Thanks to its multiverse, Marvel comics are full with alternate timelines and realities,
some of which have given us versions of our favourite characters that stray far from the
beloved personas we recognize.
The X-Men are no different, and all of their members have had some pretty darn intense
and unsettling alternates come out of the wood work over the years.
So today, we’re returning to our scariest alternate versions of X-Men with a part 2.
Part one focused a lot of evil versions who caused massive catastrophes or were guilty
of some pretty traumatic behavior.
This time around, we’re taking a slightly different approaching, but still counting
alternates that are visible scary.
We’re going to be including versions of X-Men who, in alternate realities, have an
unfortunate, tragic or frightening fate.
Scary is an expansive word, friends.
So with that in mind, let’s get to it!
10 Angel of Earth 311 This version of Angel, known as Werner, appears
on Earth 311, the Marvel 1602 universe in which all of the Marvel characters exist in
the year 1602.
Mutants are referred to as witchbreed, and the Catholic Church considered them to be
devil worshipers, hunting them down.
Generally, if a witchbreed could pass as human, the Inquisitor Enrique, the alternate of Magneto
on this earth, would let them survive, with the intention of having them join his Brotherhood
of Those who will Inherit the Earth.
Werner had special garments that his mother made him that hid his wings, but eventually
he was found out, and fled.
The Inquisition threatened that if he did not return, they would kill his mother, so
he obeyed, yet the killed her anyway.
He was tied up in chains, set to be burned at the stake – that’s where the frightful
part of his story ends, with him eventually being rescued and saved from death by the
equivalents of Jean Grey, Cyclops and Iceman.
Speaking of Cyclops though-
9 Cyclops of Earth 200524 This version of Cyclops is gross rather than
scary.
Hailing from Earth 200524, from the Wha…Huh?
Comics, this Cyclops has an eye infection.
And the results ain’t pretty, to say the least.
That’s pretty much his whole schtick – the wha…huh?
Comics are parody comics, written in a similar vein as the What If stories except with a
much more comedic spin.
Earth 200524 appears in the very first issue of volume 1 of What Huh, and it features the
likes of stories titled What if the Avengers All Had Beards, what if DC let us do batman/daredevil,
and what if black Panther were actually white?
I think you probably get the vibe they were going for overall.
8 Robert Drake of Earth 51518 This version of Bobby Iceman Drake comes from
the remnants of the Age of Apocalypse reality, remnants which were salvaged by God Emperor
Doom and made into part of his Battleworld.
It’s referred to as the Domain of Apocalypse.
Iceman has a gruesome reality.
Appearing in Old Man Logan issue 2 back in 2015, this Iceman encountered one of Apocalypse’s
Horsemen, Sabretooth, in the Savage Land, and then was seemingly killed by another Horseman,
Holocaust, who erupted into atomic fire which engulfed the land and Robert.
While his team members were dead, it was revealed that poor Bobby Drake survived, having become
a form of pure moisture, which would then evaporate and reconsolidate into a rain storm
that poured over the X-Men as they fought Apocalypse.
Talk about a jarring existence.
He’s also a much cruder looking version of the character than we’re normally used
to.
7 Ruins Kitty Pryde Ruins is one of the most depressing series
in the Marvel multiverse.
It’s tragic as hell, and most of our favourite characters have suffered from terrible fates
in this timeline.
Ruins takes place on Earth 9591, a place in which mutants all had horrible side effects
to their powers.
We actually mentioned the version of Professor X on our last part – the US president who
would hold mutants in a Texan prison, ordering for them to be experimented on and disfigured
“for their own good.”
Kitty Pryde is one of those mutants.
She’s imprisoned, and, in an attempt to escape, uses her phasing powers.
But that doesn’t go as planned – instead, when she’s phasing, she gets stuck halfway
through a door, causing her to lose three feet of her intestines in the process.
We never see her die on panel, but it’s assumed that losing a whole 3 out of the 20
feet of intestines that one has inside their body surely wouldn’t have the greatest of
side effects.
6 Hellverine Hellverine is actually a character who appears
on Earth 616.
He comes to be after Wolverine’s soul was dragged to hell, and an unnamed demon decides
to take over his body.
His whole mission is to ruin everything Wolverine likes in his life, including people – Hellverine
starts his crusade by going after a pastor Wolverine had just met prior, covering the
pastor’s body with insects and stabbing him through the chest, then going to his church
to spray acid all over it and burn it to the ground while the congregation was inside.
Dark, eh?
Luckily, he doesn’t get very far when he encounters X-23, who manages to defeat him.
