Characters / X-Men Film Series: Mystique

Main Character Index
Main Characters: X-Men | Professor X | Magneto | Wolverine | Mystique | Jean Grey | Deadpool
Original Timeline: X-Men | Free Mutants | Other Mutants | Brotherhood | Weapon X | Humans | Hellfire Club
New Timeline: X-Men | New Mutants | X-Force | Apocalypse and His Followers | Transigen | Other Mutants | Humans | Weapon X | D'Bari | New Mutants Villains
Other Timelines: Earth-17040 | Earth-17372

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Raven Darkhölme / Mystique

"You know, people like you are the reason I was afraid to go to school as a child."

^{Click here to see modern Mystique as a human}

"Mutant and proud."

^{Click here to see younger Mystique as a human}

Played By: Rebecca Romijn; Jennifer Lawrence; Morgan Lily (child)

Voice By: Rebeca Gómez (adult, X-Men), Carola Vázquez (adult, X2-First Class), Carla Castañeda (young, First Class-Apocalypse) (Latin-American Spanish); Yolanda Pérez (adult, X-Men-First Class), Licia Alonso (adult, X-Men 3), Adelaida López (young, First Class-Apocalypse) (European Spanish)

Film Appearances: X-Men | X2: X-Men United | X-Men: The Last Stand | X-Men: First Class | X-Men: Days of Future Past | X-Men: Apocalypse | Dark Phoenix

Nightcrawler: ...why not stay in disguise all the time? You know, look like everyone else.
Mystique: Because we shouldn't have to.

A mutant whose ability to alter her shape and mimic any human being is almost secondary to her role as "the perfect soldier/spy". She is an agile fighter, expert martial artist, and seems completely at ease with modern technology.

