With the third Avengers: Doomsday trailer is confirmed to feature the original Fox X-Men Professor X (Patrick Stewart), Magneto (Sir Ian McKellen), and Cyclops (James Marsden), fans are ready to see what the MCU has in store for the mutants that we have spent the greater part of two and a half decades getting to know. The new teaser trailer gives us the most comic accurate take on Cyclops we have ever seen, giving him a full on Deadpool and Wolverine style suit, and we’re assuming he won’t be the only member of the team getting an MCU upgrade.
The X-Men are major Marvel characters so their presence in the first decade of the MCU has been sorely missed, and while Fox did justice for the team in fan favorite movies such as First Class, Days of Future Past, and Logan, not every X-Men movie has shown the mutants in the best light (we’re looking at you X3 and The Wolverine, among others). To put it bluntly, Marvel would be stupid to not try and reignite the excitement for these characters if not for the potential box office revenue alone. The Fox X-Men timeline was convoluted and confusing, which led to an underwhelming delivery of some of Marvel’s most famous characters who deserved more. While Deadpool and Wolverine have pretty much been redeemed after their 2024 film, there are still many mutants out there that could use the same treatment, and we have put together a list of the top 5 mutants that we think could (and should) carry their own solo title:
5) Gambit
The idea of a Gambit solo film has been around for a long time now since his inclusion in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, originally played then by actor Taylor Kitsch. The film began gestating in “development hell” all the way back in 2012 and has remained there for the greater part of the decade. Before Kitsch landed the role, it was originally offered to up and coming actor Channing Tatum who ultimately had to decline due to his involvement in the G.I. Joe franchise. Jump ahead to 2024 and both the mutant and the original actor were brought back for the Deadpool and Wolverine movie, giving us Tatum playing almost a spoof of the character delivering ridiculous lines in a ridiculous and nearly inaudible New Orleans accent.
Now, with the character firmly existing within the MCU, I think it’s finally time to give Gambit his own solo film as Tatum proved fans would take positively to the character. Not to mention the post credit scene in Deadpool and Wolverine, while without spoiling a movie that’s been out for a year and a half now, shows that Gambit is definitely alive and out there in the multiverse somewhere. It also helps that the actor has been confirmed to return in this years Avengers: Doomsday. All we ask is that if they do go the route of giving the character a solo film, they tone down the accent so we can actually understand what Gambit is saying and take him seriously. Gambit is a fan favorite mutant with uniquely cool powers, and Tatum is a big name who delivers the character is a uniquely memorable way. While the new version does come off as comedic, they could easily make him more series in his own film while still maintaining some of the silliness that made him so meme-worthy in 2024.
4) Quicksilver
Originally I had Jean Grey in this spot, but after beginning to write I came to the conclusion she really is just more of a supporting Cyclops character then a character to give a solo film to. Fox already tried telling the Dark Phoenix saga twice now, both in X3: The Last Stand and Dark Phoenix, with minimal success between the two. It’s not to say that story will never make a good film, but with that being said my mind immediately went to Quicksilver instead. We’ve already had Quicksilver in the MCU and Fox movies played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Evan Peters respectively, and while The Flash movie from DC didn’t exactly prove that speedsters are ripe for theatrical releases if done wrong, I can’t help but think how much potential is still there. While Johnson’s version was killed off in Avengers: Age of Ultron, Peters’ version had arguably some of the most memorable scenes in the back half of the Fox X-Men universe with a unique delivery of speed powers that up until then really had not been done that way in a film before. I don’t know if Marvel should still use Peters, as his character was turned into a giant joke during Wandavision, or even Taylor-Johnson, but I think the character could easily pull off his own solo film if done correctly.
Superspeed is still, in my opinion, one of the most interesting powers from the comics because of all the different story telling and narrative routes they can take with it. And as it stands, Marvel has not done a great job showing off superspeed as they allowed Taylor-Johnson’s version to be shot down by bullets when he should have been able to completely avoid them without any sort of trouble at all. It diminished the idea of superspeed, which is a shame because while The Flash movie failed to deliver, the TV show on the other hand showed audiences just how fun the idea of zipping through a city and traveling through time on a whim could really be. The Fox movies left us with Quicksilver realizing Magneto is his father, but not fully diving into the complicated relationship. The dynamic between the characters alone could carry a film, and given the fact the character does not have as much widely known established lore like The Flash does, it could give Marvel a chance to redefine their speedster from the ground up. Not to mention if they did decide to keep Evan Peters, they could redeem him from his “Ralph Bohner” period. Why did you ever decide to do that in the first place Marvel, WHY?! We also have Scarlet Witch as an established character in the MCU who could lend some star power and add to the complicated family narrative. The more I write, the more I honestly think a Quicksilver solo film seems like a no-brainer.
