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X Men Film Series / Tropes T to Z

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Tropes beginning with the letters T to Z for the X-Men Film Series.

  • Tailor-Made Prison:
    • X-Men: At the end, Magneto is locked in a cell made entirely of plastic.
    • X-Men: The Last Stand: Magneto attacks a mobile prison convoy that contains several dangerous mutants. Juggernaut is manacled to the wall 24 hours a day so he cannot build up any momentum.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Subverted. The concrete cell under the Pentagon was not built specifically for Magneto, but simply constructed that way because steel was being rationed at the time. It still holds him quite well, though.
  • Tall, Dark, and Handsome:
    • Hugh Jackman's portrayal of Wolverine certainly qualifies, although the comic book did not depict him this way. He's dark, broody, dangerous, and mysterious.
    • Colossus is the tallest X-Man, and he also happens to be a brunet and good-looking.
    • Magneto as a younger man when played by Michael Fassbender in the First Class series.
  • Take a Third Option:
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Erik asks Mystique, "Are you still Charles' Raven... or are you Mystique?" (What Magneto is truly referring to with the latter is if she's still his soldier.) In the end, she chooses her own path. She doesn't adhere to her foster brother's pacifism, and she rejects her former lover's warmongering.
    • Deadpool (2016): When Wade pegs Negasonic as an angsty teenager, he predicts she'll either stick to sullen silence or make a mean comment. She thinks for a moment, and says he's really "got [her] in a box here," to Wade's delight.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Apocalypse offers Professor X a Sadistic Choice: if Charles immediately surrenders (which would fulfill Apocalypse's plan for world domination), then the lives of the "weaklings" (Mystique and Quicksilver) will be spared, or if he continues to hide, then Apocalypse will murder both mutants, and it's only matter of time before Apocalypse finds out where Xavier is. Professor X decides to initiate a Battle in the Center of the Mind instead, which distracts Apocalypse, and thus Mystique's and Quicksilver's executions are delayed.
  • Team Dad:
    • Professor Charles Xavier. Best shown in X-Men: The Last Stand during his funeral, where a massive amount of his students cried during it. His tombstone reads, "Father, Teacher, Friend", and naturally "Father" is listed first because he was viewed by the youngsters (especially those who are orphans or have been disowned by their families) as primarily a paternal figure.
    • X-Men: First Class: Erik Lehnsherr has a "tough love" approach with the young mutants (Sean Cassidy learns this the hard way). Charles might qualify as well, but he tends to act more like the nurturing Team Mom. Insert witty commentary here.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: James McAvoy stresses in the June 2016 issue of F*** magazine that Professor X, for all of his kindness and altruism, has a profound psychological need to be the "king of the castle," so to speak. Xavier genuinely loves his friends and his students and he cares deeply about them, but it's also very important to him to hold a certain amount of authority over them.
      McAvoy: That's partly why he's building a school and he wants that family that he never really had, and he wants to be the father. He's got that slight... he's a good man, but he's got a little bit of a god complex as well. He wants to be at the head of the table. It's a good thing, but it's his flaw as well.
  • Team Mom:
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • As a man with an androgynous personality, Professor X is a father figure to his surrogate family who also has a prominent "motherly" side. Xavier had already exhibited strong nurturing tendencies in X-Men: First Class, and here, he calls his students "my darlings" when he sends them off to bed, and he even uses a Mary Poppins reference (the joke being that he behaves slightly like a "governess" around the younger children). He is very gentle and caring when he soothes Jean's fears about her death-filled "nightmare" and her telepathy. After Raven becomes his Number Two within the X-Men, Charles' "maternal" approach appears more pronounced because Mystique is the drill sergeant who molds the team into soldiers, and he's the one who takes charge of their academic education and their emotional well-being.
      • Ororo is the matriarch of her small band of street urchins. She steals to feed them, and they obey her when she shoos them off so that she can have a private conversation with Apocalypse.
  • Teleport Spam: Nightcrawler, Wraith, Weapon XI and Azazel all do this.
  • Tempting Fate:
    • X-Men: First Class: "Gentlemen, this is why the CIA is no place for a woman." Cue a huge crash as Emma Frost is busted out of her cell.
    • Deadpool (2016): Wade bets Francis that things can't get worse from "round-the-clock torture." Oh, how wrong he is.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: After Cyclops, Jean and Nightcrawler free Wolverine from the Weapon X facility, Cyclops states that he hopes to never see Logan again.
  • Tender Tears:
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: A huge part of 1973 Charles' character development is centered around his huge capacity for empathy, and how he needs to learn to move past his own pain for the benefit of others, so he spends a good percentage of the film either on the verge of tears or outright crying.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: There's a lot of focus in this story on Xavier's sensitivity, and he's either close to tears, shedding a few of them, or openly weeping when someone he cares about is in pain.
