They’re one of the most beloved Marvel teams, containing some of the most iconic superheroes in history. Yes, we’re talking about the X-Men – that ragtag band of Marvel mutants usually found fighting against humans (or each other) to gain acceptance in a world afraid of their abilities.
Professor X, Wolverine, Cyclops and co. have been stalwarts of the superhero genre ever since they first got the live-action treatment back in 2000 – setting the modern benchmark for what comic-book movie adaptations could be, and putting us on the path towards the age of super-powered cinematic universes we’re in the midst of right now.
There have been several iterations of the X-Men over the years – the original bunch, led by Patrick Stewart and menaced by Ian McKellen; their younger counterparts, including James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender; and offshoots into the fourth wall-breaking world of Ryan Reynold’s Deadpool – but which X-Men movie is the best? Read Empire’s official list:
14. X-Men Origins: Wolverine
Read the Empire review here.
On paper, giving Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine an origin movie makes a lot of sense. Who wouldn’t want to see how the fan-favourite lynchpin of Fox’s original X-Men trilogy got his claws? In practice however, sense is just one of many things sorely lacking in Gavin Hood’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine — along with humour, heart, or really any sort of basic narrative cohesion (adamantium bullets, anyone?). Jackman does his best to bring some weight to James Howlett’s quest for peace and pull to violence, and Liev Schreiber is solid as Wolvie’s feral half-brother Sabretooth, but the whole thing is an overwhelmingly dour, head-scratching affair. It’s somewhat apt that this one’s remembered best — or worst — for Ryan Reynolds’ inexplicably mute debut as Deadpool, because honestly, the less said about it the better.
13. X-Men Apocalypse
Read the Empire review here.
Bryan Singer’s 2016 effort X-Men: Apocalypse isn’t quite an Origins level disaster, and does have some solid mutant moments — that ‘Sweet Dreams’ Quicksilver scene; Magneto’s destruction of Auschwitz’s remains. But coming off the back of X-Men: Days Of Future Past’s timey-wimey thrills, here’s a classic case of a movie overpromising and under-delivering. You see, the real problem with Apocalypse is, well, Apocalypse — and his Four Horsemen. Oscar Isaac is criminally buried under eyesore prosthetics as Marvel’s ancient, all-powerful first mutant En Sabah Nur, whose motivations and powerset both go woefully ill-defined. Alongside him, Storm (Alexandra Shipp), Angel (Ben Hardy), and Psylocke (Olivia Munn) are given unforgivably short shrift, whilst Michael Fassbender’s Master of Magnetism is lumbered with a frustratingly predictable “Oh look, he’s bad again!” arc. But hey, Apocalypse isn’t the end of the world, right? Oh…
12. Dark Phoenix
Read the Empire review here.
Anyone who knows their X-Men knows that Chris Claremont and John Byrne’s Dark Phoenix Saga is arguably the single most beloved Marvel mutant story ever written. And to pay veteran X-Men movie scribe Simon Kinberg his dues, having failed to do the saga justice with his overstuffed X-Men: The Last Stand script, as the writer and first-time director of 2019’s Dark Phoenix he does a solid (if unspectacular) job of adapting it. Sophie Turner balances Jean’s fear and growing darkness well, her affecting relationships with Tye Sheridan Cyclops and James McAvoy’s Charles Xavier smuggling a refreshing intimacy into the movie’s otherwise all-too-familiar blockbuster framework. But plagued by reshoots, overshadowed by news of the Disney/Fox merger, and hampered by a disappointingly bombastic finale, Kinberg’s film only shines in flickers, never really threatening to burn bright.
11. The New Mutants
Read the Empire review here.
Having been hampered by delays, reshoots, the Disney/Fox merger (again), and a pandemic, that Josh Boone’s The New Mutants is actually a movie we got to see at all is frankly a miracle. The film itself — a hospital-set, horror-inflected take on mutants led by Anya Taylor-Joy, Maisie Williams, and Charlie Heaton — is somewhat less so. The young cast bring some much-needed colour to the movie’s dark, gloomy palette: a pre-megastardom Taylor-Joy pops as sword-wielding Russian sorceress Ilyana ‘Magik’ Rasputin; and the queer romance between Williams’ Rahne and Alice Braga’s Dani carries a lovely tenderness. You just can’t help feeling that this was a bit of a missed opportunity. The horror is more Halloweentown than Halloween, the action is eminently forgettable, and any real depth was seemingly cut out in the editing suite. A disappointing (then-)curtain closer on Fox’s X-Men.
10. X-Men: The Last Stand
Read the Empire review.
