Twenty-four years ago, Hollywood was introduced to the glorious cast of characters known as the X-Men, and it hasn’t looked back since. The past two decades has seen a whopping 14 movies based on Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s beloved comic series, which range from films about the whole X-Men clan to origin stories for individual characters, like Wolverine and Deadpool.
What’s so great about the X-Men movies is that they all stand pretty well on their own. But, like most franchises, (especially within the MCU), there are also a ton of sneaky little threads that hold them all together and make the X-universe a fairly cohesive one.
Though you really can watch these movies in any order, there is a way to watch the X-Men movies in chronological order. You can witness the characters evolve from when the gang first banded together during the Cold War (“X-Men: First Class”) to the most recent events (for now) in the year 2029 (“Logan”).
But given the complexity of the franchise, figuring out exactly how to watch the X-Men movies in order can be complicated. No to worry, we run it down below.
X-Men Movies in Release Order
The simplest way to burn through the X-Men franchise is in order of release. The films were originally released as a trilogy, but performed so well that 20th Century Fox greenlit countless spin-offs, prequels and sequels to keep the series alive. The most recent X-Men movie, The New Mutants, was made in 2020, and while the franchise is under new ownership at Disney, Marvel Studios dabbled in mutants with “Doctor Strange In the Multiverse of Madness” and brings back Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine in “Deadpool & Wolverine.”
So here’s how to watch all the X-Men movies in order of release:
- X-Men (2000)
- X-2 (2003)
- X-Men: The Last Stand (2006)
- X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)
- X-Men: First Class (2011)
- The Wolverine (2013)
- X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)
- Deadpool (2016)
- X-Men: Apocalypse (2016)
- Logan (2017)
- Deadpool 2 (2018)
- Dark Phoenix (2019)
- The New Mutants (2020)
- Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)
X-Men Movies in Chronological Order
It’s worth noting here that the X-Men timeline is pretty fuzzy and complex. First of all, a good portion of the films are heavily rooted in flashbacks – “X-Men Origins: Wolverine” shows the titular wolf-man back in the 19th century, for example, while “X-Men” and “The Wolverine” are just a couple of the franchise’s films that have scenes that take place during World War II.
The franchise is also divided into a number of different miniseries: the “X-Men” original trilogy, the prequel films, the Deadpool films, and the Wolverine films. However, the order of these series don’t do much to help a viewer parse through the chronology of it all — “X-Men Origins: Wolverine” is set in 1979, while its sequel “The Wolverine” is set in the early 2010s, and there are five whole “X-Men” movies that come between them, chronologically speaking.
And when it comes down to it, no X-Men timeline is going to be totally spot on, because the films are chock-full of timeline contradictions. We see a non-paralyzed Xavier in the 1979 world of “X-Men Origins: Wolverine,” and yet he is paralyzed in “X-Men: First Class,” which is set in 1962. We also see Jean Grey experiencing the Dark Phoenix catastrophe in both “X-Men: Dark Phoenix” and “X-Men: The Last Stand,” which makes no sense for… well, obvious reasons.
Given these problems, there are two ways to watch the X-Men films in chronological order. In one, you can simply go by year, which means ignoring inconsistencies and flashbacks. That would look something like this:
- X-Men: First Class
- X-Men: Days of Future Past
- X-Men Origins: Wolverine
- X-Men: Apocalypse
- X-Men: Dark Phoenix
- X-Men
- X2: X-Men United
- X-Men: The Last Stand
- The Wolverine
- Deadpool
- The New Mutants
- Deadpool 2
- Logan
Perhaps a more accurate way to do it would be to split the X-Men films into two different timelines. In one timeline, everything is based around the fact that Mystique does not kill scientist Bolivar Trask, and therefore the Mutants risk extinction. Here’s what the X-Men timeline looks like with that in mind:
- X-Men: First Class
- X-Men: Days of Future Past
- X-Men Origins: Wolverine
- X-Men
- X2: X-Men United
- X-Men: The Last Stand
- The Wolverine
In the other timeline, Mystique becomes a public hero after saving the Mutants from extinction. As a result, different mutants appear in this timeline. That X-Men timeline looks a little something like this:
- X-Men: Days of Future Past
- X-Men: Apocalypse
- X-Men: Dark Phoenix
- Deadpool
- Deadpool 2
- Logan
Which X-Men Movies Are Streaming on Disney Plus?
Because it is a Marvel series, it’s no surprise that the X-Men films are on Disney+. Here are the titles that the streaming service currently has to offer:
As a bonus, the service also hosts 1996 animated series “X-Men,” the 2000 animated series “X-Men: Evolution,” the 2009 animated series “Wolverine and the X-Men” and the recent Disney+ original series “X-Men ’97.”
Upcoming X-Men Movies
After Disney acquired 20th Century Fox and thus regained control of the “X-Men” franchise, the series has been put on ice. But the Marvel Cinematic Universe reign of the X-Men is upon us. First came “Deadpool & Wolverine,” which opened in theaters in July 2024, and then Kevin Feige has teased a rebooted “X-Men” universe in the MCU.
The introduction of mutants to the world of the MCU has already happened. Kamala Khan, the star of “Ms. Marvel,” was revealed to be a mutant and in a post-credits scene in “The Marvels,” Kelsey Grammer reprises his role as Beast from the mainline X-Men franchise. So stay tuned.
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