The Professor X Mistake Marvel Needs To Avoid In Avengers: Doomsday

Now that the cast has been announced for "Avengers: Doomsday," you've gotta wonder if "X-Men: Doomsday" would be the better title. It's not just Doctor Doom making his Marvel Cinematic Universe debut in the next "Avengers" film, it's also a certain merry band of mutant heroes. The X-Men are all going to be played by their actors from the 20th Century Fox films, including Sir Patrick Stewart as Professor Charles Xavier.

We should've seen this coming. Every gesture the MCU's Multiverse Saga made towards the X-Men brought back the Fox actors. Sir Stewart even played a variant of Xavier in 2022's "Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness." Stewart didn't actually enjoy filming the "Doctor Strange" cameo, but he's back for more! That Xavier wasn't the precise iteration from previous films, but he did quote himself from the movie "X-Men: Days of Future Past." ("Just because someone stumbles and loses their way, doesn't mean they're lost forever.")

"The Marvels" similarly ended with Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) lost in another universe, only to cross paths with Hank "Beast" McCoy (Kelsey Grammer). And, of course, "Deadpool & Wolverine" brought back Hugh Jackman as Logan while simultaneously introducing Channing Tatum as Gambit, who is also coming back for "Doomsday."

Unlike the grandfathered-in Tatum, Stewart has been playing Professor X for 25 years. Even before the first "X-Men" film, he was the no. 1 choice among X-fans to play Xavier in a movie. Like the character, Stewart is a bald white guy, which is about all the fans needed. It helped that he's also one of the greatest actors alive, though.

"Wizard" Magazine readers got their way and Stewart has become synonymous with Professor X. Not even death (or a recasting with James McAvoy) can stop him — as Xavier has proven, many times over. There's been talk that "Doomsday" will give the Fox X-Men films a grand finale, but haven't we already seen that?

Let's run through the previous supposedly-final "X-Men" films, shall we?

1. 2006: "X-Men: The Last Stand," which was meant to wrap things up back when superhero movies could still be trilogies. Professor X dies, imploded by the dark "Phoenix" alter ego of his telekinetic student Jean Grey (Famke Janssen). Xavier's death was there to cement Jean's threat and paint the film as the X-Men's darkest hour. Of course, the movie also suggested Xavier's death wasn't permanent, which 2013's "The Wolverine" confirmed.

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2. 2014: "X-Men: Days of Future Past," depicting a dark alternate future where the X-Men are hunted by mutant-killing Sentinels. Professor X sends Wolverine back in time to change the present. He succeeds, and Logan wakes up to a bright world where all the X-Men who fell in "The Last Stand" still survived. "Days of Future Past" was clearly meant to give the original "X-Men" cast a happy ending while handing the baton off to the new ensemble introduced in the prequel "X-Men: First Class."

3. 2017's "Logan." Meant as a swan song for Jackman's Wolverine, it starred an older Logan in a grim future, half "Unforgiven" and half "The Dark Knight Returns." Of course, Stewart's Xavier was too important to Logan to not bring along for the ride. The 90-year-old Charles is murdered in a surprise attack by Logan's clone, X-24, and buried in an anonymous grave.

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4. 2024's "Deadpool & Wolverine." Professor X doesn't appear, but the film sells itself as a farewell to the 20th Century Fox Marvel films that had been forgotten or uprooted by the Fox-Disney merger of 2019. The end credits feature clips from the "X-Men" films set to Green Day's "Good Riddance (Time of your Life)."

"Logan" is the only one of these that's a great film. "The Last Stand" is a trainwreck, "Deadpool & Wolverine" is obnoxious, and "Days of Future Past" is imperfect but a pleasant enough swan song. "Avengers: Doomsday" is probably going to be diminishing returns.

Now, what about "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness"? Professor X, in a golden, floating chair right out of the 1990s "X-Men" cartoon, leads the Illuminati of Earth-838. His colleagues all fall to Wanda Maximoff aka the Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) from Earth-616, who is possessing her 838 counterpart. Xavier tries to telepathically free the 838 Wanda, but the 616 Scarlet Witch snaps his neck in the astral realm. Thus, Xavier dies in physical reality too.

The best part of the Illuminati sequence in "Multiverse of Madness" was how brief and violent it was. The heroes are all introduced to make the fans cheer; then, not five minutes later, they're brutally murdered. It's about as confrontational  as the MCU has ever gotten with its audience, but that audience should've known that you don't hire Sam Raimi to direct your movie unless you want some horror in it.

There's been speculation that "Doomsday" might pull the same trick and see the X-Men's world eradicated as the multiverse collapses. But even if Professor X dies for the fifth time, I doubt "Doomsday" can manage anything as gruesome as the demonic Scarlet Witch breaking his neck.

Respectfully, Patrick Stewart is 84 years old. I'm sure Marvel must be considering using "Avengers: Secret Wars" to rewrite the MCU's history so the X-Men were always a part of it. But nostalgia is not enough; these actors have already aged out of their roles and expecting them to do yet another "X-Men" film is ludicrous. But if they're not sticking around for the long haul, then any ending the X-Men of old face, happy or brutal, is redundant and old hat at this point.

Regardless, the X-Men desperately need some new blood. The cons of the Fox-Disney merger far outweighed the pros, but at least it could've put the sagging "X-Men" franchise out of its misery and let a clean slate be carved. Of course, that's not what we've got.

The "X-Men" movies never did a good job adapting their characters either. James Marsden as Cyclops? No-one with a straight face can tell me they're excited to see that version of the character back. Those movies only ever used Cyclops to make Wolverine look cooler!

Even the better-handled characters never felt quite right. The delightful Alan Cumming, who played Nightcrawler in "X2," is back in "Doomsday" too. That film nailed Nightcrawler's look, and was brave enough not to strip out his Catholicism. But it also overemphasized that quality, turning Nightcrawler into a morose guy who carves reminders of his sins into his skin. Kurt Wagner doesn't self-flagellate or dwell on his guilt, he's a fun-loving swashbuckler!

The same can be said of Professor X. Likely influenced by the casting, the "X-Men" films depicted Xavier as basically a warmer Captain Jean-Luc Picard: wise, patient, and a man of conviction. That is not who Professor X is. (Take it away, Kitty.)

Marvel Comics

Oh sure, Professor X tries to be those saintly things, and he's a force for good more often than not. But he can also be painfully naive yet self-righteous — two qualities that equal a hypocrite. He's incredibly controlling, too, and, for as much as he loves his students, he has a history of manipulating and pitting them against each other. Charles Xavier is the kind of man who considers himself a "good person" as a fixed quality and justifies his actions from there.

Walt Lewellyn, host of the "Black Casebook" podcast, explained it best:

Patrick Stewart's Professor X isn't a good adaptation of the actual Charles Xavier in the comics, but he *is* a good adaptation of the guy Xavier wants/pretends to be

— The Black Casebook (@BlackCasebook) September 7, 2024

Rather than trotting Patrick Stewart's Xavier out for yet another last goodbye, Marvel Studios should recast and reinvent.

"Avengers: Doomsday" is scheduled for theatrical release on May 1, 2026.