1. X-Men Endangered Species
(Mike Carey, Christos Gage, Christopher Yost, Craig Kyle, Mark Bagley, Scott Eaton, Andrea DiVito, Mike Perkins)

Beast has been the X-Men's science guy for a while. He is racking his brains trying to figure out how to reverse the destruction The Scarlet Witch has wreaked on the mutant population. He teams up with his sketchy Age Of Apocalypse alternate, Dark Beast, and some other questionable allies to try and discover a way out of mutants going completely extinct. It's a nice, thinking X-book that completely sets up the next episodes non-stop action madness.

For more Beast-centric adventures, he and his green-haired special agent friend team up in X-Men SWORD: No Time To Breathe, which also features Special Agent Lockheed. Yea, Kitty Pryde's dragon.


2. X-Men Messiah Complex
(Ed Brubaker, Mike Carey,  Christopher Yost, Craig Kyle, Chris Bachalo, Humberto Ramos, Billy Tan, Marc Silvestri, Billy Tan, David Finch)

For the first time after The Decimation, Cerebra registers a new mutant. But this isn't a teenager getting their powers, it's a new baby. This story connects four different runs of X-books, most of them mediocre or awful, but apart from one story thread (Predator X is hella stupid), this is probably the best X-crossover of the 21st century.


3. Wolverine Origin Deadpool
(Daniel Way, Steve Dillon)

Since getting his memories back last season, all the Wolverine books became this super-serious and maudlin book about coming to terms with his past. His past in Japan. His past in Canada. His past in Weapon X. His past in the X-Men. His past in Des Moines. His past as the understudy to Jean Valjean in Les Mis. It's exhausting, and mostly awful. Meanwhile, he's also in the X-Force books exploiting other mutants and killing a bunch of dudes, so his future isn't looking much brighter. 

One of the main plot points in his ongoing series (which you should avoid) is that he has a son, and his son is a lot like him. And evil. And Wolverine wants to save him. It's also dire and maudlin. Except when Deadpool shows up. This whole volume is a Looney Tunes episode with Deadpool as Bugs Bunny and Wolverine as Elmer Fudd, and Dakken (Wolverine's son) ends up as a bit of  a Daffy Duck. It's fun and silly, while also progressing Wolverine and his son's story forward in a way that the more serious books were unable to do.

Deadpool titles are always a mixed bag, but the first volume of Daniel Way's Deadpool Secret Invasion is a fantastic read, and may inspire you to keep reading Way's run on Wade Wilson, which is inconsistent but way better than his run on the Wolverine family.


4. Astonishing X-Men Exogenetic
(Warren Ellis,  Phil Jiminez)

The Brood are back! The green haired director of SWORD, and Beast's sort of girlfriend is back! Are there...Krakoan Sentinels? The elite X-Men team is only slightly different from the Whedon run, but things have changed. Beast is wary of Cyclops, Storm is the aloof Queen of Wakanda, Armor refuses to take shit from Wolverine, and Emma Frost is...still pretty much Emma.

There's a later volume of Astonishing X-Men called Children Of The Brood that's also fun, filled with Brood and Brand, and even features a returned character!


5. Cable Waiting For The End Of The World
(Duane Swierczynski, Michael Lacombe)

At the end of Messiah Complex, Cable took the baby into the future, and Bishop followed. The concept is great. Unfortunatelty, the series became sort of one-note as it went on, but this is the peak of the series. 

There is a crossover series of Cable & X-Force Messiah War that's not the greatest story in the world, but it will give you a glimpse of X-Force, a check in with Deadpool, and the continued saga of time traveling Cable, Bishop, and  Hope.


6. Wolverine Dark Prince
(Daniel Way, Marjorie Liu, Giuseppe Camuncoli)

Wolverine's son Dakken is, in many ways, way more interesting than his dad. During this era of the Marvel Universe, SHIELD had been renamed HAMMER and was being run by Norman Osborne. He made evil versions of The Avengers, and The X-Men, and pretty much all the heroes. But Dakken, who is Osborne's Wolverine, isn't really evil, he's just self-interested, so watching him interact with actual villains makes for a fun story.

While not about any of the X-Men that I recall, one of the best titles to come out of  the ridiculous HAMMER-time Dark era of the Marvel Universe is Kelly Sue Deconnick's  Osborne: Evil Incarcerated.


7. X-Factor Time & A Half, and X-Factor Overtime
(Peter David, Valentine De Landro, Marco Santucci)
It's another mutant birth! As Madrox and Siryn's baby is born. Plus, Darwin, Longshot, and Shatterstar join the cast, and we get a glimpse into the non-Cable focused post-Messiah Complex future,  as the noir aspect of X-Factor becomes progressively more meta, and more progressive. 

I would keep reading the series, as X-Factor The Invisible Woman Has Vanished and X-Factor Second Coming continue to evolve the X-Factor stories in fascinating ways.


8. New Mutants Return Of Legion, and New Mutants Necrosha
(Zeb Wells, Diogenes Neves, Paul Davidson)

While the 1980s New Mutants run is a fan favorite for a lot of people, it wasn't a book that I loved. So I really enjoyed that Zeb Wells made these characters interesting to me. There are a ton of returning characters in these two volumes, as we re-establish the middle generation of mutants, as they are becoming one of the top tier X-teams. This volume skirts one of the worst crossovers of the new millenium, Necrosha, but Wells makes the New Mutants corner of the crossover impactful and fun.

I'm actually missing  a huge chunk of the New Mutants run, so I can't for sure speak to its quality. But these two volumes are good enough that I will hunt down the next couple of volumes and check them out myself.


9. X-Men Second Coming
(Mike Carey,  Zeb Wells, Matt Fraction, Craig Kyle, Christopher Yost, Greg Land, David Finch, Mike Choi, Ibraim Roberson, Terry Dodson)

Guess who's back? Back again? Hope is back. Tell a friend. So is Cable, by the by. The return of the prodigal mutants ends up, much like Mesiah Complex, doing a fantastic job of weaving a bunch of mediocre or worse storylines from the Uncanny, Legacy, X-Force, Astonishing, Wolverine, and Cable runs, as well as the excellent New Mutants and X-Factor runs into one giant game-changing story. 


10. Uncanny X-Force The Apocalypse Solution
(Rick Remender, Jerome Opena)

Ending the season on a dark note. While the original X-Force was a muddily colored, X-treeem Darque Edgee Goth action book, this reimagining of the team comes across as brutal and necessary. This first volume shows how Angel has assembled this updated team to track down and kill Apocalypse. It's a typical Nothing Is As It Seems Nor Goes The Way You Expect It, but it's paced perfectly, and I'd be impressed if anyone actually saw how this story plays out in the end.

The next volume of Uncanny X-Force is pretty terrible, so skip it, and go check out Remender and Opena's  Fear Agent​ series.

Episode 1: Wolverine Ultimate Rucka
(Greg Rucka, Darick Robertson, Leandro Fernandez)

Wolverine is the most overyhyped at what he does, and what he does is feature in every X-team and spin-off, whilst also having two or three of his own titles, along with the occasional mini-series. Also, most of his work as a solo character is dreadful to read. Rucka puts him in a less-spandex scenario, as he tracks down human traffickers, while he's being pursued by an obsessed detective.  The first two storyarcs are excellent, and have some well-conceived Nightcrawler cameos. The third arc is Not Very Good, as Sabretooth and Yet Another Version Of Wolverine/Sabretooth/Feral/Wolfsbane/X-23/Wildchild/Lady Deathstrike/etc shows up, prompting a paint-by-numbers Weapon X story. It's a testament to how much I liked the first two stories that I am allowing the last third of the book to corrupt my list a bit.

If you enjoyed the first 2/3rds of this volume, check out Batwoman Elegy by  Rucka and JH Williams III. It's a beautiful standalone story in the Batman universe that I can safely recommend more than any book about Wolverine.


Episode 2: NYX Complete Collection
(Joe Quesada, Joshua Middleton, Rob Teranishi, Marjorie M. Liu, and Kalman Andrasofszky)

Last season we met X-23, a Wolverine clone who actually has an interesting backstory. In NYX, she, along with several other teenage mutants in District X, end up thrown into a series of unfortunate conflicts that would normally see The X-Men, Professor X, or one of the spin-off teams show up to help them out. But in this book, that never happens. A bunch of teenagers are left to their own devices, and, really, nothing ends up going their way.

Brian K Vaughan's Runaways also deals with super-powered teenagers not given the guidance of older superheroes, and it's a Must Read for fans of young adult superhero books.


Episode 3: X-Factor Madrox Multiple Choice
(Peter David, Pablo Raimondi)

A near-perfect noir tale following The Multiple Man, as he and some of his former X-Factor teammates (Siryn, Wolfsbane, and Strong Guy) are ensnared in a mafia love triangle by one of Madrox's rogue duplicates. Peter David's tweaking of Madrox's powers makes the character much more interesting than he was in any previous X-books, and David manages to mostly balance his Dad Joke humor with this complex character study.

The first twelve volumes of Peter David's X-Factor are pretty good. But you can stop reading there. Really. Stop. Don't do that to yourself.


Episode 4: Astonishing X-Men By Joss Whedon and John Cassaday Ultimate Collection Volume 1
(Joss Whedon, John Cassaday)

Marvel should use this book as a textbook for incoming X-writers. While the series eventually got bogged down a bit by overly-complex storylines, long-delayed issues, and editorial continuity problems, this first volume is a perfect quippy superhero book. It uses each of its characters with deliberation, it includes some backstory but mainly trusts its readers to figure out chracters' relationships, it reintroduces a dead character in a reasonable way, and it also introduces new villains who are challenging, but aren't The Most Powerful Villains The World Has Ever Seen. Whedon elevates one of the Academy X kids up to the main roster, and it works, which is not always the case. Also, Cassaday's art is cinematic and hypnotizing in the best way.

By all means, check out Ultimate Collection Volume 2. It's still good, it's just not *as* good as this volume.


Episode 5: Wolverine Enemy Of The State
(Mark Millar, John Romita Jr, Kaare Andrews)

This book seemed tailor-made for me to hate it. This is around the tipping point where Millar's work started to irritate me. I'm not a fan of Romita Jr.'s art, and, as stated earlier, Wolverine solo books rarely interest me. This book, however, has every creator working to their strength in a story about what happens when Wolverine is corrupted. And while he is certainly the center of this volume, Enemy Of The State is more about how the Marvel Universe (not just the mutants, either, SHIELD and The Avengers play a big part in this) deals with an evil Wolverine. Romita Jr. gets to draw a bunch of full spread action shots, and technology-filled backgrounds, and does so with  a precision I haven't seen in most of his other work.

New X-Men Academy X : X-Posed includes Wolverine's rampage through the Xavier school through the lens of the students. On the whole, the collection isn't superb, but the crossover issue in the middle is perfect, and it's an otherwise fun look at the soap-opera that is the teenage mutant squads of Academy X.


Episode 6: Astonishing X-Men: Mystique Vol 3: Unnatural
(Sean McKeever, Manuel Garcia)

Time to check in with Charles Xavier's espionage agent, as Mystique and Shortpack try to dismantle a corporation that's using mutants as guinea pigs for drug testing.