3) Storm
While Storm did get significant character development and screen-time in the early days of the X-Men franchise with Halle Berry in the role, the more the universe progressed the less and less we got of her. Storm is a character that is up there with Cyclops in the minds of millennials who grew up with the X-Men in the 90s, but I think the importance of the character has been lost over the past decade or so and could use a new, strong black female to take the lead and reignite the character for a new generation. Halle Berry already did a ton for the idea of female leads and diversity in superhero movies, and before the time superhero films were even super-mainstream. With the way the world is now, I think Storm would be a perfect candidate to represent the same thing once again while also just giving us a bad-ass mutant at the same time. If Marvel does choose to do a female led X-Men film, this is the obvious choice.
Storm has unique weather manipulation powers, which is something that surprisingly is not a power that has actually been explored outside of the X-Men universe as no other characters share that skill set (besides maybe Weather Wizard from The Flash, but does that really count?) The character has been around since the 80s and had even at some points led the X-Men, so the character has the gravitas and name recognition to carry a film. The character has 40 years of background, story, and villains to choose from that could see either her origin as a mutant or give her a chance to have a story parallel to the other mutants on her own. Storm perfectly encapsulates everything that the X-Men have always stood for, and that mixed with the unique powers and plethora of potential story-lines makes her a perfect candidate to get a solo film in the MCU.
2) Nightcrawler
Nightcrawler is a fan favorite of millennials and has also been a big part of the X-Men lore for decades, specifically in the 90s. Millennials can agree that growing up, one of the most recognizable mutants due to the inclusion in the cartoon and the very 90s-ish look was most definitely Nightcrawler. His powers are cool, his look is unique, and even his small inclusions in the Fox film franchise have been extremely cool, helping propel X2: X-Men United as one of the most well received and memorable X-Men movies ever made. Fans have already shown they respond positively to the character, and the original actor Alan Cummings has even been confirmed to return for Avengers: Doomsday. I don’t think Marvel would have used a mutant with such little screen time in the overall grand scheme of the Fox X-Men Universe to come back for an Avengers movie if they didn’t also see the potential in the character.
While not all the movies Nightcrawler were in for Fox were well received, his other inclusions include X3, Apocalypse, and Dark Phoenix – some of the lowest rated films in the franchise, so to say the character has been underutilized is an understatement. Like Storm, you could make a solo film for the character just based off of the tone of the character and their unique abilities alone. The name nostalgia just adds to the appeal. The character has a rich backstory featuring his time in a circus freak show before joining the X-Men, and could be used to give him an emotionally driven script. The character also has a darker tone to him, so if the X-Men movies end up going to different tones and genres for their different solo films then Nightcrawler would offer a very unique aesthetic to include in the mix. I don’t think Nightcrawler just needs a solo film, but I could see this one actually working as a solid origin story as well among a team of characters that don’t all necessarily need their origin stories told in full.
1) Cyclops
This one aslo should go without saying as James Marsden’s Cyclops was unanimously criminally underutilized within the Fox universe. In the later years they used a younger Cyclops more frequently with the Tye Sheridan version appearing in some of the last of the franchise films, Dark Phoenix and Apocalypse. It looks as if right before Disney bought Fox, they were already planning on developing Cyclops more as the leader of the team but all that fell through with the Fox acquisition. Now, with the latest Doomsday trailer, it looks like the MCU is going back to the original Marsden version of the character, and that fact along with the comic accurate costume is more than enough proof most fans should need to know the character should be a main player for the studio for years to come. If there is one mutant that is up there with millennial name recognition at almost the same level as Wolverine, it’s Cyclops, and it’s about time a new generation sees why.
Cyclops has been around since the beginning and was hand picked by Professor X to lead his team. Stan Lee considered the character to be his favorite mutant, along with Beast. If that isn’t enough to warrant the character a solo film, take into account his rivalry with other X-Men heavy hitter Wolverine, his relation to fellow mutants Corsair and Havoc, and his relationship with Jean Grey to be everything a writer needs to come up with a banger of a script… as long as it’s done right (looking at you again, X3). The original Marsden version was killed off by Jean Grey, and due to that fact he basically lost all gravitas from the original X-Men film universe all the way back in 2006. Fox still had Wolverine to bank on, and bank of him they did, but they just let the real leader of the team fall by the wayside while allowing Hugh Jackman’s Logan to thrive for decades. For that fact alone, along with just how g’d awesome that comic accurate costume looks in the trailer, we think Cyclops shouldn’t just get his own film, but should be a priority of Marvel studios up there with characters like Captain America and Spider-Man. All of us 90’s kids would literally just hand the studio our money.