Brett Ratner’s original X-Men trilogy-capper is very much a tale of two halves. On the one hand, we get a surprisingly well executed adaptation of Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men ‘Gifted’ arc, which centres around the discovery of a cure for mutants and the newly-sown divisions that creates. On the other, we get a seriously diluted take on the famously sprawling Dark Phoenix Saga that dispassionately bumps off James Marsden’s Scott Summers early doors, heinously speedruns Jean Grey’s Phoenix Force struggle, and loses the tragedy of that arc’s conclusion in favour of moments like, erm, Vinnie Jones’ abominable “I’m the Juggernaut, bitch!” meme reference. Magneto lifting the Golden Gate bridge, Wolvie lighting his cigar with fire mid-battle, and Anna Paquin’s soulful Rogue performance are highlights, but after the brilliance of X2, Ratner’s film is more a last stumble than a last stand.
9. Deadpool 2
Read the Empire review here.
Right from its 007-aping, Céline Dion banger-boasting opening titles, Deadpool 2’s MO is clear — go big, or go home. Directed by ‘One Of The Guys Who Killed The Dog In John Wick’, Ryan Reynolds’ sophomore outing as the Merc With A Mouth is every bit as fourth-wall breaking, cuss-filled, and ultra-violent as its predecessor, only now — thanks to the serious moolah the first movie made — with added star power. Josh Brolin is a distinctly non-Thanosian blast as time-travelling supersoldier Cable (Reynolds and Brolin’s “You’re so dark, are you sure you’re not from the DC universe?” tête-à-tête is sublime); Hunt For The Wilderpeople breakout Julian Dennison’s feisty Firefist winds up giving the film’s ‘found family’ angle real emotional chops; and Zazie Beets shines as X-Force spearhead Domino. Sure, it’s mostly more of the same from Deadpool, but when ‘the same’ is this much fun, it’s hard to complain.
8. The Wolverine
Read the Empire review here.
At the end of our original X-Men Origins: Wolverine review, we said a spin-off with Wolverine “kicking ass in Japan” would’ve been far more fun. Enter James Mangold’s The Wolverine to prove us right. Set amidst the rural ryokans of Tomonoura and bustling streets (and love hotels) of Tokyo, Hugh Jackman’s sixth outing as the mutton-chopped mutie — inspired by Frank Miller and Chris Claremont’s seminal 1982 Wolverine run — is a beautifully shot, soulful ronin tale. Haunted by visions of Famke Janssen’s Jean Grey, Japan-bound by an immortality-stripping life debt a wealthy Japanese industrialist is keen to repay, and embroiled in struggles of love (with Tao Okamoto’s Mariko) and war (with the Yakuza and Svetlana Khodchenkova’s venomous Viper), Jackman’s Wolverine gets both a character study and an action showcase worthy of his name here. And that bullet train sequence? Holy Snikt – it’s incredible.
7. Deadpool
Read the Empire review.
It might’ve taken a decade of relentless campaigning, a wince-worthy mouth-sewn-shut appearance in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, and a not-at-all-strategically leaked bit of test footage for Ryan Reynolds to finally bring his Deadpool to the screen in all his R-rated glory, but boy was it worth the wait. Releasing mere months before Bryan Singer’s aggressively self-serious X-Men Apocalypse came along and torpedoed Fox’s mainline X-Men franchise, Wade Wilson’s solo cinematic debut — a gleefully irreverent, anarchically meta proper introduction to everybody’s favourite cancer-riddled anti-hero — proved just the shot in the arm the superhero genre needed. Reynolds is clearly having the time of his life wielding katanas, cracking wise, and making fourth wall breaks inside fourth wall breaks (that’s like, 16 walls!) as the acid-tongued assassin, and the whole movie is an object exercise in smart silliness, shrewdly skewering genre convention in between all the dick jokes.
6. Deadpool & Wolverine
Read the Empire review here.
As a wise Deadpool once said, “Get your special sock out nerds — it’s gonna get good!” Marvel Jesus’ arrival in the MCU is a doozy, as indebted to the sensitive buddy-comedy stylings of Planes, Trains, And Automobiles as it is to the decades of Fox and MCU movies it cusses out, pays tribute to, and pulls its insane cameos from. Reynolds and Hugh Jackman anchor the multiversal madness of director Shawn Levy’s movie brilliantly, bringing real pathos to frenemies Wade Wilson and Logan. There’s some surprisingly nuanced soul-searching and off-the-scale chemistry, as the pair absolutely tear it up in a nerdgasmic haze of C-bombs, snikts, and choral Madonna needledrops. From the astonishing *NSYNC opening title sequence all the way through to the emotional closing credits, this is just about everything you — and, let’s be honest, Marvel Studios head honcho Kevin Feige — could possibly want from Reynolds and Jackman’s long-awaited mutant team-up.
5. X-Men
Read the Empire review here.
The movie that started it all. The Marvel mutants’ first appearance on the big screen back in 2000 launched a new era of superhero films, and brought the X-Men to life with some of the best casting decisions ever made – Hugh Jackman breaking out as the grumpy but fiercely likeable Logan; acting legends Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen thoroughly regal as old friends Professor X and Magneto; Rebecca Romijn on ruthless, seductive form as Mystique; plus James Marsden, Famke Janssen, Anna Paquin, Halle Berry… the list goes on. The ensemble slots together perfectly, and this first film sets up Xavier’s school, the history between the characters, and the societal implications of what it is to be a mutant effortlessly but effectively. It loses a tiny bit of steam in the Statue of Liberty-set final act, but is still one heck of a first instalment for the gang.