There is another volume of McKeever's run on Mystique, and it ties up everything he and Brian K Vaughan set forth in the series, but it's my least favorite of the four volumes.


Episode 7: House Of M
(Brian Michael Bendis, Olivier Coipel)

Starting with Avengers Dissasembled, and feeding into the background of several other books, including the second volume of Excalibur, a story has unfolded about The Scarlet Witch losing her ability to control her powers. A series of traumas cause her to create an entirely different set of traumas for herself and her Avengers teammates. Eventually, Charles Xavier and Magneto (who never came back, destroyed New York City and died again, in this continuity) try and help her, but they're not strong enough. House Of M gives you the essentials for what you need to know before it gives every mutant their fondest desire in an alternate reality where mutants are the majority, and Magneto is one of the most powerful kings in the world. It's a much condensed anti-Age Of Apocalypse, and its ending changed the Marvel Universe in an immense way.

Avengers Disassembled is where Bendis starts this storyline, and it's worth the read, even if you're not completely familiar with the Avengers of the early 2000s.


Episode 8: House Of M World Of M Wolverine
(Daniel Way, Reginald Hudson, Brian Michael Bendis, and more)

Fleshing out the main story of House of M, this volume, like Enemy Of The State, focuses less on Wolverine, and more how heroes react when they believe Wolverine has gone rogue. The main character in the series is actually Mystique, Agent Of SHIELD, whose adventures line up quite a bit with the Mystique that works for Charles Xavier. It's got a few great twists, and shows you why Wolverine made a seemingly abrupt decision in the main House Of M book. The other stories in this volume are okay, but you can skip them for the purpose of this continuity.

Daniel Way is my favorite writer to ever work on Deadpool , and if you've ever been curious to read a book about the meta-assassin but didn't know where to begin, pick up Deadpool By Daniel Way Ultimate Collection Volume 1.


Episode 9: Decimation Generation M
(Paul Jenkins and Ramon Bachs)

Written from the perspective of a journalist who lost her mutant daughter to natural causes before the events of House Of M, this book seeks to discover why so many mutants were depowered, as the world at large has no memory of House Of M taking place. It's a much better way to check in with the depowered mutants than the main books which are Garbage Fire Bad. 

Decimation Mutopia X by  David Hine is also worth reading, as it first presents his District X story, in the context of House Of M, then has the cast dealing with the reprecussions when the world resets. 


Episode 10: New X-Men Childhood's End
(Craig Kyle, Christopher Yost, Mark Brooks, Paul Pelletier)

Won't anyone think of the children? The Academy X storyline tends to fall on the melodramatic side of the X-books. Pre-House Of M, and during House Of M, the stories didn't really earn their melodrama. But the Childhood's End storyline has no qualms about killing off characters in droves, and leaving the survivors to figure out the consequences. It's a shame the books about the adults weren't as bold as this series.

.If you enjoy this, you can go back and check out the New X-Men Academy X books to get some backstory for the non X-Men characters.

A few years ago, while working on the now defunct VeXed-Men website, I did a series of The X-Men in ten seasons, where I did some exhaustive reading, some skimming, some Wikipedia-ing, and some trips to the used book store that carries comics, and put together an exhaustive timeline of how to read the X-Men using pretty much all of the trade paperbacks that were then available.

Don't do that to yourself.

In the last couple of months, I've been reading nearly 100 X-Men and X-Men adjacent books including spin-off titles like  Cable, X-Factor, X-Force, X-Man, Generation X, Rogue, Wolverine, Wolverine & Gambit...if it has been collected into trade in the last fifteen years or so, I've read it and reviewed it on Goodreads, and it made me question why I ever even liked the X-Men.

For this project, I'm just going to condense it down to the books I enjoyed reading. There are going to be ten "episodes" per season, and it's going to lean heavily and more modern stories/collections because they're easier to access, and some of the writing techniques of the 60s, 70s, and 80s haven't aged well.  Season one took us from the original stories all the way through the Claremont run and beyond. This season focuses on the late 90s/early 21st century X-Men with a focus on the better spin-offs

Episode 1: X-Men Gold Homecoming
(written by Joe Kelly, Joe Casey, Jorge Gonzales, and Bill Rosemann, art by Carlos Pacheco, Jeff Johnson, German Garcia, and Mat Broome)

90s X-Men books were terrible. The comic boom at the beginning of the decade meant that Marvel continually introduced new characters, higher stakes, sillier villains, and massive crossovers, almost all of which were terrible. But in the midst of the garbage fire was a run of issues that gave some actual depth to the weird assemblage of X-Men, most of whom have since fallen out of continuity: Cecelia Reyes, Marrow, Maggot, and Joseph. There's no single threat against the team, most issues are one-and-dones that build relationships between the new characters and the classic ones, while giving some spotlight time to various villains. There are no cosmic consequences, it's just some very enjoyable superhero comicing.

If you like this volume, check out  X-Men Vs Apocalypse: The Twelve by everyone who worked at Marvel in the 90s. It's a mixed bag of art and storylines, but it encapsulates the high drama of prophecy, which was so prevelant in 90s/early 21st century X-books.


Episode 2: X-Men Dream's End
(written by Chris Claremont,  Joe Pruett, Robert E. Weinberg, Scott Lobdell, art by  Salvador Larroca), Leinil Francis Yu, Tom Derenick, and Michael Ryan)

While not my favorite X-storyline, this ties up a ton of 90s storylines that I saved you from having to read. The Legacy Virus, a metaphor for the AIDS crisis that removed the sexual stigma from the disease, and focused only on the prejudice that having the disease brought, was a major plot point in all of the X-books for years, and here, it's done away with after a character is martyred. This volume isn't focused on a single X-Team, rather it travels across the vast array of X-characters to show them all this pivotal time in their continuity. This collection also features the best art Rob Liefeld has ever done.

Fans of this book should check out X-Men Legends 4: Feared & Hated, which takes an anthology approach to showing the world that the mutants inhabit around the changeover from the Lobdell/Nicieza era to the Morrison  relaunch.


Episode 3: Exiles Complete Collection Volume 1
(written by Judd Winnick, art by Mike McKone and Jim Calafiore)

I avoided including the Age Of Apocalypse because it's a long trudge through an alternate universe that mostly doesn't matter at all to continuity. And it's exhausting. The Exiles is a book that takes a bunch of mutants from alternate dimensions and teams them up to stop a "massive ripple" that threatens the the destruction of all universes. This is a silly concept, but what it does is give us a team of lesser-known mutants and sends them to pivotal points in various timelines and allows us to see stories like The Dark Phoenix Saga, Wolverine's escape from Weapon Plus, and The Phalanx Covenant from different perspectives. It's mainly fun, although the misogynist Morph character is excruciating.

Exiles Complete Collection Volume 2 is not  quite as good, but is worth reading if you really like these characters.


Episode 4: New X-Men By Grant Morrison Ultimate Collection Volume 1
(written by Grant Morrison, art by Frank Quitely, Ethan Van Sciver, Leinil Francis Yu, Igor Kordey, and Tom Derenick)

This is the X-Men run that changed the entire direction of  how Marvel presented its mutant books. Morrison focuses on making the school a larger priority, inventing secondary mutations for long-time characters to keep them fresh, re-examining interpersonal relationships, and evolving the team from tights to leather. There is a lot of story packed into this volume, and it's all great.

Joe Casey was writing the other major title during this era and the collection X-Men X-Corps seeds some interesting ideas into the universe that, sadly, ended up not going anywhere. But the setups are all interesting enough to check out.


Episode 5: Mystique By Brian K Vaughan Ultimate Collection
(written by Brian K. Vaughan, art by  Jorge Lucas, Manuel García, and Michael Ryan)

Morrison's run really has changed the face of the entire franchise. Now that Professor X has gone public and corporate, he can't be seen doing controversial things. So he rescues Mystique from the consequences of her life of crime and sends her on missions the X-Men can't be seen being involved in. It's a fun espionage book by one of the better comic book writers of the modern era. 

Brian K Vaughan also did a Wolverine story called Logan, if you find yourself jonesing for more Vaughan X-titles, but I'm not a huge fan. Instead, I'd recommend his run on Runaways.


Episode 6: New X-Men By Grant Morrison Ultimate Collection Volume 2
(written by Grant Morrison, art by John Paul Leon, Igor Kordey, Phil Jimenez, Ethan Van Sciver, Keron Grant, and Frank Quitely)

While not as strong as the beginning of his run, this volume deals with the massive fallout from the first volume, introduces some more fantastic characters, and majorly develops the biggest and most important romantic shift in the history of the X-books.

I can't stop you from reading New X-Men By Grant Morrison Ultimate Collection Volume 3. Many fans love it. It does wrap up Morrison's run, and has earth-shattering plot reveals and a death that they didn't undo for well over a decade. But, personally, I hate it, and think it undoes all of Morrison's work on the first two volumes, exposing Marvel's editorial overreaches, and Morrison's flaws when it comes to completing his vision.


Episode 7: X-Force Famous, Mutant, And Mortal
(written by Peter Milligan, art by Mike Allred and Darwyn Cooke)

This is probably the weirdest book I'm going to include in continuity.It's a collection of characters who you don't ever really see again, who serve as the capitalist media front for the obsession with mutant superheroes that Professor X's public relations stunts thrust into the public. They're a team of fame hungry pseudo-heroes, and they die on a fairly regular basis, only to be replaced with other temporary heroes. The story is just okay. But Allred's art, as well as Cooke's fill-in issue are gorgeous. It also does work as satire of turn of the century media.

If you want to find out how things pan out for the characters that survive this volume, the title changes to X-Statix and includes art by other indie luminaries not often seen on mainstream books, including Paul Pope! But I actually think that if you like the art, you should take a vacation from the X-Men and check out any of Allred's superhero title: Madman.


Episode 8: Nightcrawler Guardian Devil
(written by Robert Aguirre-Sacasa, art by Darick Roberston)

While Morrison changed the face of the X-Men for the better on his New X-Men run, Chris Claremont attempted a series of misguided side-stories called X-Treme X-Men, and Chuck Austen flung bags of wet diarrhea and flaming turds at readers under the guise of them being Uncanny X-Men issues (poor Austen gets a lot of flack for being The Worst Writer In X-Men History, but having read nearly 100 X-books in the past month, he has earned that title with his consistent inability to understand characters and the microphone feedback that he mistakes for dialogue composition). The Absolute Worst of Austen's run was called The Draco, and focused on Nightcrawler being fooled into believing he was a priest by a mutant hating church group that planned to make him The Pope and then...umm...well...then something was going to happen damn it. It's impressive how awful it is. This is a counterpoint to that storyline, as Nightcrawler and his faith are pitted against horror and mythology. It's sort of Nightcrawler as Hellboy.

If you're in the mood for more Nightcrawler, go back and check out the beginning of Claremont's  Excalibur run in  Excalibur Epic Collection: The Sword Is Drawn. I don't recommend the second volume of Aguirre-Sacasa's Nightcrawler run.


Episode 9: X-23 Innocence Lost
(written by Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost, ar by Billy Tan)

A series about a Wolverine clone sounds boring. And by all rights, this book should be awful. But Kyle & Yost had an understanding about the X-Men universe that few 21st century X-scribes could achieve. Rather than just another Feral or Wolfsbane or Sabertooth or Wildchild or Wendigo or Dakken or Raze or Native or Romulus or...you get the idea, they build a soap opera revolving around a Weapon Plus scientist who decides the most efficient way to create a new Wolverine is to use his DNA but make a female version. The villain is pretty flat and predictable but everything else about this story works really well and has some satisfying consequences for the coming seasons.

