Every X-Men Movie Ranked

Before the spark of imagination that became the Marvel Cinematic Universe had ever been spoken aloud, the X-Men movie franchise developed a new and strange form of storytelling: interconnected characters and narratives that reached across multiple franchises.

It began with a standalone trilogy – a well-told and distinctive ensemble series that centred around relatable characters – and later branched into character-specific standalones and a prequel franchise.

Today, we call it a “shared universe”, and have lived to see this idea normalised across studios, brands and gimmicks. Everything from Marvel Comics to LEGO, Universal Monsters to Hasbro, has either successfully formed a shared universe or has announced plans to do so. But the X-Men franchise was the first in our modern era.

Film franchises and other intellectual property had attempted it before, but none had succeeded in encouraging audiences to jump from place to place quite like Fox’s X-Men franchise did. The Matrix told its labyrinthine story across movies, video games and comic books, but consequently lost momentum between its first film and two sequels, while Marvel contemporary Daredevil/Elektra similarly suffered and other universe projects (such as Sony’s Spider-Man universe) were abandoned.

X-Men was the first successful shared universe project in the Hollywood studio system since the Universal Monsters of the early 20th century. It was the catalyst for a sea change in studio filmmaking, proving that people would happily watch a new movie if it related to an old one they had already grown to love. And so the Marvel Cinematic Universe was born, and with its success came the DC Extended Universe, M. Night Shyamalan’s Split universe, and many, many more. 

Over the course of 14 films, the X-Men franchise rewrote the rule book for studio filmmaking while simultaneously normalising superhero cinema for the masses. Where once the English speaking public had monsters or cowboys, it now had psychics, loners and comedians. 

Arguably the most revolutionary superhero franchise ever, the mainline X-Men series, the prequel team ups, the Wolverine trilogy and the Deadpool trilogy have offered their fair share of memorable moments and exceptional standalone movies. In this edition of Ranked, we at The Film Magazine have compared and contrasted each film, have read up on the critical consensus and audience reception to each, and have ranked all 14 films from worst to best. These are the X-Men Movies Ranked.

14. The New Mutants (2020)

The New Mutants Review

We waited so long to see Josh Boone’s horror-inspired X-Men spin-off that it seemed just about anything would do. With an exciting cast and an enticing premise borrowed from a unique novel, and expectations at rock bottom given the franchise’s drop in quality as well as the many production, marketing and release issues that this film faced, expectations were low but fans were hopeful of a take on the X-Men Universe that would at least offer something different.

The New Mutants still managed to under-deliver on what were very low expectations.

Primarily, the film suffered from not quite knowing what it wanted to be, wanted to achieve, or which genre/s it wanted to be a part of, and its poisonous mix of eye-rolling dialogue and dreadful performances (Anya Taylor-Joy aside) only highlighted everything wrong with this particular release – at least in the other bad X-Men movies there are performances or moments of a relatively high standard.

Despite a serviceable final act that neatly rounds our mutant heroes together against the oppressive force of the facility they’re imprisoned in, The New Mutants temporarily sent the X-Men Universe into The Void with a whimper, its only positives coming per its pre-existing material, with the general quality of the filmmaking being the very worst of the series.

13. X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)

Gavin Hood’s 2009 contribution to the X-Men franchise may have done a much better job of presenting Sabretooth as a viable threat than the original movies did, but the manner in which the film put across legendary Marvel/X-Men characters Gambit and Deadpool left a lot to be desired and a whole heap of people pissed off.

Perhaps the most shambolic mistake this movie made was centring the main emotional story arc of Logan/Wolverine – and primarily the tale of what turned his bones to adamantium – around the mythology of Wolves, which are entirely different creatures from Wolverines (which are more like small bears than angry Dogs).

It’s not that this movie didn’t have its moments, but it felt so much like a child’s claymation project – that being a piece of art that took so many forms in the course of its development that the mish-mash quality of the final product just wasn’t up to scratch.

It was so poorly received critically that Fox cancelled their plans to make the ‘Origins’ spin-off title an entire franchise that would explore some of the X-Men’s most beloved characters. And, while some of these characters have been explored in other franchises since, the issues this movie had remain vital to the lack of progression Channing Tatum found with his long-gestated Gambit standalone.

12. X-Men: Apocalypse (2016)

Apocalypse has too many characters, most of whom are completely neglected in terms of dialog or development, with Olivia Munn’s Psylocke being perhaps the most egregious example of a failed introduction in the entire franchise (Origins’ Deadpool aside).

There were holes in the plot that were so large it seemed you could fit entire pyramids through them, and some of the characterisations entirely missed the mark – think about Magneto destroying half the planet in a magnetic fit of rage and compare it to his struggles at finding the good and bad within himself in X-Men: First Class, or even his methods of destruction in X-Men or X2.

Perhaps most shockingly, Apocalypse himself was a walking contradiction whose infinite powers were never explained properly, nor his weaknesses adequately explored.

Unfortunately, this birthed probably the only bad Oscar Isaac performance of the decade, too, which seems quite the achievement given his astronomical talent.

11. Dark Phoenix (2019)

Dark Phoenix Review

Fox’s final central X-Men franchise release ahead of its reboot under the Marvel Studios banner felt less like the franchise blockbusters of old and more like a passion project sent out to market ahead of when it was due and long after its actors had lost interest.

The film, which re-told the Dark Phoenix narrative of X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), was the feature directorial debut of long-standing X-Men franchise writer Simon Kinberg, who was given the reins following work on The Last Stand, Days of Future Past and Apocalypse. The filmmaker’s passion shone through in some of the movie’s more creative set-pieces, which illustrated his understanding of the characters’ strengths and weaknesses as well as creativity regarding set-up and pay-off; his desire to return to a more tightly-knit central X-Men group also being more in-keeping with the best parts of the fabled comic books than in some of the franchise’s other films.

His hiring did seem like a sign that Fox had given up the ghost ahead of being purchased by Disney however, and the clear passion the director held for the project was one he clearly could not drag out of his much less interested cast; most notably Jennifer Lawrence who was so done with her role as Mystique by this point that she was given an absurdly short filming schedule and barely any screen time (the key beats of which were spoiled in the trailer).

Dark Phoenix did do a lot of things better than its sister movie The Last Stand, but it lacked the gravitas and history The Last Stand carried into it and was only mediocre so far as superhero movies go, leaving this Kinberg picture a spot below its fellow Dark Phoenix story on this list.

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