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#-K

• '80s Hair: Her crimped hairdo in X-Men: Apocalypse is a cross between Madonna's and Cyndi Lauper's in the early '80s.
• Action Girl: In X-Men: Apocalypse, she knocks out a few guys who are bigger than her in East Berlin. She later becomes the battle commander of the X-Men.
• Adaptational Heroism:
  • In the comics, Mystique's most defining trait is her tendency towards Chronic Backstabbing Disorder and her shortsighted, impulsive acts of petty cruelty, as well as her extreme unscrupulousness. Here, she's more of an Anti-Villain who gradually moves towards being a full-fledged X-Man, and she is still ruthless but nowhere near as gratuitously vindictive.
  • X-Men: Days of Future Past: She's given a very realistic and sympathetic motivation for her Start of Darkness moment, in contrast to her depiction in the comics, who’s pretty much a self-serving sociopath. It goes so far as to establish that prior to killing Bolivar Trask, she'd never taken a single life during one of her crimes. And additionally, she pulls a Heel–Face Turn and not only spares Trask, but rescues the president from Magneto during the climax. Presumably, this negates her role as a villain in the original trilogy via Cosmic Retcon.
  • X-Men: Apocalypse: She has been traveling the world rescuing mutants following the events of Days of Future Past, and she's the field leader of the X-Men. She insists that she's not a hero, though.
• Adaptational Sexuality: Mystique in the comics is bisexual, with one of her most significant romantic partners being the female precog Destiny. This is never referenced in the films, which only pair her up with Magneto and Beast, who are both male.
• Adaptational Skimpiness: Mystique in the comics wore clothes, or at least created clothes as part of her appearance, while in the film she goes around fully naked, with her only coverings being her reptilian scales. It is even made a plot point because, at Erik's explicit suggestion, she starts going around nude in order to demonstrate her lack of shame for her mutant body.
• Adaptational Ugliness: Downplayed. Comic book Mystique is a fairly attractive woman who just happens to have blue skin and yellow eyes. In the films, while she is still played by shapely women, she also has reptilian features, such as scales all over her face and body. In-universe, with a few exceptions such as Magneto, most of the characters find her unusual physical traits to be a great source of repulse.
• Adaptational Wimp: In the comics, her natural powers allowed her to turn not only into different people, but also into animals, as well as to create inanimate objects out of her body, with a late power-up turning the latter up to eleven and made her basically a highly adaptable Slime Girl. In the films, however, she's apparently limited to change human appearances and nothing else.
• Age Is Relative: X-Men: First Class does this in many ways with her. She's a little bit younger than Xavier, but as a shapeshifter, she chooses to look younger, and she prefers to stay with the teenage recruits. According to Hank, her body ages at half the rate of a normal human.
• Age Lift: Her movie counterpart is a couple of years younger than Charles and Erik, whereas her comics counterpart is roughly the same age as Wolverine, and hence is older than Xavier and Magneto. Tellingly, it was frequently implied and later confirmed in Immortal X-Men that one of Mystique's past identities in the comics universe was Sherlock Holmes with her lover, Destiny, having been the Irene Adler.
• Alas, Poor Villain: A non-fatal version. After Mystique sacrifices herself for a mutant cure dart meant for Magneto, Magneto coldly abandons her, proclaiming he’s no longer one of them, since she’s no longer a mutant. Being betrayed the person she’s been loyal to for decades, Mystique is visibly heartbroken.
• Anti-Hero:
  • Subverted in X2: X-Men United. Though Mystique seems to be aiding the heroes in their mission to save Professor X, her true intention is to help Magneto hijack the Dark Cerebro and commit genocide against humankind. Once the two have reprogrammed the machine, they abandon Xavier and abscond before the X-Men can apprehend them.
  • Mystique is a Classical Anti-Hero in X-Men: First Class, where she has good intentions but is plagued by self-doubt due to the abuse she suffered for her abnormal appearance. This leads her to ultimately leave the X-Men and join Magneto's radical group.
  • In X-Men: Days of Future Past, she's hardened into a Nominal Hero. Her goal is to eliminate Trask, a man who has been conducting insidious experiments on mutants. Unfortunately, she impulsively assassinates him, sending shock waves of hysteria across the globe that lead to a Bad Future where mutants have been relentlessly hunted by the Sentinels.
  • Played with in X-Men: Apocalypse. Though Mystique never commits any questionable acts and is unambiguously a heroine, it's clear she still harbours some of her past insecurities and refuses to be called as such.