Need more Weapon Plus mutants who like to stab things? Sabretooth Open Season is a surprisingly well-put together collection worth your investment.


Episode 10: Exiles Vol 6: Fantastic Voyage
(written by Judd Winnick, art by Jim Calafiore, Tom Mandrake, Clayton Henry, and Mizuki Sakakibara)

There were some absolute stinker stories of Exiles that I've left off the list, but this may be the most satisfying story of the entire Exiles run. We close the season to find Mimic has been put in charge of the team, and they are at odds with a team of Vampire Avengers. The first arc is a little hokey, but it propels the story in new directions as everyone gets separated during transit, and has their solo adventures in different realities which all feed into massive consequences once they're finally united. I think this was the last thing Winnick ever wrote for Marvel, and it serves as a cool swan song for the series (though the series went on and on and on and on after this volume until it was struck dead by the barbed pen of Chris Claremont).

If the lack of Blink on the team is getting you down, go back and check out her adventures in X-Men The Complete Age Of Apocalypse Volume 1​.

A few years ago, while working on the now defunct VeXed-Men website, I did a series of The X-Men in ten seasons, where I did some exhaustive reading, some skimming, some Wikipedia-ing, and some trips to the used book store that carries comics, and put together an exhaustive timeline of how to read the X-Men using pretty much all of the trade paperbacks that were then available.

Don't do that to yourself.

In the last few weeks, I've been reading every 90s X-Men and X-Men adjacent book (Cable, X-Factor, X-Force, X-Man, Generation X, Rogue, Wolverine, Wolverine & Gambit...if it has been collected into trade in the last fifteen years or so, I've read it and reviewed it on Goodreads.) and it made me question why I ever even liked the X-Men.

For this project, I'm just going to condense it down to the books I enjoyed reading. There are going to be ten "episodes" per season, and it's going to lean heavily and more modern stories/collections because they're easier to access, and some of the writing techniques of the 60s, 70s, and 80s haven't aged well.  Season One is going to take us from a condensed retelling of the first 60 issues of the series all the way up to the prelude to The Age Of Apocalypse, which won't be where season two begins.

Episode 1: X-Men Grand Design
(written by Ed Piskor based on Stan Lee, art by Ed Piskor based on Jack Kirby)

I'm so glad this exists and is widely available. I can't ever bring myself to slog through the Silver Age of the X-Men. There is so much exposition. So much tiresome dialog written in a "hip parlance" that only existed in the minds of the out-of-touch. It's fairly inscrutible for modern readers. But there were some good stories. Ed Piskor, using the same oversized and stylized format that he employed for Hip Hop Family Tree, retells the entirety of the X-Men Silver age in one book. Each issue being slimmed down to two pages. That it exists is kind of cool, that it works is nothing short of amazing.

If you like this volume, I recommend checking out Piskor's Grand Design: Second Genesis, which takes the same format to tackle the Claremont run. 


Episode 2: X-Men Epic Collection Second Genesis
(written by Chris Claremont, Len Wein, and Bill Mantlo; art by John Byrne, Dave Cockrum, Sal Buscema, Bob Brown, and Tony Dezuniga)

This collection starts out with some of the style that I find difficult to slog through, but it's a good introduction to the major X-Men characters of the 80s and 90s, as the X-Men becomes more of an international team. And though it's rife with stereotypical cliches at the beginning, they do get somewhat smoothed out as the collection goes along. I said in my Ten Seasons list that "Claremont isn't the father of the X-Men, but he's the mentor who guided them into adulthood." and I still believe that. This collection presents us with some familiar villains from Grand Design but also shows us what a new generation of X-Men would look like.

If you enjoy this, consider checking out X-Men Proteus to see what a terrible parent one of the X-Men is. This is a theme that will be revisited late in the season, and every other season.

Episode 3: X-Men Dark Phoenix Saga
(written by Chris Claremont and Jo Duffy; art by John Byrne, John Buscema, Mike Collins, and Jerry Bingham)

THE classic X-Men story. Space. Aliens. Possession. Cyclops being a bit of a dweeb. A female character being so powerful that her power overwhelms her. This is very tropey. But while we did see a death in the Second Genesis episode, this death is the first Major Death in X-Men history. Or, it would have been, had any X-men team member actually ever been permanently killed.

If you enjoy this, Days Of Future Past is another story from this era that is viewed as a classic. And while it does introduce some new characters, and is sort of fun, it didn't quite make the cut for this list.


Episode 4: X-Men From The Ashes
(written by Chris Claremont; art by John Romita JR and Paul Smith)

Professor Xavier is a jerk! Jean Grey is dead! Cyclops's rebound relationship is Hella Creepy! Storm gets an epic haircut! Morlocks! Japan! A wedding doesn't turn out as planned! For all the techniques that didn't age well, Claremont is a master at weaving short form stories into a long-form narrative. He wrote big crossover events but he didn't rely on them the way later writers would. This is one of his best examples of small chunks of stories and character development fitting together really well into one, focused story.

If you like it, check out Claremont & Brent Anderson's God Love, Man Kills another classic, this one with a religious bent, that didn't quite make the cut.


Episode 5:  X-Men: Mutant Massacre
(written by Chris Claremont, Louise Simonson, Walter Simonson, and Ann Nocenti; art by John Romita, Alan Davis, Bret Blevins, and Rick Leonardi)

The first major crossover on our list. We met the Morlocks, an underground dwelling group of mutants who "aren't pretty enough" to live above the surface, in the last episode. In this one, we focus on them, as Daredevil, Thor, the New Mutants (the young X-Men team), X-Factor (the original flavor X-Men team), and the current X-Men team contend with a group of mutant assassins called The Marauders who end up doing Major Damage to pretty much everyone in this story.

If the New Mutants team interests you, definitely check out New Mutant: Demon Bear, which has some next level Bill Sienkiewicz art)


Episode 6: Fantastic Four Vs. The X-Men
(written by Chris Claremont; art by John Bogdanove)

I've written about/talked about this every time I've ever discussed essential X-Men books. This is the first comic book I ever read, and I can't believe how well it's held up. It's the aftermath of the Mutant Massacre, and the X-Men have contacted the Fantastic Four to help save Kitty Pride, whose power to phase is out of control (see, once again the powerful female character's powers threaten to be her undoing).  

If you like this, I'd backtrack a bit to X-Men Epic Collection: Ghosts to see The Trial Of Magneto, which gets referenced here.


Episode 7: X-Men X-Tinction Agenda
(written by Chris Claremont and Louise Simonson; art by Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld, John Bogdanove, and Guang Yap)

The third teamup story in a row. This time it's just three X-Teams converging on a nation where mutants are bred and enslaved. The island of Genosha becomes a hugely important locale in X-Men mythology, and this appearance is a big part of why. For an 80s superhero comic, it does a surprisingly good job of handling issues of race and oppression. 

Around this time in comics, there are some weird developements for various X-Men, particularly Storm. I would check out Epic Collection: Dissolution & Rebirth to follow her adventures, meet everyone's favorite Cajun mutant, and spend a great deal of time with Forge as he attempts to put The X-Men back together after a major catastrophe.


Episode 8: X-Men Epic Collection: Mutant Genesis
(written by Chris Claremont, Jim Lee, Whilce Portacio, and Tom Raney)

The end of the Claremont era! Also, yet another multi-team adventure. This collects the best selling X-Men comics of all time, as the various X-Teams must first overcome The Shadow King and then defeat their oldest foe...in space! This is the series that launched the X-Men Animated Series (though it did some backtracking to include events like X-Tinction Agenda). If you were born between 1975 and 1990 and only ever read one X-Men book, it was probably this one. I was excited that they finally collected the Muir Island Saga that led up to X-Men #1 in the same collection as the first few issues of X-Men (the main series having been referred to as Uncanny X-Men). While Fantastic Four Vs. X-Men was my first comic, this was the series that got me back into comics as a kid. I was completely confused by virtually everything I picked up between these two series.

I can't in good conscious recommend any of the X-Men comics written by Scott Lobdell, who wrote the X-Men for an absurd amount of time after Claremont left the title. But there is a collection called X-Men The Skinning Of Souls that, of all the ridiculous 90s continuity comics,  is the one I find most enjoyable.


Episode 9: Magneto Testament
(written by Greg Pak; art by  Carmine Di Giandomenico)

No character ever truly dies in X-Men comics, but the last volume was meant to be the final Magneto story for a while. It wasn't. He came back nearly instantly. But this book would have been a good coda to a Last Ever Magneto Story. It's one of the many origin stories for the purple bucket helmeted magnet villain. But it's the best from both a storytelling and an art perspective.

For more Magneto storytelling that's relevant to this season, check out X-Men/Avengers: Blood Ties.


Episode 10: X-Men Prelude To The Age Of Apocalypse
(written by Mark Waid, Jeph Loeb, Scott Lobdell, and John Francis; art by Andy Kubert, Steve Epting, Terry Dodson, and Roger Cruz)

There is no bigger mess of an event in Marvel comics history than The Age Of Apocalypse. They took An Entire Year to reimagine every X-title. Villains became heroes, heroes became dead, the dead became villains, etc. I don't recommend it. BUT. The story of how The Age Of Apocalypse came to exist was done really well. So we close the first season with an expose on how Charles Xavier's terrible parenting led to the complete destruction of the timeline, and the death of everyone and everything he ever loved. Nice job, Chuck.

If you're a masochist, you can check out The Age Of Apocalypse. Some of it is really good but there is A Lot Of It, and much of it is trash.

The Avengers franchise is what made Marvel Studios the completely dominant force in comic based entertainment. The way they streamlined Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, and other characters into an expansive universe that also includes television shows like Daredevil and Agents Of SHIELD is something that has never been achieved before in motion picture entertainment.


The Avengers continuity, even without including the individual characters is supremely daunting. So, I’ve put together a chronology of some of the best Avengers related books that are currently or were recently available in collected editions (the recently available are still around for pretty cheap on various online outlets and in bookstores) into ten TV seasons.

Now that Osborne has been defeated. Again. Like, twice last season. It’s time to move on. (Checks series for Osborn appearances). Yes, it’s time to move on.  And speaking of time to move on, just imagine The Scarlet Witch muttering “No More Bendis” after one more ridiculous ending, we move into some other writers’ opportunities to tell Avengers stories.

​Serial 1: Avengers X Sanction, Young Avengers The Childrens’ Crusade
(written by Allen Heinberg and Jeph Loeb, art by Jim Cheung and Ed McGuinness)

Remember? Remember that time when Wanda Maximoff blew up Avengers Mansion, killed a slew of lesser Avengers, remade the entire universe, and then disappeared? Well, she doesn’t. Wiccan and Speed believe that they might be her imaginary children from way back in the first season, so they and Magneto go traipsing around the globe looking for her. What they find is….you know, the whole point of the book. The Cable story is not super compelling but it sets up the impending super crossover

The Childrens’ Crusade. 3 episodes



Episode 4: Nova Origin
(written by Jeph Loeb, art by Ed McGuinness)

Sam Alexander’s dad was a guy named Nova who was part of a giant space opera storyline that we’re not going to get into in this continuity. But he died. Now Sam has his helmet, and with the help or The Guardians Of The Galaxy, he’ll become a hero. And he’ll see something that he should probably tell The Avengers about.

