How The Marvels Sets Up the MCU’s X-Men Reboot

Marvel fans have been waiting for the X-Men to officially join the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and they may have finally got their wish in The Marvels. 20th Century Fox produced the previous X-Men films, but after Disney acquired Fox assets in 2019, that gave Marvel Studios access to the X-Men, Deadpool, and Fantastic Four franchises. Since then, things have been fairly quiet on the X-Men/MCU front, aside from the announcement of Deadpool 3 and the discovery that Kamala Khan may be a mutant in the Ms. Marvel finale. However, The Marvels provides our best confirmation that the X-Men are indeed coming to the MCU.

*WARNING: The following article contains major spoilers for The Marvels. Continue reading at your own risk.

The Marvels features a team-up between Captain Marvel, Ms. Marvel, and Monica Rambeau. After defeating the Kree accuser Dar-Benn, the trio has to close a hole that Dar-Benn opened up in our reality, causing it to bleed into another universe. Monica sacrifices herself to go through the hole and close it from the other side, trapping her in that reality. Captain Marvel and Ms. Marvel know that Monica is lost, but the post-credits scene of The Marvels reveals that she’s still alive and being tended to in what looks like a medical bay.

To everyone’s surprise, Monica wakes up to find her mother, Maria Rambeau, alive and well sitting next to her. However, Maria doesn’t recognize Monica, and a figure off-screen begins to give their theories as to why. When the camera finally pans to show this figure, we see that it’s Kelsey Grammer’s Hank McCoy/Beast from X-Men: The Last Stand and X-Men: Days of Future Past. Another surprise is Maria Rambeau is a hero as well, going with the Binary moniker.

A member of the X-Men makes their MCU debut in The Marvels

With the MCU in the midst of the Multiverse Saga, it was only a matter of time before the X-Men are working alongside the Avengers. Fans understandably assumed Deadpool 3 would be the first appearance of X-Men in the MCU – Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool and Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine are the co-headliners – Beast beat them both to the big screen in The Marvels.

Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige teased that fans would start seeing the X-Men “soon.”

“I don’t know if it’s delicate, it’s super exciting, but the X-Men are as solid and rich and great a concept and characters that exist,” Feige told Entertainment Tonight during The Marvels premiere. “(There’s) the return of the animated series next year, which we’re very excited about. I saw some new final episodes today which really bring you back to that core of who the X-Men are and that soap opera that those characters represent. And in live-action, people will see….perhaps, soon.”

In The Marvels, which arrives in theaters on November 10th, Carol Danvers aka Captain Marvel (Brie Larson) has reclaimed her identity from the tyrannical Kree and taken revenge on the Supreme Intelligence. But unintended consequences see Carol shouldering the burden of a destabilized universe. When her duties send her to an anomalous wormhole linked to a Kree revolutionary, her powers become entangled with that of Jersey City super-fan, Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani) aka Ms. Marvel, and Carol’s estranged niece, now S.A.B.E.R. astronaut Captain Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris). Together, this unlikely trio must team-up and learn to work in concert to save the universe as “The Marvels.” The Marvels will also see the franchise returns of Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury, Saagar Shaikh as Aamir Khan, Zenobia Shroff as Muneeba Khan, and Mohan Kapur as Yusuf Khan. New cast members include Zawe Ashton, Park Seo-joon, and Shamier Anderson. Produced by Marvel Studios, The Marvels is directed by Nia DaCosta with a script from DaCosta, Megan McDonnell, and Elissa Karasik.