The X-Men In Ten Seasons, Season 4: Legacy

​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?
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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.

Colossus & Cecelia Reyes
art by Salvador Larocca

Season Four: Legacy
(Showrunner: Alan Davis)

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.

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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.