Despite that, Hellverine goes after the X-Men and almost murders Colossus.
He’s captured by Mystique and a ritual is performed to bring Wolverine’s soul back
to his body.
Once Wolverine has returned, he and Hellverine duke it out inside of his body, and eventually,
Jean Grey is able to force the demon out and back to hell.
5 Ulimates Nightcrawler The Ultimates universe, aka Earth 1610, is
filled with a whole lot of fascinating but often meaner versions of beloved Marvel characters.
Nightcrawler Kurt Wagner definitely falls into that category.
Kurt grew up in the Bavarian mountains but was kidnapped for the Weapon X program in
his early formative years.
He was forced into becoming a mutant agent for them.
Once free of the program, he joined up with the X-Men, and was generally well liked until
he turned out to be a total dick.
After he befriended Colossus, the metal mutant came out to him, telling Kurt that he was
gay.
Turns out the Ultimates version of Kurt is a homophobe, and was disgusted by Colossus,
telling him that he was dead to him.
He eventually grew very lonely, and kidnapped his crush, Dazzler, who was dating Angel,
all as a scheme to manipulate her to love him instead.
The X-Men had to go after him to rescue Dazzler, and Xavier had to put Kurt into a coma in
order to ‘rehabilitate him.’
4 The Fallen (Earth 1298) We’ve got another alternate of Warren Worthington
the third on our list, this time from the Mutant X reality.
On this Earth, Warren has a very different transformation into one of Apocalypse’s
horsemen.
Rather than being Archangel, he became something referred to as The Fallen – no longer did
he have his angelic wings.
Instead, his skin became incredibly pale, his wings became bat-like wings, and he was
able to breath fire.
Warren, thanks to this transformation, became completely conflicted, eventually giving into
all of his dark urges, turning against his allies and becoming completely cruel and merciless.
It got to the point that no one really trusted him anymore, friend or foe.
3 Charles Xavier Earth 20329 This Xavier comes from an earth that’s referred
to as the Steampunk Godworld, in which the world is ruled by Mutant gods.
Which seems pretty neat, until this Charles Xavier comes in, is totally evil, and takes
mental control over all of the mutant gods.
Xavier was unsatisfied with the gods who ruled over them, so he began to manipulate Storm.
He made the gods slaughter millions of innocent people and cause natural disasters like droughts,
which made the people of Earth rise up to fight against them, including the version
of this earth’s Magneto named Magnus.
Together.
Xavier and Magnus created the secret island of Utopia – a haven of science and technology
for mortals.
At some point, he reveals the truth, freeing the Gods from his control, but later, would
be killed by Magnus.
2 Nazi X-Men What’s scarier than white supremacy?
Yeah, f*ck Nazis.
Here we have an earth, Earth 597, in which the X-Men are nazis, all thanks to the Nazis
winning World War 2 and subsequently took over the world.
The X-Men here are called the Reichsmen, and consist of Banshee, Storm, Havok, Psylocke
and Rogue.
It’s an earth that appears in Excalibur Weird War 3, volume 1 issue 1 from 1990 when
the Nazi universe begins to slip into the 616 universe.
The Excailbur team end up having to fight against them, along with Herr Xavier, a german
version of Professor X who resembles Josef Mengele, one of the real life Nazi scientists
who was known for his cruel experiments on Jewish prisoners in holocaust camps.
Xavier creates mutants through horrible genetic experiments, including the Reichsmen.
1 Sublime Beast This version of Hank McCoy comes from Earth
15104, and he’s a drug addict.
From the mind of Grant Morrison, this alternate reality is from the writer’s Here Comes
tomorrow story arc, in which we get to see a glimpse of a future timeline version of
the X-Men.
It’s a post apocalyptic world in which Scott Summers has abandoned his role as leader of
the X-Men, leaving Hank to take over, who ends up creating an army of cloned Nightcrawlers
in order to take over the world.
Hank’s having some major trouble keeping things together, and became incredibly stressed
out, so he ends up turning to a drug for mutants called Kick.
Being vulnerable, he becomes the new host for Sublime, and wages a war against humanity
– that’s where the nightcrawler clones come in, called The Crawlers – and in the
process he ends up completely destroying the Xavier Institute.
150 years later, he’s still at it, wanting to completely wipe out all other species that
weren’t mutants.
He manages to find the Phoenix Egg, and resurrects Jean Grey aka Phoenix, who, seeing him as
Beast rather than Sublime, acts as his minion, exterminating races in his name.
He takes some of her DNA, and duplicates her powers for himself, which prompts Jean to
remember who she is, and purge sublime from Hank’s body.