  • That Man Is Dead:
    • X-Men: First Class ends with Erik outright proclaiming that he prefers his new moniker: Magneto.
    • The Wolverine: When Yukio tells Logan it's an honour to meet the Wolverine, he mutters, "That's not who I am anymore."
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • When Hank tells Logan that "the Professor isn't here," Xavier is still living at his estate, only he has lost his powers and the will to lead mutants, thus dissociating himself from his identity as Professor X. It doubles as a Call-Back to First Class when he insisted that "You don't get to be called a 'professor' until you actually have a teaching position."
      • In Saigon, Mystique tells Alex that Raven isn't her name anymore. Given how the film ends, it's ambiguous if she still feels this way.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Charles pleads with Erik not to join Apocalypse, but Lehnsherr has already reclaimed his Magneto persona.
      Xavier: Erik, don't join them.
      Magneto: Whatever it is you think you saw in me, I buried it with my family.
  • Time-Shifted Actor: The majority of characters who appear in both the original trilogy and the First Class trilogy. Wolverine is a notable exception.
  • Time Skip: There can be fairly long gaps of time within the individual stories and in between some movies.
  • Time Stands Still:
    • X2: X-Men United: The audience is momentarily led to believe this happened at the museum, although what had actually transpired is that Professor X had applied his mind-controlling powers to put everyone on "pause."
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Peter Maximoff uses the super speed version to mess with some Pentagon guards, and to redirect the bullets they had just fired.
  • Traumatic Superpower Awakening:
    • X-Men: First Class: Erik is originally only able to use his powers when extremely angry. The first two times, it involves maternal separation.
    • X-Men Origins: Wolverine: James Howlett's awakening occurs when he stabs his father's killer to death.
    • Deadpool (2016): Invoked by Ajax. His Super-Soldier factory works by grabbing people, pumping them full of a mutant gene kickstarting serum, and then torturing them until the trauma gives them superpowers (or they die, whichever comes first). Deadpool's powers get activated when he is deprived oxygen for an entire night.
  • Understatement:
    • X-Men Origins: Wolverine:
      • Logan's response when asked how his execution by firing squad went.
      "Tickled."
      • Also this exchange:
      Farmer: Had a rough night?
      Wolverine: You could say that.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • Wolverine reminds Professor X that "Patience isn't my strongest suit."
      • Kitty Pryde warns Logan that her power "might sting a little"; he then screams at the top of his lungs when she activates it.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Most definitely applies when Wolverine is involved. The "little help" was basically doing all the killing for them.
      Raven: Well, you've been busy.
      Scott: We had a... little help.
  • Undying Loyalty:
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • There are plenty of other things that Hank could do with his time, yet he chooses to take care of Charles during the latter's decade-long Heroic BSoD. Hank may even be a little too loyal because he serves as an enabler by providing a serum which worsens his friend's already bad case of substance abuse.
      • Wolverine has developed this for Xavier during the Time Skip after the post-credits scene of The Wolverine. Although both Magneto and Professor X are co-leaders of the remaining X-Men in 2023, Logan only defers to Charles' authority. When Erik tells him that, "You'll need me as well [in the past]," Wolverine is wholly against the idea, but he reluctantly agrees after Xavier nods in approval.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • Although Havok was under Professor X's tutelage for no more than a year when he was a teen,note  he remains grateful for the help that Charles gave to him. Havok is the first one to run after the Professor and try to rescue him when his ex-mentor is seized by Magneto.
      • Apocalypse's original crew were all willing to defend their master until their last breath.
  • Unwitting Instigator of Doom:
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Mystique's plan was simply to avenge a number of dead mutants by murdering the man who had abducted them and experimented with their corpses. That man had projects, rejected by the Congress, to build powerful robots to kill mutants. His death proved his point, that mutants were an actual menace, and so his projects were restored and continued. The Sentinels would prove so deadly and effective that they would cause the apocalyptic future seen at the beginning of the story. Of course, Mystique had never intended any of that; all she wanted was plain revenge.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: After mutants became public knowledge in 1973, a cult was formed to worship En Sabah Nur, and Agent Moira MacTaggert's investigation inadvertently awakens him because his followers always cover up the entrance to his resting place, but she had left it exposed to sunlight, which reanimates him.
  • Vanity Is Feminine:
    • Downplayed with Professor X, as his habit of always being dapper isn't treated as a negative trait In-Universe. However, the attention he pays to his appearance does subtly distinguish his brand of androgynous masculinity from the other two male leads in the franchise (namely the macho Wolverine and the manly Magneto).