Nova. 1 episode



Serial 2: Avengers Vs X-Men, Avengers Academy AvX, Avengers AvX, New Avengers AvX, Secret Avengers AvX
(written by everyone at Marvel, art by everyone and their grandmother at Marvel)

The Phoenix Force is back! Which is, uhhhh, a big deal to the X-Men but The Avengers haven’t cared until now. But when it appears that Hope, the first mutant born after M-Day is going to host the most powerful entity in the universe, Cap and the crew get a little anxious and put Wolverine on the spot about fixing the problem. There are a bunch of cool side stories, including Iron Fist taking Hope to learn how to master The Phoenix Force. And, oh yea, The Scarlet Witch is back. For good. This is probably the worst trade I'm putting in this continuity. It's inexcusable garbage written by writers who should have told editorial that writing a series by committee with each person writing a an issue (sometimes, seemingly without having read any of the previous issues) was awful. But it feels important to the continuity. Hopefully, if I'm redoing this continuity in the future, this trade will be far far away from the list.

AvX. 4 episodes



Episode 9: Avengers Assemble
(written by Brian Michael Bendis, art by Mark Bagley)

A team called The Zodiac is being run by Thanos? That…that can’t be good.

The Zodiac. 1 episode



Episode 10: Thanos Rising
(written by Jason Aaron, art by Simon Bianchi)

How did Thanos get to be the big bad bad in the Marvel Universe? By hitting every cliche in the Why I’m A Supervillain Handbook. But he did it on a different planet with beautiful art, so let’s check it out.

Thanos Rising. 1 episode



Episode 11: Captain Marvel In Pursuit Of Flight
(written by Kelly Sue Deconnick, art by  Dexter Soy, Emma Rios,  and Filipe Andrade)

Carol Danvers is a Captain again. And it’s time for her to get her time travel on.

Captain Marvel. 1 episode



Episode 12: Hawkeye My Life As A Weapon
(written by Matt Fraction, art by David Aja and Javier Pulido)

Clint Barton lives in an apartment building in New York where totally nobody knows he’s Hawkeye. He and his friend Kate Bishop (Hawkeye from The Young Avengers) have a serious problem with some Russian bros. What kind of Avenger story is this?

Hawkeyes. 1 episode



Serial 3: Avengers Arena Kill Or Die, Avengers Arena Game On, Avengers Arena Boss Level
(written by Dennis Hopeless, art by  Alessandro Vitti, Kev Walker, Dave Johnson, Karl Moline, and Ricardo Burchielli)

Arcade has trapped sixteen young superheroes on an island where they are going to have to fight to the death. Only the lone survivor will be able to escape. Why aren’t The Avengers or The X-Men coming to help them? Hasn’t anyone noticed they’re missing?

Avengers Arena. 2 episodes



Episode 15: Hawkeye Little Hits
(written by Matt Fraction, art by David Aja and Javier Pulido)

Clint Barton is really bad at love, and dating, and, well, pretty much everything. Kate Bishop and a bunch of his exes guest in this adventure, and we get a story told completely from the perspective of Pizza Dog.

My Cherry Amour. 1 episode



Serial 3: Captain Marvel Down, Avengers The Enemy Within
(written by Kelly Sue Deconnick, art by Scott Hepburn, Matteo Buffagni, and Filipe Andrade)

After a run in with former Captain Marvel, Monica Rambeau, Carol starts to lose her powers, just when a bunch of mysterious events from Avengers past start popping up in NYC.  Maybe some Avengers can help.

The Enemy Within. 2 episodes



Episode 18: Captain America Castaway In Dimension Z Books 1 & 2
(written by Rick Remender, art by Jonathan Romita JR)

Arnim Zola ships Steve Rogers into another dimension where nothing is familiar. Unfortunately, like many Remender Avenger books this isn’t great but it did have a huge impact on Steve Rogers’ storyline. Art by Romita JR looks a bit like he had to rush out issues of Hit Girl, as all of his young characters look the same: poorly drawn.

Castaway In Dimension Z. 1 episode



Serial 4: Captain America Loose Nuke, Captain America The Iron Nail
(written by Rick Remender, art by Carlos Pacheco, Nic Klein, and Pascal Alixe)

Fortunately, this Remender storyline works better and has far superior art. Cap was in Dimension Z so long that he’s having trouble reacclimating to the 616. And, unfortunately, his battle against some new villains is not going to end up returning everything to normalcy.

The Iron Nail. 2 episodes



Season 7 has the requisite 20 episodes.

The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?

​Here it is, the final season. Will the two units of X-Men be able to resolve their differences and become one happy franchise again?  Everything’s been cheery since this point, why not, right?

Episode 1: Avengers X-Sanction
(written by Jeph Loeb, art by Ed Mcguiness)

In order to protect Hope from being killed in the future, Cable is back, and he’s here to kill the Avengers.

X-Sanction. 1 episode

Serial 1: Avengers Vs. X-Men
(written by Brian Michael Bendis, Jason Aaron, Ed Brubaker, Matt Fraction, and Jonathan Hickman, art by John Romita JR, Oliver Coipel, Adam Kubert, and Frank Cho)

This is a giant mess to read but it’s necessary. The Avengers, thanks to Cable, believe that Hope is going to turn into The Phoenix, so they go to Utopia to contain her, and the X-Men (either faction) aren’t happy about it. But as it turns out, The Phoenix may not be targeting Hope, per se.  Or is it targeting her in a different way?

AvX. 4 episodes



Serial 2: Wolverine & The X-Men Volumes 5-7
(written by Jason Aaron, art by Nick Bradshaw, Ramon Perez, David Lopez, and Steve Sanders)

Closing off the Hellfire Club saga, we get to see the post AvX Jean Grey school as an idyllic place where almost nobody dies too often.

Hellfire. 3 episodes



Episode 9: X-Men Primer
(written by Brian Wood, art by Oliver Coipel and David Lopez)

Vampire Jubilee is back. With a baby. Storm forms an all female X-team to protect it from….everything.

Primer. 1 episode



Serial 3: All New X-Men Yesterday’s X-Men, Uncanny X-Men Revolution, All New X-Men Here To Stay, All New X-Men Out Of Their Depth, Uncanny X-Men Broken
(written by Brian Michael Bendis, art by Stuart Immomen, Chris Bachalo. David Marquez, David Lafuente, and Frazer Irving)

Beast goes back in time and retrieves the original X-Men team, hoping past Cyclops can bring current Cyclops back from the dark place he’s been in since AvX. Unfortunately, he doesn’t seem to be able to send the team back. Time. Line. Problems.

All New X-Men. 4 episodes



Serial 4: X-Men Battle Of The Atom
(written by Brian Michael Bendis, Brian Wood, and Jason Aaron, art by Chris Bachalo, Stuart Immonen, Frank Cho, David Lopez, Giuseppe Camuncoli, and Esad Ribic)

X-Men from the future show up to warn what will happen if the X-Men from the past aren’t returned to their timeline

Battle Of The Atom. 2 episodes



Episode 16: Guardians Of The Galaxy All New X-Men Trial Of Jean Grey
(written by Brian Michael Bendis, art by Stuart Immonen and Sara Pichelli)

Remember when Jean Grey used to be The Phoenix? The Sh’iar do. They show up to put Jean Grey on trial for the crimes of…the Jean Grey that’s been dead for five seasons. The Guardians Of The Galaxy might be able to help with that.

Trial. 1 episode



Serial 5: Wolverine The Death Of Wolverine, All New X-Men All Different, All New X-Men One Down, Uncanny X-Men The Omega Mutant, Uncanny X-Men Revolution
(many writers, many artists)

The final serial takes us all the way up to Secret Wars, which ends this timeline. It includes a fond farewell to one of everyone's favorite Canadian metal salesmen.

End Of Days. 4 episodes


​Season 10 is 20 episodes.

The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?

​Now that the X-Men are tucked safe and sound in a place called Utopia, one would imagine they’re all happy together and throwing the best psychic slumber parties ever, right? Not so much.

Serial 1: X-Men Legacy Aftermath, X-Men Age Of X, Lost Legions
(written by Mike Carey, art by Paul Davidson, Harvey Tolibao, Jorge Molina, Rafa Sandoval, and many others)

Legion, Professor X’s mentally ill son, is one of the most powerful mutants in existence. He has a long and complicated backstory intertwined with The Age Of Apocalypse (which he accidentally created) but let’s pretend we are seeing him for the first time here. He’s brought to Utopia by The New Mutants and in the first half of The Aftermath trade, he accidentally creates Age Of X. So put Aftermath down, check out The Age Of X trade, you can skip the Avengers and Spider-Man stories at the end of Age Of X, and then resume reading Aftermath, as Utopia struggles to understand how many of the mutants spent seven days in an imaginary world.

Age Of X. 3 episodes



Episode 4: X-Men Legacy Lost Legions
(written by Mike Carey, art by Khoi Pham)
Professor X forms a team of  X-Men to track down six of Legion’s missing personalities.
Lost Legions. 1 episode



Serial 3: Uncanny X-Force Apocalypse Solution, Uncanny X-Force Deathlok Nation
(written by Rick Remender, art by Jerome Opena, Esad Ribic, and Rafael Albuquerque)

There is a run of X-Force that goes back a few years before this, and it’s a good run, but Remender’s run is excellent. X-Force is a team assembled by Cyclops to handle situations that the now public X-Men can’t be publicly involved with. Wolverine is the team leader and they do all sorts of morally dubious things. Their first mission lead them to a reborn Apocalypse who is still a child when they discover him. Their second mission gives them an opportunity to get their revenge on The Reavers from waaaay back in Season One. The only problem? Deathloks programmed to kill Fantomex. Ok, that’s not their ONLY problem.

X-Force. 2 episodes



Serial 4: Uncanny X-Force The Dark Angel Saga Volumes 1 & 2
(written by Rick Remender, art by Jerome Opena, Dean White, Esad Ribac, Billy Tan, and Mark Brooks)

Fiiiiine, here’s your Age Of Apocalypse story. Angel has been able to transform back and forth into Archangel for a while now, but Archangel is becoming a bit of a monster. In fact, he may be the next Apocalypse. Can his teammates stop him before he destroys this world?

Dark Angel. 3 episodes



Serial 5: X-Men Schism
(written by Jason Aaron and Kieron Gillen, art by Carlos Pacheco, Frank Cho, Daniel Acuna, Alan Davis, Adam Kubert, and Billy Tan)
The whole point of X-Force is to be the soldiers of the X-Men’s Utopia, so when Cyclops responds to a new Hellfire and Sentinel threat by using members of Generation Hope, Wolverine decides that the X-Men have gone astray and  decides to come up with a solution. Breaking up the X-Men.

Schism. 2 episodes



Serial 6: Uncanny X-Force Otherworld, Uncanny X-Force The Final Execution Volumes 1 & 2
(written by Rick Remender and Sam Humphries, art by Jerome Opena and Ron Garney)
Wolverine has some unfinished business to attend to before he can take on his new role as headmaster of the Jean Grey school. This arc is probably not going to win him the prestigious Father Of The Year Award.