4. X-Men: First Class
Read the Empire review here.
Matthew Vaughn introduces a whole new swathe of X-Men stars in this ‘60s-set exploration of how the band of mutants first got together, with James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Jennifer Lawrence taking up the mantles of Charles Xavier, Erik Lensherr and Raven/Mystique respectively. We see how they all initially met, with Charles providing Erik with a safe place to harness his powers and emotions, and establishing the X-Mansion as a training ground for young versions of Hank McCoy (Nicholas Hoult), Havok (Lucas Till), Banshee (Caleb Landry Jones) and more. Weaving in Erik’s World War II past with the Cuban Missile Crisis, First Class culminates in a showdown between the newly formed X-Men and Kevin Bacon’s murderous former Nazi general Sebastian Shaw. McAvoy and Fassbender embody their two iconic characters magnificently, their chemistry fleshing out the friendship and clashing ideals that we know is a backdrop to what Professor X and Magneto eventually become. Throw in some properly exciting super-power flourishes – Erik turning the satellite, January Jones’ Emma Frost turning into pure diamond, the shot panning between a frozen Shaw and Charles screaming as Erik sends the coin through the former’s brain – and you’ve got a thrilling start to the new timeline.
3. X-Men: Days Of Future Past
Read the Empire review here.
A good while before Avengers: Infinity War marketed itself as ‘the most ambitious crossover event’ in cinema history, we got Days Of Future Past – a time-travelling wonder that brought together both generations of X-Men cast (and, of course, the yet-to-be-replaced Hugh Jackman as Wolverine) to try and stop the wiping out of all mutant-kind. Combining dark apocalyptic action from the ‘Future’ contingent, and ‘70s-set, long-haired, bell-bottom-wearing interpersonal drama from the ‘Past’, this seventh instalment in the X-Men franchise deepened the bonds between the characters, as the world continues making it difficult for mutants to exist. We see chinks in Charles’ armour as he deals with his paralysis; Hank and Raven are divided by their views on showing their real selves; grainy Zapruder-style footage gives a great sense of time and place; Jackman is a fantastic lynchpin between the two settings; and the fascinating powers of those in the future timeline make for some incredibly choreographed action. Not to mention the Magneto prison break sequence with Evan Peters’ Quicksilver – pure mutant magic.
2. X2
Read the Empire review here.
Long considered the best of all the X-Movies, Bryan Singer’s 2003 sequel comes a close second in Empire’s list. It opens in serious style, with teleporter Nightcrawler (played beautifully by Alan Cummings) making an attempt on the President’s life – which sets in motion the resurgence of calls for some kind of mutant registration act. The X-Mansion is attacked, Magneto is broken out of his plastic prison cell (in a very different way to Days Of Future Past, but still mightily effective), and Logan comes face to face with William Stryker, the military scientist that put all that adamantium in him decades before. With several of the schoolkids captured, and Charles being manipulated into using Cerebro for evil by Stryker’s son Jason, the X-Men and Magneto team up to bring their common enemy down. Brian Cox is thoroughly menacing as Stryker – one of the all-time superhero movie villains – and Hugh Jackman takes Wolverine to new, more emotional places. The police stand-off scene that sees Pyro let loose and Wolverine shot in the head (“Put the knives down!” “I can’t.”) is great, but it’s the grief-stricken finale that seals the deal for X2, with Jean Grey sacrificing herself to lift the jet out of the oncoming floods, and save the others.
1. Logan
Read the Empire review here.
It was meant to be the big farewell to Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine – but even though the Aussie star donned those adamantium claws again for Deadpool & Wolverine, James Mangold’s sombre masterpiece Logan is still an incredible closing chapter for a character that has helped define the superhero genre on screen. Set in 2029, the film finds Logan ageing, his healing factor fading, working as a limousine driver in Texas to help take care of an elderly Charles Xavier. It’s a time where no new mutants have been born for decades – but the pair soon come across ‘X-23’, or Laura (Dafne Keen), an almost-feral young girl with Wolverine-like abilities. This is X-Men for grown-ups, with Mangold not holding back on the F-bombs, the ultra-violence, or the adult emotional drama. Charles is suffering from Alzheimer’s, which combines with his telepathic powers to induce seizures, making him a weapon of mass destruction; Logan is coming to terms with the fact that, finally, mortality might be chasing him down. Both Stewart and Jackman are excellent, given far bigger scope to dig into the knotty relationship between their characters by the darker material, and Keen’s ferocious performance is a revelation. That a movie this refreshing, this complex, and this moving could be made almost two decades into the X-Men franchise is truly a Marvel miracle.