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • Vanity, thy name is Charles Xavier. Although his preoccupation with his looks is an aspect of his androgyny, unlike most other male examples, it's not presented as being demeaning to his character. Professor X's feminine side is his most valuable asset in the story, and because Beauty Equals Goodness applies in his case, taking pride in his attractiveness is an extension of him being thoroughly at ease and joyful with his inborn empathy.
      • Quicksilver checks his hair and teeth in the mirror of this commercial, and he's a Manchild. When Evan Peters was asked in this interview to describe his character in only three words, the actor replied, "Fast, cheeky, stylish," so preening is important to Peter Maximoff.
  • Villain Teleportation:
  • The Voiceless:
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: The Stinger for X-Men: Apocalypse suggests Mr. Sinister will be appearing in a future movie. Though he doesn't appear, the orphanage in Deadpool 2 is named after Nathaniel Essex.
  • What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: As with the comics, as mutant powers are seemingly random, some students at the school have powers are rather... unthreatening, although these characters are pushed to the background because, frankly, people don't want to watch a film about characters whose power is being mute and having a lizard tongue. It helps to humanize mutants as a whole, as it shows that, while some mutants are fairly dangerous and so it makes sense to be weary, they're just as likely to be harmless, and so hunting them down and treating mutants as a whole as inherently dangerous beings is rather unfair. Because of this, mutants are fairly similar to people with mental and social disorders, who are similarly just as likely to be harmless and/or benevolent despite their condition, despite being perceived as dangerous by nature.
  • What Beautiful Eyes!:
    • Nightcrawler's irises were yellow in X2: X-Men United, but they are rimmed with red in X-Men: Apocalypse.
    • X-Men: First Class: After Charles is shot in the spine, the glare of the Cuban sunshine shrinks his pupils, which makes his irises appear very large, and they are a stunning shade of vibrant blue, especially in close-up. His Innocent Blue Eyes are shiny and wet with tears due to the intense physical and emotional pain, and it marks the character's Break the Cutie moment.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • 1973 Xavier collapses after the serum wears off, and there are a few close-ups of his eyes. The colour of his irises is quite vivid, and they fully express his mental anguish and vulnerability in that scene. It's a stark contrast from his hopeful and confident Innocent Blue Eyes in First Class.
      • Blink's irises are a weird aqua, complete with a Sickly Green Glow.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Just before Professor X enters Apocalypse's mind, the camera zooms in on the former's right eye. It's so blue that it's practically glowing, and it's wracked with pain and fear because of the grisly abuse that Apocalypse has put him through, but Charles' iris also exudes his defiance, and he's determined to fight his adversary to the bitter end.
  • While You Were in Diapers:
    • X2: X-Men United: Colonel Stryker says this to Senator Kelly (or who he thinks is Kelly).
      "I was piloting Black Ops missions in the jungles of North Vietnam while you were sucking on your mama's tit at Woodstock, Kelly."
    • X-Men: The Last Stand: Beast pulls one of these on Wolverine, but the former is approximately 110 years younger than the latter.
      "My boy, I have been fighting for mutant rights since before you had claws."
  • The White House:
    • X2: X-Men United: Nightcrawler breaches security at the White House and comes within an inch of stabbing the president before being winged by a Secret Service agent, allowing Nightcrawler to break free of his mind control.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: The 1973 section of the climax occurs on the lawn in front of the White House, which culminates in Magneto's attempt to assassinate President Nixon and his cabinet.
  • Wide-Eyed Idealist:
    • X-Men: First Class: While Charles isn't exactly naïve, his idealism is accentuated by the fact that everyone else seems to have a far more pessimistic approach to mutant-human relations. It's suggested that this is at least partly because he hasn't faced persecution in the same way. It sets up a nice contrast with his portrayal in the previous films, where he remains idealistic, but is a lot more cautious about it now that he's had personal experience.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Xavier has regained most of his cheery optimism from First Class, and Word of God even says that he has too much hope at the beginning of the story. By the end of the movie, he becomes The Idealist, i.e. he is no longer "wide-eyed," but he doesn't give up hope for peaceful coexistence between mutants and humans.
  • Winged Humanoid:
    • X-Men: The Last Stand: This is Warren Worthington III's only "superpower." Bonus science points in that his wings are probably large enough to actually lift a human, although there are still the typical issues of musculature and bone structure.
    • X-Men: First Class: Angel Salvadore's most distinct mutation is her dragonfly-like wings, and she's able to disguise them as tattoos.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Angel begins the movie with feathered wings, but they are later replaced by metallic ones by Apocalypse.
  • Worthy Opponent:
    • X-Men: First Class: Downplayed with regards to how Shaw views Xavier. They never have a face-to-face confrontation, but Sebastian recognizes that Charles is a formidable foe, hence Shaw's commission of the telepathy-blocking helmet and his hope to recruit Xavier when he infiltrates the CIA facility. Moreover, after Charles mind-controls a Soviet officer to fire upon the Aral Sea to avert World War III, Sebastian utters in admiration, "That telepath is powerful," which implies that Emma Frost's psychic ability isn't as sophisticated as Xavier's.
