Favorite X-character

[Anchorsify]

Ditto. He's not in my top five either, but what he is, is *vital.*

Every group needs someone *solid* for the whacky and over-the-top sorts to contrast against. They can't *all* be pulling to radical extremes or edge-lords. Just as comedy shows need a 'straight man' who serves to point out the absurdity of the comic shenanigans around them, a superhero team, IMO, benefits from having someone like Colossus or Wonder Man or Colossal Boy, who *isn't* an orphan or an alien gladiator or vengeance-obsessed or a billionaire playboy or a member of a thieves guild or an ex-spy / assassin or whatever. Someone whose background is not quite as high drama (and whose character isn't quite as high maintenance) as the rest, serving as a sort of palette cleanser before getting back to time-displaced AU children from the future or body-swapped faux Asian assassins or whatever craziness serves as other people's origin stories.

Bingo. Which is why I think he fits 100% perfectly in the Deadpool movies and I'm glad he's got his chance to shine in the cinema now--he is the 'straight man' to Deadpools insanity.. which fits perfectly.

I'm super happy to see him getting more exposure (in the cinema at least), though I was really hoping the wedding would be a good thing for him.. well, surprise surprise, the movies are doing it better than the comics lately, inside and outside of the MCU.

He'll always be my favorite and reason I pick up comicbooks.

[AdamFTF]

Other:

Illyana 2.0

(My head canon Illyana 1.0 is still my favorite, but she hasn't been seen on-panel since Inferno, and she'll probably be ultra-nasty when she finally does, depending on who writes it... Simonson revealed in an interview she always intended for someone to bring 1.0 back, and was amazed no one took the hint <my letter published in TNM v1 #87 gives details on how Illyana 1.0 clearly never died/deaged, and Louise verified that in the interview with CBR, which has unfortunately been removed since the CBR reboot> )

No offense or disrespect intended, but when I think of Illyana, she'll always be the little girl who died from the Legacy Virus. I never read Inferno. I've barely even read any New Mutants (there are so many comics, guys. Just SO many). But that moment hit me hard as a kid. I think the death of Illyana Rasputin was kind of the "ending of Dark Phoenix Saga" for readers who started in the early '90s. It was the big death/loss that was really felt through everything. So, I still find it weird that some version of her is back as a semi-demonic adult.

what's so cool about colossus? Never found him interesting, except when he's juggernaut, or with domino, and he's at his worst with kitty pryde

The thing I find notable about Colossus is something that was established in his very first appearance. His primary motivator for doing what he does is his conscience. It wasn't any sort of demons from his past or personal loss (that stuff came later, as indicated by the previous part of this post). It's his own values and morality and feeling that he couldn't live with himself if he didn't do right by others that drove him to join Xavier's cause. When you consider this, it actually makes it really clear why he's the one X-Man they stuck in the Deadpool movies. It's to play off of Wade who barely has a conscience or at least has one that's very skewed.

[bearman]

Banshee.
And it’s been a rough decade for his fans.

[Fokken]

Oh boy. What's cool about Colossus?

He manifested his powers saving his sister. Boom, he's got the hero magic. This farm boy from Russia comes on over to America, learns another language, and immediately helps rescue the A-team of the X-men at the time, because they got themselves captured. Then he proceeds to just be this giant teddy bear of a dude who doesn't really have beef with anybody and just wants to get along.. kind of the personification of Xavier's ideals, even though he gets zero credit for it because there's more popular X-men like Jean Grey, Scott, and Logan to be angsty about their personal lives (sry to peeps that like them tho I do too, just saiyan'). When this dude isn't lifting the blackbird for fun because Kitty told him to he's painting to try and be chill because he doesn't want to become a big green rage monster. He's fought gods (Thor), he's fought unstoppable villains (Juggernaut), he's fought battles he knows he will lose (The Hulk) just because It's The Right Thing To Do and because at that moment, if he didn't do it, no one else would be able to. He does it all without a bunch of personal angst about how hard his life is or how many battles scars he's got or how many times he's been knocked into canada from New York because some jerk decided to play fisticuffs at a school for mutant children (Again, the hulk).

He willingly lost even when possessed by a destruction-loving demon as the avatar of Cyttorak for the sake of not endangering Utopia (the island) and New Atlantis. He used the cosmic powers of only one-fifth of the Phoenix Force to denuclearize the planet, solve world hunger, and negotiate with the Electric Legion to become a power source for Eastern Europe. Take that, Jean Grey. When was the last time she tried to talk down a gang of pure energy beings into helping instead of killing people, much less did some real good with her cosmic powers that wasn't trying not to lose control? (to be fair, he only had a portion.. but also to be fair, he only had a portion and was exponentially more helpful with it.)

When he isn't being written as some randomly-raging jealousy monster for someone's self-insert (big shoutout to Ellis for that), he's just a compassionate, introverted, tower of muscle and kindness that just wants to find some semblance of peace for himself and those he cares for. Of course, that means that he gets manipulated by his own sister into becoming the juggernaut, having her go behind his back to interfere with his wedding/etc, but hey, the fact that he keeps forgiving Illyana despite her many mistakes is just kind'a testament to his character. Some people see that as a pushover.. but it's easy to be upset and kick someone out of your life when they do you wrong. It's much harder to forgive and continue caring for them (especially when it isn't just because of a lack of options, but because they're the only family each other has and that matters to him).

Best of all, he does this kind of under the radar of most people. He is never the most popular, or even second most usually, he's just kind of there because he rarely acts out or is ever dramatic. His powers aren't flashy (though they can be reflective! and impressive, when he stops cars and ignores bullets and bombs and such). he's just a tankbro being that dependable strongman who's always willing to help whenever his friends need him. He doesn't go out of his way to interfere in people's lives, but if someone calls, he's got their back.