• Barbie Doll Anatomy: Is completely naked, but doesn't have any "attributes" to speak of, as they are noticeably covered by thicker scales.
• Being Tortured Makes You Evil: Implied in the backstory told in X-Men: Days of Future Past. After assassinating Trask to avenge her fellow mutants, she is taken captive and experimented on, with her DNA being used to create the Bad Future Sentinels. The experience likely resulted in her transformation into the remorseless, silent killer we see in the original trilogy.
• Best Her to Bed Her: Mystique tries to seduce Wolverine in X2: X-Men United because he defeated her in combat in X-Men, complimenting him that "nobody ever left quite a scar like you did." Logan is not interested. Later films show that Mystique is capable of having loving, if not necessarily intimate, relationships with other mutants even if they didn't actually beat her (Charles Xavier, Magneto).
• Big Bad Ensemble: For X-Men: Days of Future Past, opposing Bolivar Trask and Magneto.
• Blond, Brunette, Redhead: She loves disguising herself as a blond. Her mutant form has red hair. When de-powered, she has raven hair.
• Breaking Out the Boss: Mystique is the only member of the Brotherhood who is alive and free at the end of the first film, which puts her in prime position to free her boss Magneto in the second.
• Breakout Character: While she was an important character in the original trilogy, as of First Class and beyond she's become one of the franchise's iconic characters alongside Wolverine, Professor X and Magneto.
• Character Death: In Dark Phoenix, an out-of-control Jean accidentally blasts Raven away, fatally impaling her.
• Characterization Marches On: First Class imbues her character with more humanizing traits and relationships that simply weren't present in the original trilogy, such as her relationship with Charles.
• Clingy Jealous Girl: She wasn't too fond of seeing Charles hit on other women in a pub in First Class.
• Corrupt the Cutie: She starts out as Charles' sweet sister and as Erik convinces her to accept her mutant background, she also follows his beliefs treating humans as enemies. Best displayed when Magneto, trying to convince her to help him start a war against humans, asks her if she is Charles' "Raven" or "Mystique."
• Cunning Linguist: Knows several languages, and this trait is retained even after the reboot.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Mystique dishes one to Stryker's forces when she infiltrates Alkali Lake, killing several armed soldiers with nothing but her own martial arts expertise.
• Cute Monster Girl: When Charles first meets her in X-Men: First Class, she looks like a cute young girl who just happens to have blue skin.
• The Cynic: In the Alternate Timeline, she's the first one to (somewhat brutally) point out to Charles that prejudice against mutants still exists throughout the rest of the world despite the relative peace; this new mindset came partially from traveling with Erik, but mainly from experiencing it herself after becoming a major figure for mutant acceptance. That said, she's more active and outspoken in challenging it where she can than in the original trilogy.
• Dark Action Girl: Mystique kicks lots of ass, but is a major antagonist in the original trilogy. In the altered timeline, she is still a formidable fighter, but becomes an anti-heroine.
• Dead Person Impersonation: Mystique is introduced masquerading as Senator Kelly's aide Henry Guyrich who was murdered by the Brotherhood. Between the first and second films, she takes on Senator Kelly's identity after he melts.
• Death by Adaptation: Mystique is alive in the comics, and was last seen alive in the original timeline in The Last Stand in 2006, but in the new timeline she is killed by Jean in Dark Phoenix in 1992.
• Do Not Call Me "Paul": In The Last Stand, when an interrogator calls her Raven, she responds, "I don't answer to my slave name." In Days of Future Past when Havok addresses her as Raven, she declares "That's not my name."
• The Dragon: She is Magneto's second-in-command for the first two films.
• Dying Declaration of Love: To Hank after being accidentally impaled by Jean in Dark Phoenix.
• Early-Installment Weirdness:
  • In the first three films, her voice has a faint echo when she speaks or screams while in her true form. This trait is absent in First Class and she speaks normally in every subsequent film.
  • During the battle on Liberty Island, Mystique disguises herself as a statue by changing the texture of her skin to resemble marble; and also displays the ability to shapeshift her hands into weapons, as demonstrated when she mimics Wolverine's claws (although hers were not made of actual metal and are cut off by Wolverine). Despite the usefulness of these powers, she never manifests them again in subsequent films.
