What do you feel are the reasons for Storm and Wolverine so far being the most popular and only highly recognizable X-characters to the general public?

Wolverine yeah storm not so much

@grenadeflow: Storm is probably the most marketable female X-Men. Alongside with Jean Grey.

I believe that their appearances in movies made them more popular than most x-men members. Also, Wolverine and Storm are more popular in video games.

No, when you see a bald guy in a wheel chair you think X-Men

Professor X is pretty well known.

Professor X and Magneto are in my opinion more iconic and well known than Storm.

It can even be argued that Mystique is more Iconic. She's been more movies

Yes but every X-Men film revolves around Wolverine. And Storm gets most of the screen time as a female in the X-Men.

But it's not just about movies. They are no match in Storm's appearance in cartoons, video games and comics.

@jhazzroucher: Okay I see what you are saying here.

Thank you! : )

@jhazzroucher: You are very welcome (:. I love you!!!

Professor X, Cyclops, Beast, and Magneto are 10 times as iconic as Storm.

@mistresssobeautiful: As far as female x-men I think Jean is still way more iconic than Storm. That being said neither are as iconic as about a dozen male characters.

No

What are you basing these claims on?

Wolverine & Storm are the most popular X-Men, and I think the most recognizable. But I also think Cyclops, Rogue, Magneto, & Mystique are also popular and well recognized because of the movies.

That's what I ask myself whenever these threads pop up

I think Storm, Wolverine, Jean, Mystique, and Magneto.

i think its safe to put Wolverine and Storm, along with Professor X, Magneto, Jean and Cyclops as the most iconic. I'm sorry but Iconic is a VERY vague term (much like the malignant use of the term "a-list").

to me iconic means instantly recognisable, famous, known for who or what they are... and potentially even role-models or inspiration for others. (in these character's case it would be inspiration of the fan-base). Of the X-Men there are few who would qualify beyond those above. Some others might be also "iconic" but not the MOST. Rogue, Mystique, Emma Frost, NIghtcrawler and Beast perhaps.

Rogue and Mystique, yes. not sure with Beast, Nightcrawler and Emma Frost.

Cyclops? Kitty Pryde? Gambit? Psylocke( for reasons already known...)? How are these guys not iconic ?

let's not forget Doop

Most iconic X characters? I'd say Professor X and Magneto. Storm and Summers and Drake in his ice form and Logan's popped claws follow.

@mistresssobeautiful: i think cos Wolverine is that classic rebellious anti-hero type that people connect with; he's bad-ass but he knows wrong from right. And Storm is such a powerful character, both her mutation and her personality, that when represented in television or gaming, she can't help but be awesome and engaging. She's quite visually attractive too (black woman with blue eyes and white hair), as is Polaris and Psylocke, and once she's drawn you in physically her regal nature, strength, exoticism and grace are among the things that make you fall in love with this character

True

I vote for Ernst.

Nicely stated.

I think Xavier in his wheelchair is really iconic.

And lets be honest everyone know who Magneto is.

I mean there is a reason people call him Mag-f**king-neto.

When they make a Storm movie that is not carried by someone else then you can say she is iconic.

I think the most iconic are: Magneto, Cyclops, Wolverine, Professor X and Storm.

It's like when you see those characters you just automatically know who they are.

Beast, Nightcrawler and Emma are all recognizable.

It depends on how you define iconic. Sadly, I'd say Wolverine is the most iconic of the X-Men for his own merits and is able to prove his popularity by selling movies, comics, cartoons, video games and etc. Cyclops and Jean's relationship is iconic due to the Phoenix Saga, but neither character has broken out of being considered B or C list on their own. I'd say that Storm is also on the B or C list - general readers know who she is, but she is so identified with the X-Men that she hasn't been able to generate any crossover appeal and despite some impressive feats, it is generally other characters, such as Magneto, Wolverine and Jean Grey/Dark Phoenix, who have inspired imagery that became iconic - those characters steal the show, leaving Storm, Cyclops and other X-Men just being members of the cast. Storm's always had issues with this, though - not much seems to change for her character despite her costumes so she can actually look more derivative than actually progressing (her current look, for example, is highly evocative of Janelle Monae), but the figures for her limited series weren't that good and her marriage to BP generated more of a negative popularity bump for either character among their own fans. That said, it's telling that she is able to change her outfits/costumes without much bellyaching because it partially suggests that her look itself isn't iconic whereas changing Superman, Spiderman or Wonder Woman's costumes would cause a lot of grumbling.

