It used to be the idea of being in the X-Men was cool. Superpowers were easily gained upon puberty. There wasn't the need for dangerous experiments involving radioactive spiders or cosmic rays. You just had to wait until you became a teenager, and if all went well, you'd get some cool powers.
The X-Men had it good. They fought many evil mutants but they always had the feeling of being a family. After a while things changed. Life for the mutants got darker. While they were pretty much always feared and hated, it rose to a whole new level. To make it worse, the X-Men started becoming aware of their possible futures and they all were filled apocalyptic elements.
Because the future is always in motion and in the Marvel Universe there are infinitely many alternate realities, you would think there could be one that turns out nicely.
With the recent future seen in this week's WOLVERINE AND THE X-MEN #4, it looks like there never will be a cheerful future for the X-Men. Be warned, there will be some tiny spoilers to that issue below.
== TEASER ==
It all stared with Days of Future Past. The X-Men had a visit from an adult Kitty Pryde (in the body of her 13-year-old self). They were clued in that the assassination of Presidential candidate Robert Kelly would result in the destruction of the world. But that really meant mutants lived in concentration camps and were often hunted and killed.
The X-Men prevented the assassination of Kelly but it appeared they were not able to prevent the dark future from happening. Since then, the timeline had been revisited in other arcs and it's always the same gloomy thing.
Another example is from the Old Man Logan story. This time the blame fell on Wolverine's shoulders. He was tricked into killing all his teammates. It was Mysterio who managed to do the tricking. Mysterio was able to make them look, feel and even smell different. Wolverine stabbed each of them through the heart.
The entire team was dead. That's a pretty grim future.
In Grant Morrison's Here Comes Tomorrow story, we saw yet another bleak future. 150 years in the future, the human race had been eradicated. Sounds good for mutants but the fighting shifted towards genetic battles between mutants and new emerging species.
All this was the result of Magneto (who wasn't really Magneto) killing Jean Grey. Cyclops lost his heart and quite the X-Men. Beast tried to carry the burden and one night decided to take some "kick," the drug that enhances mutant powers. A bacteria was released and humanity died and a bunch of other bad things happened.
The recent future seen was in WOLVERINE AND THE X-MEN.
We see the students at the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning grown up but in a world that looks pretty bad. What should be noted is these kids weren't seen in the past future stories. Now that they've become associated with the X-Men, you can almost say that is what is leading to them possibly having this dark future.
There have been other futures revealed. Why is it the X-Men can't have a future where everything is calm and peaceful? Why can't they all be living on a tropical island without any worries. Well, it wouldn't add any drama to the story but does that man the X-Men can't ever have a "happily ever after"?
If there's anything the mutants should learn is to either not associate with the X-Men or begin living life for the moment. No matter what happens, regardless of how many evil mutants they stop, the X-Men will always have a dark, grim and horrid future.
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