    • The Wolverine: Viper is rather impressed by Logan.
  • Would Hit a Girl:
    • X-Men:
      • Magneto places Rogue into his machine, knowing full well that she will die from its effects.
      • Considering that Mystique is trying to kill Wolverine, he fights her as viciously as he would any man.
      • Toad has no qualms attacking Jean Grey and Storm.
      • Sabretooth wanted to cause Storm enough pain so that she would scream, but he failed twice.
    • X2: X-Men United:
      • After Lady Deathstrike attempts to sedate Cyclops, he hits her with an optic blast, but she recovers quickly due to her Healing Factor.
      • Pyro has no problem throwing a fireball at a female cop who has him at gunpoint.
      • The brutal confrontation between Wolverine and Lady Deathstrike is one of the most violent duels in the franchise.
      • With his Master of Illusion ability, Jason tricked his mother into committing suicide with a power-drill to her temple.
    • X-Men: The Last Stand:
      • Juggernaut is willing to murder Kitty Pryde.
      • Wolverine has no choice but to slay the Phoenix in order to end her catastrophic rampage.
      • Quill gives a Deadly Hug to Dr. Kavita Rao.
    • X-Men: First Class:
      • Sebastian Shaw heartlessly shoots Erik's mother dead in front of the boy's eyes.
      • Lehnsherr cracks Emma Frost's crystalline neck after she refuses to cooperate.
      • Angel Salvadore attacks Havok and Banshee with her highly acidic spit balls, so once they land safely on a beach, Alex Summers unleashes his power and burns her wings.
      • Magneto nearly strangles Agent Moira MacTaggert to death with her own military dog tags, although Xavier manages to talk him out of it.
    • The Wolverine:
      • Shingen slaps his daughter Mariko in the face when they get into an argument.
      • Shingen attacks Yukio and a katana duel ensues. He is about to stab her after he knocks her unconscious, but a revived Logan stops Shingen in the nick of time.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • Major Stryker successfully tasered Mystique, but he failed to shoot her in Saigon and inside The White House's underground bunker.
      • Magneto would have murdered Mystique if it weren't for Beast's timely intervention.
    • Deadpool (2016):
      • While on the hunt for Ajax, Deadpool tracks down and assaults two women, wondering aloud whether not hitting them would be more sexist after one tried to attack him. He does so, while clearly preparing to shoot them at point blank.
      • Colossus doesn't hesitate fighting Angel Dust once she shows that she's as strong as he is.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • Apocalypse chokes Mystique while lifting her off the ground.
      • Beast performs a Catch and Return with a car that Storm had launched at the X-Men, and he goes on the offensive when the homicidal Psylocke fights him.
      • Cyclops attempts to target Storm with his Eye Beam, and she barely manages to get out of the way.
  • You Are Better Than You Think You Are:
    • X-Men: First Class: It has a repeated line where Charles urges Erik to "be the better man" and work for more than just revenge. Erik interprets this somewhat differently than Charles intended.
      Charles: There is so much more to you than you know. Not just pain and anger. There is good, too. I felt it. When you can access all of that, you will possess a power no one can match. Not even me.
    • Deadpool (2016): Colossus keeps handing out speeches to this effect almost every time he speaks to Deadpool throughout the movie, but Deadpool is having none of it.
  • You Can't Fight Fate: Discussed in Days of Future Past, when Hank posits that time is like a river, and will eventually correct itself no matter how big the ripples one makes, rendering everything they try to do to stop the bad future from occurring ultimately futile. In at least one timeline shown in Logan, his fears are confirmed, as mutants are still destined to all but die out at the hands of normal humans.
  • You Can't Go Home Again:
    • X2: X-Men United: After Stryker's raid on the school, Bobby, Rogue, Logan and Pyro stop by the Drake family house in hopes of regrouping, which in the process reveals Bobby's mutant abilities to his parents. His own brother calls the police and reports them as a threat despite the mutants not harbouring any ill intentions. After Pyro stupidly attacks the officers in the standoff that follows, Bobby is forced to flee with the others knowing he can never come back.
    • X-Men Origins: Wolverine: Invoked by a young Victor Creed after James Howlett kills his family's groundskeeper. The boys are being pursued by lawmen and search dogs.
      Jimmy: I want to go home.
      Victor: We can't.
  • You Monster!:
  • Younger and Hipper:
    • X-Men: First Class explores the younger (and more groovy) versions of Professor X, Magneto, Mystique and Beast with new actors playing the familiar roles.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse features Jean Grey, Cyclops, Storm and Nightcrawler as adolescents.

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