The Final Execution. 4 episodes



Serial 7: Uncanny X-Men by Kieron Gillen Volumes 1 & 2
(written by Kieron Gillen, art by Carlo Pacheco and Brandon Peterson)
Back on Utopia, Cyclops uses the adult X-Men to handle events that would previously be X-Force’s problem and dubs them The Extinction Team. Mr Sinister returns to help them live up to their name.

Everything Is Sinister. 2 episodes



Serial 8: Wolverine & The X-Men Volumes 1 & 2
(written by Jason Aaron, art by Chris Bachalo and Nick Bradshaw)

Wolverine opens the Jean Grey school for mutants on the grounds of the former Charles Xavier school in Westchester. For a guy who’s all about making younger mutants students and not soldiers, he sure puts them in a lot of life or death situations, though.  Blame the Hellfire club.

New School. 3 episodes


Season 9 is 20 episodes


Interseason Special: Avengers The Childrens’ Crusade
(written by Allan Heinberg, art by Jim Cheung)
The Young Avengers go off in search of Wiccan’s mom, The Scarlet Witch, who has only been seen once since House Of M. How will the possibility of her return affect the population whose genocide she’s responsible for?

The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?

​After years of destroying and rebuilding Westchester New York, The X-Men decide they need to freshen up their routine, so they head west to go about destroying the Pacific coast for a change. They even form their own little island called Utopia.

Episode 1: X-Men Manifest Destiny
(various writers and artists)

The mutants head west to San Francisco. Follow the journeys of Wolverine, Nightcrawler, and many more as all 198ish surviving mutants are invited to take up residence in the new mutant haven.

Manifest Destiny. 1 episode



Episode 2: Deadpool Secret Invasion
(written by Daniel Way, art by Paco Medina and Carlo Barberi)

While the mutants have been moving west, all the NY based superheroes have been battling Skrulls during The Secret Invasion. That’s not really the X-Men’s problem, though. Everyone’s favorite merc with a mouth, on the other hand, sees a profit in taking down the impending Skrull empire. And make a profit he does but at the cost of the entire Marvel Universe as he single handedly ushers in Marvel’s Dark Reign era.

One Of Us. 1 episode

Serial 1: Uncanny X-Men Lovelorn, Uncanny X-Men Sisterhood
(written by Matt Fraction, art by Greg Land and Yanick Paquette)

Back in San Fran, Emma Frost does a little therapy in Cyclops’s head while Colossus battles his past. Also, some old school mutants come back into the picture. Then, everyone’s favorite redhead is back and she and some female villains are kicking X-ass. Also meet the X-Men’s Science Team.

Sisterhood. 4 episodes

Serial 2: X-Men Curse Of The Mutants
(written by Victor Gischler, art by Paco Medina)

Vampire Terrorists? Vampire Bombs? One of the X-Men’s long-shelved c-list characters becomes a Vampire Mutant?  San Francisco is not great for this team (please note, I did not use the phrases “San Francisco bites” or “San Francisco sucks” or “bloody hell in San Francisco”).

Cursed. 2 episodes



Serial 3: Avengers & X-Men Utopia
(various writers and artists)

Dark Reign has a team of Dark Avengers and Dark X-Men. Basically, if there’s a team, HAMMER (the organization that replaced SHIELD) has their own version filled with villains.It’s like every team is The Thunderbolts. Well, Cyclops has had enough. He decides to take on Norman Osborne once and for all. Emma will undoubtedly be the key to ending the standoff. Of course she’ll be on the winning side.

Dark Reign In Utopia. 4 episodes



Episode 13: X-Men Psylocke
(written by Christopher Yost, art by Harvey Tolibao)

After the events of Sisterhood, Psyclocke decides to go back to Japan to clear up some loose ends from the early seasons of the X-Men.

Revanche. 1 episode



Episode 14: X-Men Legacy Emplate
(written by Mike Carey, art by Daniel Acuna)
Now that the X-Men are safely on Utopia they shouldn’t have to worry about any…wait. Emplate?

Devil At The Crossroads. 1 episode
.
Serial 4: X-Men Second Coming
(various writers and artists)

Having been absent all season, Cable and Hope return from the future. Hope is now sixteen years old and her mutant gene is active. But what are her powers? Who, aside form Bishop, is chasing her now? Will she be the savior or the end for all mutantkind? Find out as one pivotal X-Men completely and totally dies. For a little bit.

Second Coming. 3 episodes



Serial 5: Uncanny X-Men The Birth Of Generation Hope, Generation Hope The End Of A Generation
(written by Matt Fraction, James Asmus, and Allan Heinberg, art by Whilce Portacio, Leonard Kirk, Jamie Mckelvie, Steven Sanders, Oliver Coipel, Ibraim Roberson, Tim Green II, and Takeshi Miyazawa)

Now that Hope is back, new mutants have started showing up all over the globe, and it’s up to her to track them down and try and recruit them to the X-Men. But sometimes, the new recruits are a bad idea.

Generation Hope. 2 episodes



Episode 20: Uncanny X-Men Quarantine
(written by Matt Fraction and Kieron Gillen, art by Greg Land)
Sublime is back and he has a new drug that can turn anyone into an X-Man. Downside? There’s a plague on Utopia sapping the powers of all the mutants. Maybe these two things are connected? Also, Emma deals with one of the mutants Hope brought back from her mission.

Quarantine. 1 episode


Season 8 has 20 episodes


Interseason Special: Deadpool X Marks The Spot
(written by Daniel Way, art by Paco Medina and Shawn Crystal)
The merc with a mouth has spent years as foe or unlikely ally to the X-Men, just ask Cable. But he really, really wants to be an X-Man. And now that all the mutants are on Utopia, he’s determined to join their ranks. They’d be crazy not to accept him.

The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?

​The events of the last season brought the mutant population from millions to 198. Despair ran through the Xavier school, the ashes of Genosha, Mutant Town and beyond. This season Beast tries to come up with a way to bring the species back from the brink of extinction.

Backup of the first six episodes: Endangered Species
(written by Mike Carey, Christopher Yost, and Christos Gage, art by Scot Eaton, Mark Bagley, Mike Perkins, Tom Grummet, and Andrea Divito)

Beast goes across the globe in search of a solution to the decimation crisis, running into a slew of villains, old friends, and surprises along the way.


Episode 1: New Avengers The Collective
(written by Brian Michael Bendis, art by Steve McNiven and Mike Deodato)

The Avengers know all about what happened during House Of M so they’re super worried when a new cosmic entity shows up in Alaska that appears to be a mutant. What it is is much, much worse.

The Collective. 1 episode



Serial 1: X-Factor Life & Death Matters, X-Factor Many Lives Of Madrox, Heart Of Ice
(written by Peter David, art by Pablo Raimondi, Ariel Olivetti, Dennis Calero, Renato Arlem, and Roy Allen Martinez)

The heart of the post House Of M world is X-Factor. Peter David’s decision to draw from the event and then only skirt around the other crossovers works really well, making this book much more engaging than any of the other X-books. In these two volumes they deal with mutant terrorist cells, the truth behind Decimation, the enigmatic Layla Miller, and the X-Men who really want them to pick aside in Civil War.

The Many Lives Of Madrox. 5 episodes



Serial 2: Messiah Complex
(written by Ed Brubaker, Mike Carey, Peter David, Craig Kyle, and Christopher Yost, art by Marc Silvestri, Billy Tan, Chris Bachalo, Humberto Ramos, and Scot Eaton)

A mutant child is born in Alaska and every mutant and villain are fighting for control of it. Marauders. Purifiers. Reavers. Mr Sinister. Forge. Lady Deathstrike. Mystique. Pretty much everybody but Apocalypse is involved. And in the end, the X-Men are betrayed by several of their own. But at least there’s hope. Also, Madrox and Layla Miller go to the future to learn what they can. It doesn’t go well.

Messiah Complex.  6 episodes



Serial 3: X-Factor The Only Game In Town
(written by Peter David, art by Pablo Raimondi and Valentine De Landro)

X-Factor had a rough time during Messiah Complex and Madrox and Layla’s return to Mutant Town isn’t precisely restful. Plus, Quicksilver has had a rough time of it since House Of M but maybe things will finally turn around for him. Also, Val Cooper from the early X-Factor days gets some comeuppance.

The Only Game In Town. 2 episodes



Episode 14: Wolverine Get Mystique
(written by Jason Aaron, art by Ron Garney)
Mystique wreaked havoc during Messiah Complex, and Logan decides he needs to make her pay.

Get Mystique. 1 episode



Serial 5: Cable Messiah War, Cable Waiting For The End Of The World
(written by Duane Swierczynski, art by Ariel Olivetti, and Ken Lashley)

Tasked with keeping the future of mutantkind safe, Cable travels through the future with Hope but they are constantly being trailed by a certain turncoat X-Men who thinks Hope is the key to mutantkind’s extinction, not their salvation.

Waiting For The End Of The World. 2 episodes



Serial 6: X-Factor Time And A Half, X-Factor Overtime
(written by Peter David, art by Valentine De Landro and Marco Santucci)
Just when you think X-Factor couldn’t get any darker, it does. Longshot, Darwin, and Shatterstar join the team. Madrox goes back to the future and we finally learn why Layla Miller “knows stuff”.

Overtime. 3 episodes



Serial 7: Cable X-Force Messiah War
(written by Duane Swierczynski, Craig Kyle, and Christopher Yost, art by Ariel Olivetti, Jamie Mckelvie, Mike Choi, Sonia Oback, Clayton Crain, and Larry Stroman)
Returning from their adventures through time, Cable and the child are greeted by X-Force and a litany of villains still trying to claim the messiah child as their own. Remember how I said it was everybody but Apocalypse? Yea, well, Apocalypse shows up. Plus, Deadpool and Cable have some long unfinished business.
Messiah War. 2 episodes


Season seven. 22 episodes

Interseason Special: X-Men Legacy Divided He Stands, Uncanny X-Men Divided We Stand
(written by Mike Carey and Ed Brubaker, art by Scot Eaton, John Romita Jr, Billy Tan, Greg Land, Brandon Peterson, Mike Deodata, and Mike Choi)

​Having been shot by a traitorous X-Man earlier in the series, Professor X is being put back together by an unknown benefactor memory by memory. Meanwhile Cyclops and Emma Frost go to the west coast to examine the future of mutantkind.

The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?

​After all the problems at the school last season, Professor X hands the reigns of the school to a new generation. We also see a new class of students. Isn’t change wonderful? And by the end of this season, mutants will finally get everything they ever wanted. I’m sure it will be permanent.

Serial 1: Astonishing X-Men By Joss Whedon & John Cassady Ultimate Collections Vol 1 & 2
(written by Joss Whedon, art by John Cassaday)

Joss Whedon was supposed to take over the X-Men directly after Grant Morrison but things didn’t go as planned. That’s ok, though, his run with John Cassady is one of the finest X-arcs there is. Headmasters Emma Frost and Cyclops welcome Kitty Pride to the school and then shenanigans occur. Wonderful shenanigans. Many of them in space. Just read the whole run all the way through. It’s totally worth it.
Gifted & Dangerous. 6 episodes



Episode 7: X-Factor Madrox Multiple Choice
(written by Peter David, art by Pablo Raimondi)

After that fun but long serial, let’s step in and visit Multiple Man. This spectacular noir miniseries delves further into Jamie Madrox’s power. A man who can duplicate himself a large but finite amount of times learns some interesting skills. In this series he acts a detective for hire, teaming up with some of his old friends from the 90s X-Factor team.

