7 Great X-Men You Forgot Were Awesome

The X-Men rose to popularity in the late ’70s, and eventually became the most popular team in the comic industry until the mid ’00s. The X-Men created some iconic heroes, with Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm, Jean Grey, and more all becoming well-known heroes. The X-Men have fielded some amazing teams over the decades, and the more popular characters have often gotten the lion’s share of the attention. However, what made the X-Men so popular wasn’t just the well-known heroes, but the sum of the team’s members, each of them bringing something interesting to the team. These second and third-string members of the team have always been a boon to the team, but don’t always get remembered.

Marvel built an entire universe out of the mutant corner of its universe, and this has given the X-Men a small army of pretty great members. There are definitely some members of the team who don’t get the credit they deserve, and were all amazing X-Men. These seven X-Men have been forgotten and are way better than they get credit for being.

7) Bishop

Bishop was introduced in Uncanny X-Men #282, and became one of the stars of the early days of the ’90s X-Men books. Bishop was a mutant policeman from a dystopian future where the X-Men had been killed by a mysterious traitor and went back in time chasing Trevor Fitzroy. Bishop’s energy-absorbining power made a great addition to the team. After the truth behind his future’s events were revealed, Bishop sort of floundered for a while because no one knew what to do with him, and he was dropped into every kind of story you can imagine to see if he’d work. He’s been a hero and a villain, and excels in both of these roles. The years of floundering have made him a more well-rounded character, giving creators way more options to use him.

6) Warpath

Warpath is the brother of the X-Men’s first casualty, Thunderbird, and ended up joining X-Force in the early ’90s. Warpath has the same powers as his brother — superhuman strength, speed, durability, and senses — and was mostly used as generic muscle in most teams he was in. He finally ended up joining the X-Men in the late ’00s story “The Rise and Fall of the Shi’Ar Empire”, given vibranium knives by Storm and acting as the team’s Wolverine — a mouthy loner warrior with cool blades. Warpath got misused on the X-Men rather quickly, eventually moving over to Wolverine’s X-Force, but Warpath is a great character. He brings muscle and a warrior attitude to the team, and is the kind of interesting blank slate character that creators can do anything with.

5) Darwin

Marvel has created some broken superpowers, but few of them are as broken as Darwin’s. Darwin is a mutant whose body evolves to protect it from any danger, making Darwin basically unstoppable. As far as character traits go, Darwin doesn’t really have all that many. He’s mostly just a power set, but what a power set it is. Darwin can be anything creators need him to be, and it’s honestly kind of weird that no one has ever tried to build him into something. Darwin is limitless potential, and hopefully soon a creator will decide to give him the chance he deserves.

4) Monet

The X-Men have had some great members, but few of them are as upfront about it as Monet, sometimes known as M or Penance. Monet St. Croix has some of the best mutant powers ever — super strength, flight, invulnerability, psionic powers, and the ability to transform into a red diamond form with razor-sharp claws — and is one of the most formidable mutants on Earth. She’s always been upfront about how great she is since her debut in Generation X, and is one of the most interesting powerhouses the X-Men have. Monet has only been a member of a few X-Men teams, but she’s always one of the most fun to read about whenever she’s on the page. Monet could easily be an anchor of any X-Men team, and it’s about time that creators realized how useful she can be to the team.

3) Rachel Grey-Summers

Jean Grey is currently the Phoenix, but there’s a much better character to hold the power of life and death. Rachel Grey-Summers came from the “Days of Future Past” time, sent back in time to figure out how to keep her future from happening. Since then, she’s had many names — Phoenix, Marvel Girl, Prestige, and Askani — hanging around with the X-Men, Excalibur, X-Factor, and X-Force. Rachel has always been one of the more confusing characters in the X-Men mythos, coming from a dark future and ending up in an even darker future a millennium later, but that’s part of her charm. She made bringing X-Men from the future to present cool, and is an important part of the X-Men mythos. It honestly seems like most writers don’t want to deal with her unique circumstances, which is a shame. Rachel is a classic X-Man, and deserves better than to be Captain Britain II’s girlfriend.

2) Cable

Cable is the son of Cyclops and Madelyne Pryor, and became one of the X-Men’s most popular characters in the early ’90s. Cable was sent to a future where Apocalypse ruled everything so he could learn to survive the techno-organic virus that he was infected with. Since then, Cable has returned to the present and has become the X-Men’s foremost soldier, founding X-Force before going on years of solo adventures. Cable first joined the X-Men in the year 2000, and has had several berths with the team. Cable is known for his guns, but he’s also an extremely powerful psionic talent, with high level telepathy and telekinesis, although much of that power is used to hold back the techno-organic virus. Cable has a rich history with the X-Men, but often gets left behind. Every time Cyclops brings together another team of mutant soldiers and forgets to recruit his son is a huge mistake.

1) Cannonball

Cannonball was a founding member of the New Mutants, and became Cable’s second in command with X-Force before taking the team over when Cable left. Cannonball led X-Force while they were underground mutant team the X-Men didn’t trust, showing just how great he had become, but was eventually brought onto the main team after “The Age of Apocalypse”. Cannonball was a member of the X-Men for years, before rejoining Rogue’s rapid response team. Since then, he’s gone back to the New Mutants and X-Force, even joining the Avengers during Hickman’s stellar run. Currently, he’s married to Shi’Ar Superguardian Smasher, living on Chandrilar with his wife and child. Cannonball has a rich history with the X-Men, his blasting powers — kinetic energy based flight and an impenetrable force field that absorbs kinetic energy — making him an amazing combatant. Cannonball proves the New Mutants should be on the X-Men and hopefully one day he’ll lead his own X-Men team.

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