, no one wants to read a comic about a group of people who only have an extra pair of hands or the ability to glow.
  • Walk, Don't Swim: Juggernaut's default method of crossing bodies of water.
  • Weak Boss, Strong Underlings: Downplayed. Depending on the Writer, Professor X alternates between Genius Cripple and Handicapped Badass. After battling a Human Alien, his spine takes a severe injury that prevents him from walking. He, however, keeps his mighty telepathic powers, so he serves as excellent support for the other mutants, especially in finding new recruits. Offensively, he can brainwash people. Professor X is the Big Good of the X-Men franchise and most mutants training under his Super Hero school look up to him for advice or as a parental figure. Amongst his pupils, we can count several combat-adept people and a handful of overpowered mutants (some able to control climate change and one that gets a universe-destroying power at some point).
  • Weaponized Offspring: The minor villain Tusk could create smaller copies of himself.
  • Wedding Episode: Logan made sure Cyclops and Jean Grey's wedding in X-Men #30 was conflict-free. Not to mention Jean's atypical wedding dress was absolutely gorgeous. Jean chose to have the last dance with wheelchair-bound Xavier, and used her telekinesis to lift him up.
  • Weight Loss Horror: Whoever is chosen as Famine in Apocalypse's Horsemen can cause people to become emaciated by touching them.
  • Wham Episode:
    • Uncanny X-Men issue 105: The alien that has been haunting Xavier's dreams reveals themselves... and just happens to be a beautiful woman.
    • Uncanny X-Men issue 275: Magneto renounces his attempt at reforming, and kills Zaladane.
    • Uncanny X-Men issue 388: The Muir Island facility is totalled.
    • X-Men issue 108: Moira MacTaggert passes on, despite the best efforts of the X-Men. And Senator Kelly is murdered by a human.
  • Wham Line:
    • Uncanny X-Men Issue 101, courtesy of Jean Grey, who it should be noted is supposed to be dead: "Hear me, X-Men! No longer am I the woman you knew! I am fire! And life incarnate! Now and forever — I AM PHOENIX!"
    • Deadly Genesis issue 5: "[Professor X] is human."
  • What Measure Is a Non-Human?: For those who think mutants aren't human.
  • What the Hell, Hero?: Sometimes characters get called out on things they did, sometimes not. Taken to extreme lengths with everyone's reaction to finding out Scott assembled the X-Force, a black ops team with the most dangerous mutants to go and kill the X-Men's most deadly enemies who could possibly eradicate the last of the mutants.
  • White Man's Burden: It's occasionally pointed out that the X-Men mostly consist of attractive people who could easily pass for being normal humans and have powers that do nothing but improve their lives, unlike most other mutants who have freakish appearances and powers that are useless at best and actively detrimental at worst. Charles Xavier himself is a wealthy white man who spent most of his life pretending to be a normal human until he was "outed" by his evil twin sister.
  • Whole-Plot Reference: Uncanny X-Men #143 is based on Alien. And it stars Kitty Pryde, a character that Byrne designed after Sigourney Weaver to boot. The reference was so blatant (the alien is even killed the same way), that they thought they were going to be sued.
  • A Wizard Did It: As knowledge of genetics and radiation became more prominent, it was eventually decided that Sufficiently Advanced Aliens "planted the seeds for beneficial mutation," rather than natural processes giving random people cool superpowers. This is not explicitly stated as fact though it at least acknowledges the underlying problem.
  • Wolverine Publicity: Trope Namer.
  • The Worf Effect: If the writers want to show that a telepath, Eldritch Abomination, Cosmic Entity, etc. has REALLY powerful mental abilities, they have the character curbstomp Charles Xavier in a mental battle. Since most every telepath in the Marvel universe has gone up against him at some point, this happens a lot, to the point where Xavier's status as one of/the most powerful telepath on Earth becomes more of an Informed Ability.
  • Would Hit a Girl: In order to break her free of Mesmero's hypnosis and lacking any solution, Wolverine reluctantly hits Jean Grey, on the basis that since they're similar, her anger will bring her back to normal. It works, though Wolverine still gets the power of Phoenix thrown at him.
  • Would Hurt a Child: A distressing number of the X-Men's foes have absolutely no problem harming children or teens. The Purifiers take this to sickening heights, being willing to torch an entire maternity ward just to get one Mutant.
  • Writer on Board: With a number of his former fans now writers at Marvel themselves, Wolverine is a frequent beneficiary of this, often being written as an unstoppable badass who is always right no matter what horrible thing he does or suggests doing. It's not usually so bad when the writers instead focus on other characters, but sometimes it can be quite extreme.
    • Wolverine went the other direction in Uncanny Avengers, where he was portrayed as a bloodthirsty idiot whose main role was being lectured at by the more "enlightened" members of the team. This, naturally, didn't satisfy many people either.
    • As Wolverine's Opposite-Sex Clone, it's perhaps not a surprise that X-23 gets slathered with this too. Run, don't walk, away from any issue her creator Craig Kyle has penned.
  • "X" Makes Anything Cool: The whole X-Men title. To a smaller degree, Professor Charles Xavier, whose surname is a flashier but correct alternate spelling of the Hispanic name "Javier".
  • You Wouldn't Hit a Guy with Glasses: Some drunkards try to pick a fight with (civilian-dressed) Cyclops. He says the stock phrase, so one of them takes off his glasses.

Alternative Title(s): The X Men, Adjectiveless X Men

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