Multiple Choice. 1 episode

Serial 2: New X-Men Academy X Vol 1 Choosing Sides, Wolverine Enemy Of The State, New X-Men Academy X Volume 3 X-Posed
(written by Nunzio DeFilippis, Christina Weir, and Mark Millar, art by Randy Green, Staz Johnson, Michael Ryan, Rick Ketcham, and John Romita Jr)

I avoided the classic New Mutant series because one can only read so much Claremont before one starts carving cuneiform on their arms and narrating their lives unnecessarily. “Now I am going the bathroom because that is a biological function humans have. Now I am flushing the toilet because human waste is gross and indoor plumbing, which was invented in…” you get the idea. But this adventure introduces us to a new generation of students (with some that were introduced during Morrison’s run) who have a much smaller scale story but with more serious consequences than the original New Mutants.

I know I said there wouldn’t be any Wolverine but there is one Really Important storyline for all of the X- books. Enemy Of The State shows what happens when everyone’s favorite walking cutlery is brainwashed into being evil. Characters die and stuff. And the repercussions are felt in the next Academy X book.

Choosing Sides. 4 episodes



Episode 11: X-23 Target X
(written by Craig Kyle and Christoper Yost, art by Mike Choi)
We check back in with X-23 to see what happens when Captain America tries to help Stabby Jr. Also, Stabby Jr. meets Stabby Sr. as X-23 goes claws-to-claws with Wolverine.

Target X. 1 episode

Serial 3: Excalibur Forging The Sword, Excalibur Saturday Night Fever, House Of M Prelude: Excalibur
(written by Chris Claremont, art by Aaron Lopestri)

This period of X-Men comics was mainly written by Chuck Austen and Peter Milligan, and almost none of it is worth reading, but Chris Claremont picked up his old Excalibur title and helped set up this season’s huge event. In this series we see Professor X, Magneto, and some lesser known X-characters try and rebuild Genosha from the destruction in season five. But does Magneto have another motivation for being there? One that, maybe, isn’t even evil? Also, a bunch of X-Corps offices are attacked around the globe. Plus Genoshan humans are jerks, and Doctor Strange steps in to help fix The Wanda problem.

Unfixable. 2 episodes



Serial 4: House Of M
(written by Brian Michael Bendis, art by Olive Coipel)

But Doctor Strange fails, and thus House Of M. The Scarlet Witch alters all of reality so that every mutant gets everything they ever wanted. But that just isn’t enough for the greedy mutants, and their utopia, like everything else the X-men touch, falls apart.

House Of M. 2 episodes



Serial 5: Decimation The Day After, Decimation The 198
(written by Chris Claremont, Peter Milligan, and David Hine, art by Salvador Larroca, Randy Green, Jim Muniz, and Kevin Conrad)

Three words from The Scarlet With in House Of M undid a whole mess of Morrison’s X-Men idea, and now there are only 198 Mutants left in the world. In this serial we see how the mutants’ lives are changed now that there aren’t so many of them. Featuring a ton of sentinels.

Decimation . 2 episodes



Serial 6: New X-Men Childhood’s End Volumes 1-3
(written by Craig Kyle & Christopher Yost, art by Mark Brooks and Paco Medina)

But what about all those kids we met at the beginning of the season? In Childhood’s End we see how those kids live and die in the post-House of M world. Many are depowered and all of them are in serious risk of being killed. Plus, X-23 joins the Academy, and The New Avengers stop by to help the surviving mutants battle Nimrod.

Childhood’s End. 2 episodes



Season 6 is 20 episodes


Interseason Special: X-Factor The Longest Night
(written by Peter David, art by Ryan Sook and Dennis Calero)
Picking up after House of M and Multiple Choice, Madrox’s detective agency goes from being in the thriving “Mutant Town” section of New York City to a city of depressed depowered mutants. The detectives need to solve a series of mutant related problems and do their best to handle the consequences when some of Jamie’s multiples go rogue. No, they don’t speak with a Southern accent and leech your powers.

The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?

​At its heart, The X-Men have been a small band of mutants brought together by Professor Charles Xavier. He’s a professor because he runs a school. A small school. A small private school for mutants. But when Marvel handed the reigns of their franchise to Grant Morrison, he thought “What if we made everything about the X-Men bigger?” More mutants, bigger campus, higher stakes. And thus, all the X-men writers and artists followed him as he helped the X-Men involve into the 21st century.

​Serial 1: New X-Men Ultimate Collection Volume 1
(written by Grant Morrison, art by Frank Quitely, Ethan Van Sciver, Leinil Francis Yu, Igor Kordey, and Tom Derenick)

Grant Morrison fucks shit up. Secondary mutations, how mutants fit into the evolutionary timeline, Professor X takes his school global, the X-Men give up their random uniforms for leather jackets with yellow Xes, Professor X has a twin sister, Emma Frost has a British accent and a heroic streak, a whole mess of new characters. So much goodness in one giant book.

E Is For Extinction. 4 episodes



Serial 2: X-Treme X-Men Volumes 1-3
(written by Chris Claremont, art by Salvador Larroca)

Meanwhile, Chris Claremont is back for a weird little run of his own. Rogue is trying to figure out Destiny’s book of predictions for the X-Men and how to stop world ending events. There are a lot of Claremont tropes of losing powers and team dynamics that are a fun respite from the Morrison stuff.

Destiny. 2 episodes



Serial 3: X-Corps
(written by Joe Casey, art by Ian Churchill, Sean Phillips, Ashley Wood, Ron Garney, and Aaron Lopresti)

On a more serious note, while Morrison’s book focuses on Xavier’s School, Joe Casey shows us what happens when Angel’s money allows the X-Men to form a corporately funded team to react to world events. Banshee leads a squad in Europe, while back in the US, some of the usual X-Men are joined by Chamber and Stacy X, as Casey explores a lot of religious and sexual themes (but not X rated sexual themes).

X-Corps. 3 episodes



Serial 4: New X-Men Ultimate Collection Volume 2
(written by Grant Morrison, art by John Paul Leon, Igor Kordey, Phil Jimenez, Ethan Van Sciver, Keron Grant, and Frank Quitely)

Our leather clad school teachers try to deal with the aftermath of an extinction level event and the outing of Professor X (as a mutant), a drug epidemic, a school based riot by a naughty psychic student, and then Bishop returns from The X-Treme X-Men to solve a murder of someone who is totally and completely dead forever.

Riot At Xavier’s. 4 episodes



Background story: Mystique: The Brian K Vaughan Ultimate Collection
(written by Brian K Vaughan, art by Jorge Lucas, Michael Ryan, and Manuel Garcia)

Throughout the third and fourth serials, we witness Professor X sending long-time X-foe, Mystique, out as a mercenary to do the jobs that Professor X can’t have traced back to him. What could possibly go wrong?



Episode 15: X-23 Innocence Lost
(written by Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost, art by Billy Tan)

We spend an “episode” away form the main teams as we meet yet another stabby member of the Wolverine “family”, as a young clone fights her Weapon # training to try and be a good uhhhh person.

X-23. 1 episode



Serial 5: Assault On Weapon Plus
(written by Grant Morrison, art by Phil Jiminez and Chris Bachalo)

I’m sure you imagine this season will end with New X-Men Ultimate Collection 3, the denouement of Morrison’s run. Ehhhh. Look, you can buy it if you want, but the last few issues of his run is a giant middle finger to Marvel’s Editorial, and while that’s conceptually interesting, it’s kind of annoying to read. I recommend getting the smaller trades. In this serial we meet Fantomex and discover what the “X” in “Weapon X” really stands for. (Spoiler alert: It’s not porn related.) Plus, bonding between Cyclops and Wolverine is always so much fun.

Assault On Weapon Plus. 2 episodes



Serial 6: Planet X
(written by Grant Morrison, art by Phil Jiminez)

I’m not really a fan of Planet X but it does wrap up all the plot development that Morrison laid down. We learn more about Xorn than we imagined. The “special class” at Xavier’s school goes rogue. Plus, while I’m usually sarcastic when I mention that a character death is totally permanent and forever, the death in Planet X has lasted fifteen years and that character isn’t back yet. Very much.

Planet X. 4 episodes



Season 5 is 20 episodes


Interseason special: NYX Wannabe.
(written by Joe Quesada, art by Joshua Middleton and Robert Teranishi)

X-23 and some other young mutants live in New York. They’re not on the X-Men’s radar, so they live their lives on the streets making dubious choice after dubious choice.

​The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?
​
Season three absolutely destroyed The Marvel Universe (don’t worry Rob Liefeld and Jim Lee came back to put it back together between seasons). Now we step away from Mr. Sinister (about time!) and the consequences of Professor X vs. Magneto, and deal with Apocalypse, who was pretty annoyed that I didn’t include the serial where they renamed the entire X-Men universe after him. Suck it up, Blue Boy, here’s your season. You have to share it with Magneto. Deal with it.

Serial 1: Magneto: Rogue Nation
(written by Alan Davis and Fabian Nicieza, art by Lee Weeks and Brandon Peterson)

Since Professor X was wheeled out at the end of Onslaught, why not start this season with Magneto.. Look, everyone, especially the government has reasons to be afraid that Magneto is back, so….they give him Genosha.. But if this is Magneto, who’s that guy that looks like young Magneto and has all his powers? Also, it’s called Rogue Nation partly because everyone’s favorite sugah gets all cuddly with Mr. Purple Helmet (that’s not a good nickname).
Rogue Nation. 3 episodes


Serial 2: The Shattering, The Twelve, Ages Of Apocalypse
(written by Alan Davis, Jay Faerber, Rob Jensen, Terry Kavanagh, Howard Mackie, Chris Claremont,  Joe Pruett, Fabian Nicieza, Mike Raicht , and Karl Bollers, art by Adam Kubert, Brandon Peterson, Tom Raney, Erik Larsen, Rob Liefeld, Roger Cruz, and Bernard Chang)

Since we missed out on The Age Of Apocalypse last season, let’s get to know Apocalypse through some good old fashioned team destroying as Death comes to the X-Men. In The Shattering we learn a lot of horrible things about every member of the team but only one of them is real. Only one of them IS DEATH (dun dun dunnnnnnn). Then Apocalypse sets out to kidnap a dozen X-Men for his evil scheme in X-Men Vs. Apocalypse: The Twelve. And the X-Men fight back in X-Men Vs. Apocalypse: Ages Of Apocalypse.
The Twelve. 6 episodes



Serial 3: Powerless
(written by Alan Davis, Terry Kavanagh, Joseph Harris, Erik Larsen, and Joe Pruett, art by Tom Raney, Brett Booth, Steven Harris, Graham Nolan, and Juan Santacruz)

The team has virtually no time to recuperate from their Apocalypse problems when they all find themselves Powerless. How will the mutants survive without any of their powers?
Powerless. 2 episodes



Serial 4: Counter X Volume 1, Volume 2
(written by Warren Ellis, art by Ian Edgington, Whilce Portacio, Ian Medina, Ariel Olivetti , and Enrique Breccia)

Annnnnnnnnnnd then a not so brief detour into the X teams as written by Warren Ellis. In Counter X Volume 1, Ellis takes X-Force’s mercenary ways to the 2000 era limit as Pete Wisdom leads the team into battle in a much darker color palette than the 90s ever had. In Counter X Volume 2 he takes Generation X from school kids to teenagers rescuing mutants in serious danger. And he kills one of them. You know, for reals.
Extreme X-Men. 3 episodes



Serial 5: Dream’s End
(written by Scott Lobdell, Joe Pruett, and Robert Weinberg , art by Salvador Larroca, Leinil Francis Yu, Tom Derenick, and Michael Ryan)

Finally, the end to The Legacy Virus problem that’s been going on since season three. Spoiler alert: Someone dies. Totally permanently forever, I’m sure.