Also, he's got actually some of the more iconic aspects of comicbook-ness there are. His signature move is known by everyone, even those that don't know it's his, and it's been replicated and copied a hundred times over just because it's the epitome of cool:



The Fastball Special. It has its own wiki page, it's that good.

And then there's this iconic cover drawn by John Cassaday which is one of the best looking covers of all time, imo (though clearly I'm biased), and certainly one of the best ones of the more recent comics:




Which is to say nothing of the recent Deadpool movies in which he's portrayed awesomely also, or to go in too deeply to the fact that he's still one of the strongest and toughest mutants on the planet but very rarely ever flexes his potential, and usually does it on the defensive, for the sake of someone else's well-being, when doing things like holding up buildings and the like.

The passion of this post fuels my soul.
Well done fellow poster. Well done indeed.

[TheCape]

The passion of this post fuels my soul.
Well done fellow poster. Well done indeed.

It beats every post here frankly, i wish that i could have expressed this well on my own.

[CuteClops]

Each and every character is cool. There are no rules about that, except one: No matter what anyone tells you, your love is all that counts.

Colossus is cool.
Kitty is cool.
Magik is cool.
Banshee is cool.
Cyclops is cool.
Jean is cool.
Storm is cool.
Maggot is cool.
Dazzler is cool.
and so forth...
All X-Men are cool.

[Wiccan]

He used the cosmic powers of only one-fifth of the Phoenix Force to denuclearize the planet, solve world hunger, and negotiate with the Electric Legion to become a power source for Eastern Europe. Take that, Jean Grey. When was the last time she tried to talk down a gang of pure energy beings into helping instead of killing people, much less did some real good with her cosmic powers that wasn't trying not to lose control? (to be fair, he only had a portion.. but also to be fair, he only had a portion and was exponentially more helpful with it.)

But also to be fair, he didn't had an evil BDSM illusionist and a telepath messing up his mind. Jean managed to not lose control of the Phoenix Force for all of Morrison's run and for all of Claremont's run before what I mentioned happened. And she has used the Phoenix Force to literally undo an entire apocalyptic future(Here Comes Tomorrow), so... No. I have no idea why you found the need to take a jab on her to make Colossus look better....

[Ricochet Rita]

what's so cool about colossus? Never found him interesting, except when he's juggernaut, or with domino, and he's at his worst with kitty pryde

The passion of this post fuels my soul.
Well done fellow poster. Well done indeed.

Indeed. I was about to tell what's so cool about Piotr, but there's no need already

I suspect many like him, he's just not many's favourite.

Yeah, Xavier is vital, but hardly #1 for many readers. That doesn't mean we hate him or we don't care about him.

[Ricochet Rita]

LONGSHOT

I'll try to stick to one sentence (sort of...) as asked in the OP.

I like him the best because he's in general a rara avis in superhero genre. Just the contrary of an alpha male, androgynous, extremely friendly, trusting and open-minded, although extremely honest and clear-visioned about stinginess so he usually put people in embarrasing situations because of their hypocrisy --and that's great. I also love his tragic background of horror and magic, as well as his condition of non-born but built creature. His difficult balance between sublime and ridiculous, joy and melancholy -his bittersweet nature, in short- I find hugely appealing.

[Andru]

Magik (Illyana Rasputin)



Why?...She has awesome bangs!

Kidding aside, my whole introduction to the X-Men was the animated series and the comics from the same period. Pretty much the same time Illyana died from the Legacy Virus, so I had no clue who she was.

Many, many years later I got back into X-Men with AVX. As soon as I saw this demon chick with goat legs own Doctor Strange in this bizarre hell dimension, I immediately knew I wanted to find out who she was and where she came from.

After months of collecting & reading back issues, I had a new favorite character.

Illyana has such a rich history. Her stories are filled with detailed writing, vivid visuals, & so many emotions.

A teleporting (space & time) mutant sorceress of Limbo who has a sword made of her own soul & varying degrees of eldritch armor. And on top of that, she can transform into the Darkchilde.

Basically endless avenues of storytelling potential. Also, doesn't hurt that many of her writers have a great passion for the character.

[Triniking1234]

X-Men is like Pokemon. Any X-Man can be someone's favourite.

Even Stacy X. lol

[cc008]

X-Men is like Pokemon. Any X-Man can be someone's favourite.

Even Stacy X. lol

So true lol

[MyriVerse]

I feel the same way about Moira McTaggart. She seemed vital to the book's flavor, as a human ally and mutant specialist (kind of the living embodiment of Xavier's dream of mutants and humans working and living together, which is deader than Xavier himself, in the last decade or so), but I wouldn't want to read a book about her, and didn't really like to see her suited up as an X-Man.

I miss Moira something awful. I would read an X-Club series with her as lead. She's more interesting than Kavita Rao.

[comicbookfan5878]

I voted "other" for Magik. Her potential is still so untapped and forso many reasons I connected to the character long long ago via back-issues of the original New Mutants run. She was already de-aged by that point and I never understood why such a formidable and interesting character was not brought back in the early 90s. She is tops for me.

[AdamFTF]

X-Men is like Pokemon. Any X-Man can be someone's favourite.

Even Stacy X. lol

Yes. And just like with Pokemon, it's easy for people to be attached to their own generation of characters and not quite get the appeal of the newer ones. However, we should remember to be nice. For example, I don't quite get the appeal of relatively new kids like Hellion, Rockslide, etc. But I can also remember when favorites of mine like Jubilee and Skin used to get a lot of flack from older fans.

(By the by, how long do you think it'll be until they bring back Synch and Skin? Because they already brought back ALL the dead New Mutants. So, I think it's our turn).