But I define iconic to mean revenue generating, popularity, actual ability to sell storylines/series/action figures/games/movie tickets and etc. Taking those into account, Magneto is one of the most iconic mutants, as well. Iconic, IMO, isn't something most characters ever achieve and most of the X-Men are simply supporting cast members for their own area of the Marvel Universe. Wolverine, due to his character, visceral nature of his powers, anti-authority stance (which I personally don't respect) and dynamic nature is able to generate interest without a supporting cast. Magneto is able to do some of the same and generally speaking, he has the greatest consistent feats without wis/pis/cis. None of the other X-Men have been able to duplicate this interest because, honestly, most of the more well-known team members are just not that interesting to the general group of comic readers, and they tend to have smaller sub-communities of fans (i.e. there are Gambit fans, but there are much fewer of them then Spiderman fans, and not enough interest to risk a lot of money giving him his own series).

I think 'iconic' as a term is thrown around too easily, though, because seriously speaking, the vast majority of characters will never be iconic but a number of factors outside of a character's personality and origin story are needed to get this status: the heroes' personality and struggles must resonate with readers, there must be dynamic tension sufficient to maintain interest beyond splash pages/big events, and writers/editorial staff must be able to mine their creativity to put the heroes in stories that people will want to read. Those events are very difficult to orchestrate and some characters just function as lightning in a bottle: created at the right place, at the right time and able to pull in money as a result of finding an audience receptive to them.

I don't think I'd agree with you about Storm. Storm has always been used often on other stuff that other x-men aren't (except Wolverine) like in breast cancer awareness month, dolce and gabbana, etc. Cyclops may have a better role in comics but Storm is still there leading a group and showing up in a lot of comics. Storm and Wolverine are usually in video games like rise of the imperfects, popular in marvel vs capcom games, etc.

@jhazzroucher: Not sure how much being used in those breast cancer awareness or promo ads really qualifies as proof of iconic status; we'd have to get into a discussion of whether this generated any additional buzz or if she was recognized by non-comics readers by appearing in them. I think the whole point of the breast cancer ads was to show various comic book women conducting the test, versus really relying on the general, female audience's ability to recognize any of them.

If we are going to bring in the video games, then it's actually kind of spotty in terms of Storm appearances as a player character - X-Men II Fall of the Mutants, X-Men for Genesis, X-Men: Mutant Apocalypse, X-Men Clone Wars, X-Men 3 Mojo World, and the X-Men movie game didn't feature Storm as a playable character but she appeared in most of the others. Plus, Wolverine has had 5 of his own games in addition to appearing in every other X-Men video game as a player-controlled character which indicates both his popularity and apparent necessity to associate him with X-Men branded projects to help drive sales. Then we'd have to deal with the fact that Dazzler has appeared in more games as a controllable character than Kitty Pryde or Jean Grey, but I doubt we'd say that Dazz is more iconic (or even more popular) than either Kitty or Jean simply because she had more appearances in that medium. If we were to be as fair as possible, the X-Men games, even including the fighting games, generally include Storm as a recognizable member of the X-Men - she's very strongly associated with the team, which can be good and bad.

I think so few X-Men are "iconic" versus being part of "iconic storylines" because they were designed as members of a team, so not as much work went into some of their individual designs, making each X-Man/Woman have their own niche, subset of fandom that generally don't translate into iconic stature but there are certain X-Men that you'd expect to make an appearance if the team was involved, including Storm and Wolverine but I don't think we've really defined what an "icon" is. It would be like asking "Who is the most iconic member of the Fantastic Four?" - very difficult to answer because the core concept of that is a family operating as a team, however you could definitely say that they have an iconic lineup consisting of the original members. Similarly, if we were to ask what the most iconic X-Men lineup was, I'd generally say it would include Wolverine, Cyclops, Jean, Storm and Professor X but I'd say that of that lineup, Wolverine was the only breakout star to go beyond the X-Men to become a pop culture icon.