Dream’s End. 3 episodes



Serial 6: Eve Of Destruction
(written by Scott Lobdell, with art by Salvador Larroca, Tom Raney, and Leinil Francis Yu)

Then we cap off the season as some old faces return in the form of a new X-Men team that must rescue Professor X from Genosha (you know, the place that Magneto rules). Also, old X-Men faces return to rescue Professor X who aren’t currently official X-Men because that’s the kind of loyalty old Chuck inspires.
Eve Of Destruction. 3 episodes


Season 4 is 20 episodes.


Interseason Special: X-Force Famous, Mutant & Mortal
(written by Peter Milligan, art by Mike Allred and Darwyn Cooke)

​One of the great cliches of comics, and especially the X-Men, is when a team is touted as “all new” or “all different”. Apart from the Uncanny team being debuted in the 70s, the X-Men team may change rosters and add one or two new characters but, for the most part, they’re same old same old. This is not true for X-Force: Famous, Mutant & Mortal as Peter Milligan introduces all new characters and kills them seemingly indiscriminantly. It’s a really cool commentary on the reality television spectacle at the turn of the millennium starring a bunch of mutants who gain instant fame because they’re on TV. The art by Mike Allred and Darwyn Cooke was unlike any previous art on X-books. For about a decade, it was questionable whether this was even considered part of continuity but some of the survivors have popped back up in recent years. If you really like it, you can follow it up with X-Statix but it’s not quite as fun as this first run.

The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?
​

Season two focused on Mr. Sinister and The Marauders and the dissolution of the team that came together in the first season. Well season three returns us to Xavier’s school, introduces us to The Legacy Virus, and gives us a new big bad who is so bad, he gets the whole season named after him.

​Serial 1 & 2: X-Men Mutant Genesis.
(written by Chris Claremont, Scott Lobdell, and Jim Lee, art by Jim Lee)

See how the new teams come together, learn uncomfortable truths about the X-Men’s relationship with Magneto. See Rogue and Gambit mercilessly flirt. Delve into Wolverine’s backstory as Omega Red shows up. Oh yea, and Jubilee’s around. Must be the 90s.

Avalon. 2 episodes
Omega Red. 2 episodes




Serial 3: X-Cutioner’s Song
(written by Scot Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, and Peter David, art by Brandon Peterson, Andy Kubert, Jae Lee, and Greg Capullo)

Who tried to kill Professor X? Who is Cable? How many 90s characters happen to have that shining eye thing that Longshot and Cable and Ahab and Stryfe and everybody seem to have? While all of the mutants try and solve the mystery (ok, they don’t care about investigating the eye thing but I want answers, damn it), we learn a whole mess of more confusing things about Jean Grey and Cyclops. They must be important or something.

X-Cutioner’s Song. 3 episodes



Serial 4: X-Men: A Skinning Of Souls
(written by Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, and Dan Slott, art by Andy Kubert, Brandon Peterson, Richard Bennet, and more)

Picking up right after X-Cutioner’s song, we meet a new villain let loose in Russia who will take on the X-Men AND Omega Red. More Jean Grey Cyclops drama. Rogue and Gambit continue to make kissy-face. Mr. Sinister just won’t go away. And then you get two Psylockes for the price of one! Why are there…is this a clone thing….are they…I mean…huh.

Skinning Of Souls. 3 episodes




Episode 11: Avengers & X-Men: Bloodties
(written by Bob Harras, Fabian Nicieza, Roy Thomas, and Scott Lobdell,  art by Steve Epting, Andy Kubert, Matt Ryan, Dave Ross, and John Romita Jr)

The X-Men, The Avengers, and The West Coast Avengers team-up as The Acolytes who once served Magneto (who is totally dead, of course) wreak havoc on all the superheroes. The two most prominent Acolytes, Fabien Cortez and Exodus battle for control of the team, each believing they are truly following in Mag’s footprints. A lot of this takes place on good old mutant hating island nation, Genosha.

Bloodties. 1 episode



Serial 5: The Wedding Of Cyclops And Phoenix
(written by Fabian Nicieza, Scott Lobdell, Glen Herdling, and Kurt Busiek, art by Richard Bennett, Andy Kubert, Ian Chuchill, Mike McKone, John Romita Jr, Tim Sale, and Ron Randall)

Because somebody in the 90s demanded it The Wedding Of Cyclops And Phoenix not only delivers on the promise of the title but also delves into The Legacy Virus, dealing with the multiple Psylocke issue and gives us a whole mess of Sabretooth. And for the love all that’s Summers, GO AWAY MR. SINISTER, YOU ARE NOT SCARY.

It’s a big collection but I’m only giving The Wedding. 3 episodes



Serial 6: The Road To Onslaught, Prelude To Onslaught, and The Complete Onslaught Epic Volumes 1-4
(many writers and artists)

Now we get to our first big skip. You don’t need to read Age Of Apocalypse. It has a fun set-up where Legion goes back in time to kill Magneto but accidentally takes out Professor X instead, but the ensuing storyline is utter madness. It’s a whole different world that, by the end of the series ceases to exist. So don’t invest! Instead, it’s time for The Road To Onslaught featuring Bishop, The X-Babies, a dude who looks but does not act an awful lot like Magneto, and Psylocke trying to cure Sabretooth of his rage (it doesn’t go well). Plus a bunch of planted seeds about the coming of Onslaught.

Prelude To Onslaught is the perfect primer. It starts with pivotal snippets of storylines (some which are already represented in the previous seasons, some which aren’t, including a glimpse of the aforementioned missing Age Of Apocalypse) and then throws you right into The Complete Onslaught Epic. See the ultimate consequence of Professor X shutting down Magneto’s mind at the beginning of the season. Guest starring pretty much every Marvel superhero who existed in the 90s. And not leaving very many of them alive at the end.

Onslaught. 6 episodes



Season 3 has 20 episodes.



Interseason Special: Zero Tolerance.
(written by Scott Lobdell, John Francis Moore, Larry Hama, and James Robinson, art by Chris Bachalo, Carlos Pacheco, Leinil Francis Yu, and Adam Pollina)

After the cataclysmic events of Onslaught (what other kind of events are there when the X-Men are involved?) the government declares open season on mutants (again). Lots of Wolverine, Cable, Cecelia Reyes, Generation X, and even some Deadpool. Plus, sad kids.

The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?
Season one introduced us to Claremont’s X-Men, a couple of whom were killed off, and introduced us to a slew of villains, but there wasn’t a Buffy The Vampire Slayer “Big Bad”. Well, welcome to season two, you’re about to get to know Mr. Sinister and The Marauders.

Serial 1: X-Men Mutant Massacre
(written by Chris Claremont and Louise Simonson, art by John Romita Jr, Rick Leonardi, Alan Davis, and Barry Windsor-Smith)

Because Claremont’s writing is so dense, and he was on the Uncanny X-Men book for so long, it’s tough to skip a chunk of continuity, but that’s what I’m doing. Luckily, Claremont waxes backstory that you’ll hardly notice the forty missing issues. Cough. So we start Season Two with Magneto as the headmaster at Xavier’s school. Storm has been depowered, there’s a new generation of X-Men called The New Mutants, and, as we learned in the interseason special, the original X-Men have started their own team called X-Factor which claims to be out hunting mutants, when, actually, they’re rescuing them. Well, all those teams, plus Thor and a group of kids called The Power Pack have to deal with The Marauders, a group of villains who have invaded The Morlock Tunnels and are killing mutants. All the heroes work (not necessarily together) to stop the threat, but there’s great costs (of course), and new X-Men join the team.

Morlock Massacre. 4 episodes



Episode 5: Fantastic Four Versus The X-Men
(written by Chris Claremont, art by John Bogdanove)
It really only takes one episode to tackle this mini-crossover where The FF and She-Hulk fly off to Muir Island to try and help The X-Men recover from Mutant Massacre, which has put four long time team members out of commission. The current lineup is initially excited that Reed Richards has come to help but when he experiences moment of self-doubt, Dr. Doom steps in to offer his assistance. This was the series that got me into X-Men comics, and I think it still very much holds up as one of their best stories.

Out Of Phase. 1 episode




Serial 2: Fall Of The Mutants Volume 1 & Fall Of The Mutants Volume 2
(written by Chris Claremont and Louise Simonson, art by Marc Silvestri, Walt Simonson, and Bret Blevins)

This is a giant, non-intersecting, crossover where full-on madness takes place. Forge and Storm enter a realm of magic, X-Factor battles old friends and Apocalypse, the X-Men just might die, The New Mutants lose a team member on the island of…Bird Brain? Even The Hulk, Captain America, Daredevil, and The Power Pack are involved in yet another Everything Will Change storyline.

Fall Of The Mutants. 6 episodes




Serial 3: Excalibur Classic Volume 1
(written by Chris Claremont, art by Alan Davis)

We’re not going to get invested in Excalibur continuity because it was a beautifully weird book that is a fun read but isn’t essential to X-Men continuity. But the first book shows what happens when the X-Men who weren’t involved in Fall Of The Mutants (most of them were put out of commission during Mutant Massacre) .

Excalibur. 2 episodes



Serial 4: Inferno
(written by Chris Claremont, Louise Simonson, and many more, art by many)

Another storyline that pulls in Daredevil, The New Mutants, X-Factor, Excalibur, The Fantastic Four, and more. Madelyne Pryor is a teensy bit upset that her husband abandoned her, and, oh yea, sent their child into the future to save him from a virus that he probably got because his dad is a superputz. So she accepts demon powers and transforms New York into a Hell On Earth, even more so that it usually is. In the end, we learn Madelyne’s relation to Jean, and yadda yadda, not so happily ever after. Plus more Sinister & Marauders.

Inferno. 4 episodes



Serial 5: The X-Tinction Agenda
(written by Chris Claremont and Louise Simonson, art by Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld, John Bogdanove, and Guang Yap)

Eventually, we’ll pare down the amount of teams in a book, but here’s another All Mutant crossover. It turns out that X-Factor has been working for an evil dude this whole time. There’s an island where mutants are slaves and they’re hella mad at the X teams because of the events of a super complex (don’t read it if you don’t have to) storyline called Days Of Future Present. So the leader of Genosha kidnaps The New Mutants and Storm (who was de-aged….don’t worry about it) and all the X teams go to rescue them. This is the Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld era of X-Men so expect big guns and big muscles.