• Enemy Mine: Fights along the X-Men in X2: X-Men United. Subverted in that she and Magneto fully intend to betray the heroes once the Dark Cerebro has been reprogrammed.
• Even Evil Has Standards: While disguised as Senator Kelly in X2, Mystique shows disgust at the idea of attacking Xavier's mansion when William Stryker brings it up.
• Everyone Loves Blondes: She really loves to take the form of a very sexy blond (e.g. Rebecca Romijn and Jennifer Lawrence).
• Evil Redhead: In her true form, Mystique has crimson hair.
• Evil Sounds Deep: In the original trilogy, her natural voice has a noticeable reverb quality. Given the younger Mystique doesn't have it, it probably only kicked in when she became a clear cut villain.
• Face–Heel Revolving Door: In X-Men: First Class, she starts off as Xavier's friend and adoptive sister, but ends up leaving to be with Magneto. Once Magneto is imprisoned and she finds out about the experiments Trask has conducted on her friends, she becomes the mutant supremacist seen in the original trilogy. However, due to the changes in the timeline brought by the events of Days of Future Past, she makes a Heel–Face Turn that sticks.
• Femme Fatale: Not above employing some seduction to push her plans forward. (Jennifer Lawrence even declared that replacing Romijn would be "a lot easier if she wasn't the most gorgeous person in the world," leading her to play Mystique in a less sultry manner.)
• Foot Focus: She gets lots of close-ups to her feet in many of her action scenes across the franchise.
  • She uses her her feet to subdue Senator Kelly by pushing him to his seat with one leg, hook one foot behind his head and slap the other one on his cheek, slap him across the face with that same foot, and then push his unconscious body to the seat with both feet. Throughout the whole scene, the camera focuses on Kelly's face with Mystique's bare foot on his cheek. Exaggerated in the collectible cards of the movie as "The Capture of Kelly" pretty much consists of Mystique's feet grabbing his face.
  • Her encounter with Wolverine is mainly Mystique kicking him throughout most of the fight.
  • Her final action scene in the original trilogy is snapping a guards neck with her feet to pick up his keys with her toes to unlock clamps on her hands.
  • Even in the past, we get a close-up of her foot as she uses it to choke someone unconscious.
• Full-Frontal Assault:
  • She is always naked. This makes sense from a sci-fi point of view since her mutation only affects her own body and it works in a sort of reptile-chameleon sort of way, so wearing clothes would simply at the very least be impractical, the 'clothes' she appears to wear are actually a part of her body; she describes taking off these 'clothes' feels like in much the same way a snake sheds its skin.
  • She appears to form perhaps the basis for the mindset of walking around completely without clothing especially in her natural form throughout X-Men: First Class. When Erik Lehnsherr tell her that her natural form is beautiful and demonstrates, by dropping a barbell on her ,that it takes more concentration to maintain a fake form to conceal her true appearance than fighting in her natural form and concentrating completely on fighting would and when she tells Hank McCoy at the end, "Remember, Hank, Mutant and proud." right after joining Magneto.
• Genius Bruiser: Aside from being a Cunning Linguist, she is a good with computers, and a skilled pilot and driver.
• Good Is Not Nice: in X-Men: Apocalypse, she is brisker and stricter with the young X-Men than Professor X.
• Handy Feet: Her feet are human-like, but her toes seem to be more dexterous, which allows her to use her feet as another pair of hands (see Foot Focus above).
• Heel–Face Turn: In X-Men: Days of Future Past, she eventually decides to give up her vendetta against Trask to prevent future bloodshed against Mutants. She also saves Nixon and his cabinet from Magneto.
• I Am What I Am: From X-Men: First Class, "Mutant and proud."
• I Shall Taunt You: Mystique goes out of her way to piss off Wolverine during their battle in the first film. She sends him kisses, licks her lips in satisfaction and poses seductively to set him off; then counters his reckless attacks.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice:
  • Wolverine stabs her with his claws in the first film, but she pulls through.
  • In Dark Phoenix, Jean accidentally blasts her onto a set of broken pieces of wood, killing her.
• Kick Chick: Mystique's fighting style exploits her nimble and agile body, but she prioritizes kicks as her main attack form.
  • It is made evident in the original movie, where she used her feet to push Senator Kelly to his seat, put him on a headlock, and slap him unconscious with them rather than just punch him unconscious. Similarly, the only times on which Mystique didn't kick Wolverine was when she was using weapons like chains or a door.
  • Her assault on the White House shows her use many types of agile kicks to defeat her opponents.