@thunderbolt30: ah thanks man :) :)

What I'm trying to say is that they don't pick the x-men as a group but they pick some x-men members and use them and it's usually Wolverine and Storm being picked. In movies, newspapers, magazines, etc it's usually Wolverine and Storm images that are shown especially when promoting the first x-men films. In UMVC3, Storm, Wolverine, X-23, Phoenix, Magneto and Deadpool may have been picked as x-men representatives but they're moreoverly carrying their names.

The Fantastic Four will be considered an iconic team if every team in comic are being named but if we're going to talk about Marvel Comics, then X-men is the most iconic and Avengers is next though The Avengers are doing really decent lately.

As for who is the iconic member of Fantastic Four, I don't think we should be considering any of them as iconic because it's always been four of them. But if I were to choose who is the most iconic or most popular, then it'd be Thing.

For the X-men, there have been a lot of members but we cannot say because the x-men team is an iconic team that we would say all its members are iconic.

For me, the iconic x-men characters are: Wolverine, Storm and Cyclops. Then behind them will be Magneto, Professor X and Phoenix. Mystique may have had a lot of exposure in films but I'd still say Rogue is more iconic than her and could have been more iconic if she didn't lost her flight and superstrength.

You've mentioned about Dazzler having more appearances in video games than Kitty or Jean (though I think Jean has more appearances than Dazzler), we still need to consider the popularity of the video game they are in and once again, I'm not only considering video games but in all forms of media like tv, films , movies, etc and if we'll count all of them then that's why we would both say Jean and Kitty are more popular than Dazzler.

Hopefully in MVC4, we will have Storm, Phoenix and Rogue because they're the best female characters created by Marvel Comics. That's in my opinion and maybe a bit biased because I am a crazy X-men fan. : )

@jhazzroucher: Ah, I see some of your points - I would disagree and say that Wolverine and Cyclops are the most iconic, but I would agree with your list overall. I do tend to think of Jean as being iconic, so when I think of an X-Men cartoon, I always think that Wolverine, Jean, Cyclops and Storm will be a part of it in some way or it won't "feel" like a real X-Men team. I don't think Rogue or Mystique are iconic, though.

In terms of video games, Dazzler had appeared in more games prior to 2000; she was a playable character in X-Men (the pc one), X Men II Fall of the Mutants and the arcade game. Jean first appeared in X-Men II Fall of the Mutants, and again in X-Men 2 Gamesmasters Legacy, but she didn't really appear consistently until after the first Mutant Academy. I chalk that moreso up to the fact that telepathy and telekinesis don't lend themselves as easily to beat-em-up or fighting games, which are easier to design. I was saying that you couldn't really say that Dazzler was more popular prior to 2000 just because she had appeared in three games compared to Jean's 2 (Kitty, afaik, has never appeared in a game as a playable character). It's really spotty for every X-Man save Cyclops and Wolverine; Wolverine is in all of them, Cyclops is only missing from the movie tie-in, whereas Storm is in many but she comes in third for appearances overall. Heck, in X-Men: Mojo World, Bishop's sister and Rogue were the female X-Men chosen, but they still made sure to include Wolverine and Cyclops.. I don't think considering the popularity of the game comes into play here at all, though - I just noted that the selection of characters is indicative as to whom is consistently recognized as an X-Man when companies are designing the game and developing the scenario. Those are the characters that corporate suits think represent the brand best.

I think the films have pushed them both forward (although I'm not sure Halle Berry's writing/performance deserved 2nd billing). With First Class, Professor X and Magneto have come up a little more, but when general audience people think X-Men now they think Hugh Jackman and that's probably it.

Cyclops, Xavier and Magneto >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Storm.

@teerack said:

I think Xavier in his wheelchair is really iconic.

And lets be honest everyone know who Magneto is.

I mean there is a reason people call him Mag-f**king-neto.

That Magneto GIF is so memorizing 0.0

For Mainstream audiences, Wolverine, Magneto, Professor X , Mystique and Storm are the most well-known, mainly in that order.

I thought it was Wolverine who was the poster boy and everyone recognized Magneto. Then the rest of both sides are present.

there are others... storm is definitely iconic though

Juggernaut is pretty Iconic.

@butterflykyss: Thanks fellow Storm<3

why is storm considered the only iconic x-woman?

Jean Grey for life!

I would also say scott is more recognizable. maybe rogue too but I rep Carol over her.

Because somehow Jean Grey was gone for a while. But I'm glad that she's back.

Patrick Stew-um..I mean Professor X is iconic.