X-Tinction Agenda. 3 episodes



This puts season two at 20 episodes.



Interseason Special: The Muir Island Saga
(written by Chris Claremont, Fabien Nicenza, and Peter David, art by Paul Smith, Andy Kubert, Whilce Portacio, Kirk Jarvinen, and Steven Butler)

I’m going to stray from my Collections-Only policy, and tell you to track down five issues. They’ll be cheap, probably cheaper than new comic issues. Uncanny X-Men #278 & #279, X-Factor #69, Uncanny X-Men #280, and then X-Factor #70 make up The Muir Island Saga. Since the end of Fall of The Mutants, the X-Men have been less a team and more a series of former teammates on their own adventures. In these books, all the mutants are put back on the board and arranged into new teams. Professor X battling The Shadow King is the focus of this story but the purpose was to set up X-Men #1. the biggest selling comic of all-time.

The X-Men franchise has had a few animated series, and is on their way to a sixth live action movie. But how would you put together a ten season live action show with continuity and including the best stories from the various X-books over the years?
​
Personally, I’m skipping all the silver age comics. No offense to silver age fans. The silver age X-Men books are fun but the book didn’t really hit its stride until the 70s, where we’ll start off Season 1. In place of episodes, I’m calling each book a serial, like old school Doctor Who storylines because you shouldn’t try and cram a Chris Claremont story into forty-five minutes.

Serial 1: X-Men Epic Collection: Second Genesis
(written by Chris Claremont, art by Dave Cockrum, Bob Brown, Tony Dezuniga, and John Byrne)

Chris Claremont isn’t The Father of The X-Men (Stan Lee and John Byrne are the My Two Dads for our mutant heroes) but he’s the mentor who raised them into what they’ve become.

We start off with Professor X recruiting a team of mutants to rescue his previous team of mutants (the original X-Men) who went on a mission to Krakoa and, apart from team leader, Cyclops, did not return. This is a very 1970s shot at diversity. There’s an eastern European demon-looking guy, a Russian who seems to be made of metal, an African storm goddess, a Japanese flamethrower, a Canadian with adamantium claws, a Scottish guy with a debilitating scream, and a super strong Apache. By 2015 standards, their characters and origins are hugely problematic, but this team was incredibly progressive for 1975. In this volume, the team comes together, suffers a tragedy, integrates with the original X-Men and hits all the tropes from the original run of X-Men in a slightly more modern manner.

We’re then introduced to The Phoenix, the Sh’iar, we spend some time learning about Professor X’s backstory via Juggernaut and Black Tom and some other crucial X-Men villains make appearances. A lot of what will become important X-history is laid down here by Claremont, Cockrum, and Byrne, and though its over-exposition is dated, the actual story is worth the read.

This serial is called Hope You Survive The Experience. 4 episodes


Serial 2: X-Men Proteus
(written by Chris Claremont, art by John Byrne)

This serial presents us with the first Claremont-conceived villain. Moira Mactaggert discovers something bad is going down on Muir Island, and it isn’t long before the X-Men show up to help some of their beleaguered comrades. The hardcover collection also contains some issues of Classic X-Men that delve deeper into the Proteus story, and have some fun artistic takes on what happens to mutants when you bend reality. Polaris and Havoc show up in this volume, and we also get to meet Madrox.

Proteus. 2 episodes.



Serial 3: X-Men The Dark Phoenix Saga
(written by Chris Claremont, art by John Byrne)

This is pretty much the ultimate X-story. Every time the X-Men have crossed into another media, the writers tell some version of this space saga. Phoenix (formerly Marvel Girl/Jean Grey) is manipulated by members of The Hellfire Club. In this volume you meet Kitty Pride, Emma Frost, Dazzler, and more (but who needs more than them?), you get to see Wolverine be all Wolveriney for the first time, and the Sh’iar show up to put a stop to a villain who threatens their very existence. There are also some cameos by Oatu The Watcher and Dr. Strange.

The Dark Phoenix Saga can not be containted. 4 episodes



Serial 4: X-Men Days Of Future Past
(written by Chris Claremont, art by John Byrne)

This is not quite like the movie of the same name. We start at a funeral (omg, did someone die in the last storyline? I wonder if it’s forever), then we spend some time with Alpha Flight, and then we get into the storyline that the movie is based on. Sentinels. Mystique. Destiny. The future. And how to keep all the X-Men from being massacred by a corrupt government. The series closes off with a Christmas story where Kitty Pride battles an alien that is in no way at all inspired by the xenomorphs in Alien.

Days Of Future Past. 4 episodes.


Serial 5: God Loves, Man Kills
(written by Chris Claremont, art by Brent Anderson)

We take a break from Byrne (but not Claremont) for what was originally a graphic novel with art by Brent Anderson. We see how religion and politics are at odds with the science based mutant X-Men. This graphic novel was the basis for the second X-Men movie, with the main difference being that the villain (Stryker) is a minister, not a military guy. Also we get to see Magneto be more of a good guy, as his aim doesn’t seem to be “kill all non-mutants”.

God Loves Man Kills. 2 episodes



Serial 6: From The Ashes
(written by Chris Claremont, art by Paul Smith, Walter Simonson, and John Romita Jr)

“Professor X is a jerk!” is one of the most iconic Kitty Pride moments. In this serial, we spend more time with The Hellfire Club, Mystique and Destiny. Rogue joins the X-Men, Wolverine goes to Japan, the X-Men meet The Morlocks, Storm gets a mohawk, and Cyclops meets Madeline Pryor who looks just a teensy bit like his ex. There is a metric ton of story packed into this volume, and not just because of Claremont’s exposition. This is a good closing spot for season one, not just because many of the characters are at rest points in their stories, but because there is a vast amount of X-Men books after this that haven’t been collected anywhere.

From The Ashes. 4 episodes



This puts Season 1 at 20 episodes.
BUT WAIT. One of the recent traditions in Doctor Who is to have an Interseason (usually Christmas) special. I’ll be using this device as a setup for a coming season.



Interseason Special: Fantastic Four By John Byrne Vol 07.
(written by John Byrne, Roger Stern, and Bob Layton, art by John Byrne, John Buscema, and Jackson Guice)

It’s possible that I’ll do an FF chronology someday, but for now, you don’t need to know anything to pick up this book. It opens with the Fantastic Four (Reed Richards, The Invisible Woman, The Human Torch, and She-Hulk) calling in The Avengers to fight a bunch of Skrulls. Once that crossover is finished, The Beyonder shows up and then the FF and The Avengers find a cocoon in the ocean. Inside the cocoon? An X-Men believed to be dead. Yeup, Phoenix is back and she joins up with the original X-Men team (Cyclops, Beast, Iceman, and Angel) to form a new superhero group: X-Factor. Yeup, Cyclops leaves his wife and baby boy (born between seasons) behind to bro out with his high school friends and his ex-girlfriend. Scott Summers has always been an egocentric piece of shit.

In 2009, Chris Claremont began the odd alternate timeline series in the Marvel Universe called X-Men Forever.  The series picks up from Claremont's 1991 X-Men run, and presents the timeline as he would have written it, had he not jumped ship to Image comics.  While it's completely ridiculous, it's a focused examination of the X-Men by one of the series's premiere writers.  Batman Confidential is a DC series that focuses on stories from early on in Batman's career.  It's written by several long-time DC writers like Peter Milligan, Sam Kieth, and Royal McGraw. I included one of the story arcs, Lovers and Madmen in a previous entry, but Rules Of Engagement helped clinch my decision to not include any more of the Batman Confidential series as part of this project.  If something contradicts the chronology it needs to be at least fun, and this series seems more an exercise in frustration.

Rules Of Engagement is about Bruce Wayne/Batman's first encounter with Superman's nemesis, Lex Luthor.  The plot outline: Lex Luthor sets up WayneTech to look dangerously inept in front of a group of defense contractors, all in the name of world domination!  The evil, hand rubbing, mwa-ha-ha-ing bald guy attempts to take over the world because he doesn't like superheroes.  Batman, of course, takes him down in the end.  While the story is fun, the dialog is...questionable, and Whilce Portacio 's art is trapped forever in 1991.  This was the first book that I had to struggle to finish.

Story: 2/5, Art: 2/5
 


If Nancy Reagan was as devout a Batman reader as Barack Obama is a Spider-Man fan, her favorite collection would probably be Venom.  It's the first time in continuity that we encounter the designer drug, Venom, a pill (and later inoculant) that shows up repeatedly in Gotham. 

After failing to save a little girl from drowning in the sewer (a girl who's father happens to be the creator of Venom), and then tearing a deltoid muscle during a workout, Batman gives into temptation and begins taking Venom to bulk himself.

It's not long before the now super-strong Batman has his senses dulled and starts making dubious decisions.  He goes so far as to drive Alfred away, and is then asked to kill Jim Gordon.  The conversation around taking Gordon down has one of my favorite continuity nerd jokes when Batman refers to Gordon as "Lieutenant or Captain or whatever he is".

Spoiler alert : Batman doesn't kill Gordon.  But every character introduced in this story dies by the end.  The curious omission in this story is that it feels like it should be the origin of Bane.  Venom is the drug that enables this future villain to bulk up and battle Batman.  And the island that the villains retreat to is Santa Priscia, which is where Bane grows up.

This is a well-told introduction to Batman's relationship with drugs.

Story: 4/5, Art 4/5



J H Williams III is one of my favorite Batman Universe artists of all time.  His work on Detective Comics is one of the most beautifully rendered pieces of art I've seen in comics.  But before he ever laid a pencil to page in Detective, he wrote a story arc for Legends Of The Dark Knight along with Dan Curtis Johnson that's collected as Batman: Snow.  The story focuses on two important events: Batman's first foray into working with sidekicks, and the origin of Mr. Freeze.  Much like the much maligned movie, Batman and Robin, the author chooses to borrow Freeze's origin from The Animated Series (the episode, Heart Of Ice, won one of the series's two Emmys).

The Freeze origin is the most tragic of the villain origins in Batman's rogues gallery.  But this story intersects with the fascinating story of Batman assembling a team of experts to help him fight crime.  After Jim Gordon declines to assist Batman on an investigation, he recruits an awkward technology expert, an unsatisfied FBI investigator, a journalist famous for profiling criminals, and two rehabilitated criminals to serve as the brawn.

His strategy to get the team to bond is to turn them against him, which is a terrible strategy utilized by angry middled aged losers guilted into coaching Little League Teams, and antagonistic old men.  It is sort of working when Mr. Freeze (sans terrible puns about the cold) gets involved.  By the end of the issue the team has decided to disassociate with Batman (but hint that they may continue on their own), and Batman tells Alfred he is thinking of trying another strategy.  On his kitchen table is a newspaper mentioning a circus featuring The Flying Graysons.  The Robin is coming soon teaser is used in several different books, including Year One, and The Long Halloween.  The way I choose to fit it into chronology is that he misses the circus when it comes to town during Year One, but that this story, as well as Rules Of Engagement and Venom, coincides with The Long Halloween.  There are several references in each of the stories about working with Harvey Dent (who doesn't actually get any face time, just gets his name dropped), who is a major player in The Long Halloween, after which, well, he doesn't work with Batman anymore.

Story: 4/5, Art 5/5