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- Broken Aesop:
- Despite trying to lecture the world about how great mutants were and how they should be allowed to embrace their identities, Xavier spent most of his life masquerading as a normal human who just happened to be a mutant expert. Xavier only involuntarily 'outed' himself during Grant Morrison's New X-Men run when he was possessed by his evil twin. Even James McAvoy, Young!Charles' actor in the X-Men Cinematic Universe, said he portrayed Charles as someone who, will passionate about the cause, is blind to the true struggles of those who don't have the luxury of passing as an upper-class human.
- Despite Professor X's dream of humans and mutants co-existing, even the most well-read X-Men fan will struggle to think (outside of Crisis Crossovers where they fight alongside other heroes) of more than a handful of times when the X-Men actually worked with humans. More often than not, the X-Men isolate themselves from humans just as much as the Brotherhood, have a blatant disregard for human laws and have even expelled depowered mutants from the Institute. This was only made worse when Krakoa was established, readers arguing that the X-Men had become isolationist supremacists (admittedly because mutant numbers are now so low worldwide that repopulation of mutants took priority over all else).
- In general, more than a few critics have noted that the X-Men as an allegory for oppressed minorities rings somewhat hollow for a few reasons:
- A common one, tying into the X-Men's lack of association with humans, is that the X-Men do precious little for the cause of mutant equality. They don't non-violently champion for rights or attempt to educate people about mutants, largely thinking it their right to act unaccountable. This only increased when Krakoa debuted, fans arguing that the X-Men had now become proponents of supremacism.
- For all that the X-Men are meant to be a stand-in for minorities, people in real life do not have the X-Men's powers. It's stupid to fear a minority based on hearsay in real life given that they're just people. But when a minority group can birth people who can level buildings, read minds, control the weather or even be a Reality Warper... well maybe the denizens of the Marvel Universe aren't entirely off-base in their fear that a kid going through puberty could suddenly burn down their apartment complex. It's no less hypocritical given how much they love mutates, aliens and Inhumans but it's not unjustified. And then there's the label of "homo superior". Oppressed groups who champion for equal rights are after... well equality, not proving themselves superior.
- When it comes to the X-Men standing in for non-heterosexual people, many a time will an X-Man say that the world is changing and that more people like them will be born in the future - a clear analogue to how society's increasing progressivism allows more non-heterosexuals to be more comfortable in identifying as being true to who they are. But since the books always tend to default to mutants being on the verge of extinction, this moral rings somewhat hollow at best, and rather hopeless at worst.
- Broken Base: The Status Quo Is God Fantastic Racism against mutants. Some think it makes no sense given the public's acceptance of heroes like the Fantastic Four who can clearly go toe-to-toe with the X-Men's heaviest hitters. Other think that prejudice actually doesn't make sense at all so it's sadly quite realistic for one group to face bigotry while another is given a pass (and some of these argue that those like the Four getting their powers artificially draws a clear line that might smooth over any fears that the denizens of the Marvel Universe have towards mutants).
- Common Knowledge: While there were some anti-racism themes under Stan Lee and Jack Kirby's pen - namely mutants being cast as scary outsiders - it's really under Chris Claremont that those themes came to define the book compared to its sister titles. So while the X-Men line has always made a rejection of prejudice and social marginalization part of its identity, it didn't define their identity until about a decade after it started.
- Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: Thanks to Status Quo Is God, very rarely are the X-Men's attempts to bring about mutant equality successful on a long-term basis, something which can deter some readers from checking out their stories.
- Designated Hero: A complaint emerging in the Krakoa era and beyond is that the X-Men themselves have become this. Supporters of this mindset argue that since moving to Krakoa, the X-Men have become outright mutant supremacists, allowing their once greatest enemies a place at the table, hiding themselves away from any other threats that the Marvel Universe faces, banishing Franklin Richards when it was found he wasn't a mutant (long story), claiming Mars as a new mutant homeland and even withholding the cure for death. Even Doctor Doom called them out on this. To comic fans making this complaint (backed up by Sue Storm), the X-Men of the 2020s were barely even heroes anymore.
- Franchise Original Sin:
- A lot of the problems with the books started with Chris Claremont doing too many things on the fly and not often planning ahead. But at least he didn't force those Running the Asylum now to take his older plots as canon gospel. That is their own fault.
- The X-Books arguably have another big problem. Originally, the handling of the concept of mutants and the theme of racism was edgy and interesting. But over time, the presence of these topics has increased more and more. It reached the point that the franchise has turned almost entirely inwards: most stories revolve around the "mutant problem", anti-mutant attacks and sentiments - and since House of M - the survival of mutants as a people. The X-Men don't even seem like superheroes anymore. Certainly, they don't fight much crime anymore, and spend most of their time reacting to the various attacks and agendas of others.
- A frequent critique of the X-Men books is that it makes little sense for mutants to be so hated when beings of comparable power (most notably the Avengers) are, largely, beloved and accepted by the Muggles. This was there from the start but in the early days of the Marvel Universe but the nature of the Shared Universe wasn't quite established (the most people could expect in the 1960s was maybe a background cameo or a rare guest appearance). After the world was fleshed out more, only then did people notice this logical gap (something the Marvels even stopped to lampshade), especially as things never got better for mutants while the similar Inhumans were, largely, accepted peacefully by the denizens of the Marvel Universe.
- A lot of the Designated Hero/mutant supremacist complaints made during and after the Krakoa era could sadly be applied to the X-Men as early as the Lee-Kirby era where the X-Men forced aside human guards, expelled those mutants with no powers and plotted their own agenda away from any governmental or societal oversight. And despite being the victims of Fantastic Racism, many a time have the mutants shown themselves to hold a Fantastic Racism against other minorities, most prominently the Inhumans, and sometimes sneer at humans just as much as the Brotherhood does.
- Memetic Loser: The whole X-Franchise is sometimes seen as this. Compared to the crossing over between the Avengers, Fantastic Four and street-level New York heroes, the X-Men rarely seem to join in, most mutants tend to be overpowered by regular humans pretty easily and most X-Men Big Bads only square off against the X-Men, not requiring the all-hands on deck approach of rogues like Galactus, Thanos, Doctor Doom or Ultron. Even X-Men books (and Deadpool) have noted that mutants have a losing streak when it comes to going up against regular humans, always being outstripped by human numbers and technology.
- Memetic Mutation: "Magneto was right" in response to the Status Quo Is God of mutants never getting equal rights or all the Bad Futures showing mutants as extinct by human machines.
- Unfortunate Implications: Critics have accused the notion of mutants officially being called "homo superior" and their status of being oppressed by "inferior" baseline humans of having some eugenic overtones to it.
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