L-Y

• The Leader: In X-Men: Apocalypse, she's a reluctant field leader of the X-Men because she's used to working on her own, and she's of the Headstrong variety. She's outspoken, determined and courageous.
• Like Brother and Sister:
  • X-Men: First Class: She and Charles grew up together for 18 years as foster siblings, and he introduces her as his sister to Amy. He later cites this when Raven, feeling insecure about her looks, asks if he would date her... although it falls a little flat coming right after he's answered the question with "of course" in reference to her human form, before she clarifies that she means in her real form.
  • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Said by the older Professor X when he mentions that she was like a sister to him. It's later alluded to when a nurse wonders if the blue, scaly woman at the Paris Peace Accords has a family, and Raven replies, "Yes, she does."
  • X-Men: Apocalypse: She tells Magneto, "I'm going to fight for what I have left," which specifically refers to her foster brother Charles.
• Living Legend: She's greatly admired for saving President Nixon from Magneto in 1973, but she resents her fame, and she chooses to disguise herself in her blond Raven form so that people won't recognize her blue, scaly self.
  Raven: I told you I'm not a hero.
  Jean: You're a hero to us. Seeing you that day on TV changed my life.
  Kurt: Mine too.
  Peter: Mine too.
• Marquee Alter Ego:
  • She is played by world famous supermodel Rebecca Romijn, and has the power to take any form. She had at least one "cameo" per movie without make-up.
  • The younger version often spends more time as Jennifer Lawrence than in her blue-skinned form.
• Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: A foster siblings variation with her and Charles in X-Men: Apocalypse. Both are mutant activists, but they use different approaches when saving the world one mutant life at a time—the sister is more "active" and the brother is more "passive." Mystique is a forthright Action Girl who travels around the globe and regularly employs violence to free mutants who are in physical danger; she tells Caliban that she doesn't care what they do with their newfound liberty. Professor Xavier, on the other hand, is a sweet Non-Action Guy who remains at his home/school and coaches his mutant students on how to master their inherently hazardous abilities so that they're no longer a threat to themselves or to others, while at the same time nurturing them as individuals. In the final scene, Raven assumes a stern, no-nonsense approach when training the X-Men for combat, whereas Charles will continue to educate their minds and provide emotional support.
• Meaningful Name: When de-powered in X-Men: The Last Stand, she's seen with Raven Hair, Ivory Skin.
• Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: In the new timeline Magneto becomes a Broken Pedestal to her when he attempts to kill her to prevent the Bad Future involving the Sentinels.
• Monster Modesty: You can see scales over her nipples and pelvis.
• Ms. Fanservice: Aside from being naked most of the time, she uses seductive alternate forms.
• Non-Humans Lack Attributes: Despite not being human, she is decent even while naked. This might be part of her shapeshifting (seeing as how she can look like she's wearing clothes too). Rebecca Romijn even lampshaded this by commenting that her character's costume was "strategically placed body paint, pasties, and clever camera angles."
• Number Two: By the end of X-Men: Apocalypse, she becomes Professor X's second-in-command, which is the Adaptational Heroism equivalent of her position as Magneto's Dragon in the original trilogy. In the Alternate Timeline, she sides with her foster brother instead of her ex-lover.
• Older Than They Look: She qualifies as an extreme example, being played by Rebecca Romijn despite being only a few years younger than Magento and Xavier. Justified by her ability to shapeshift (why age if you never have to?) and a comment made in X-Men: First Class about her mutation slowing her aging.
• Old Flame: In The Rogue Cut, she and Beast definitely still have feelings for each other despite being separated for over a decade. Mystique was even romantically involved with Magneto before he was incarcerated, but her first choice back in 1962 was Hank. X-Men: Apocalypse makes it quite clear that that flame is, at least on Hank's end, still burning. And then Dark Phoenix confirms that it's mutual as Mystique dies telling Hank that she loves him.
• One of the Kids: She'd rather hang out with the adolescent mutants in X-Men: First Class than with Charles and Erik even though her age is much closer to that of the two men.
• Organic Bra: Her Shapeshifter Default Form has a scaly covering over her naughty bits (or what would be her naughty bits; she's rather... non-distinct in those areas).
• Point of Divergence: She creates one when her decision to spare Trask drastically alters the timeline, but also leads to her eventual death much much earlier than that of counterpart in the original timeline.
• Protectorate: She is this to Charles in X-Men: First Class, although she finds his concern for her safety utterly suffocating.
• Purple Is Powerful: In X-Men: Apocalypse, her risqué dress is shiny and purple, and she's the most effective combatant at the cage match.
• The Quiet One: In the first film, she only has one line in her natural form.
• Rousseau Was Right: Raven at heart is a sweet and compassionate person. She is motivated to kill Trask for all the mutants he killed along with being captured/tortured and following Magneto's influence leading her to become the Mystique of the original trilogy. When Charles leaves the choice up to her, free of anyone's manipulation, she chooses to spare Trask.
• Satellite Character: In the original trilogy, we know very little about her as an individual outside of her Undying Loyalty to Magneto.
• Shameless Fanservice Girl: She has no qualms about going about fully naked, although she does seem to understand the societal norms of covering up.
• Shapeshifter Baggage: The first two movies averted this by having her only transforming into adults (or in one case, an adult-sized Statue of Liberty model). Then the third had her briefly becoming a child, X-Men: First Class had her child self (also briefly) disguised as Charles' mother, and X-Men: Days of Future Past had her become the small Bolivar Trask.
• Shapeshifter Guilt Trip:
  • She tries this on her captors in X-Men: The Last Stand. She transforms into the President and threatens to have them all court-martialed if they do not release her, and then a little girl who begs and cries to be let out. She finally turns mockingly back into herself when one of the guards threatens to empty a can of pepper spray in her face if she doesn't knock it off.
  • In the second movie, X2: X-Men United, while in an Enemy Mine situation with the X-men, she tries to seduce Wolverine as Jean Grey, Rogue, and Storm. He gets wise when he sees the scars he left on her belly from the first movie.
• Shapeshifter Longevity: Throughout the franchise, she's the most prominent and talented example of a shapeshifter among the mutant cast... and, as X-Men: First Class reveals, her mutation dramatically slows the aging process; having grown up alongside Professor X during the 1940s, she's in her sixties by the events of the first film in the franchise, but looks and moves like she's still in her twenties.
• Shapeshifter Struggles: After living a life shapeshifting to blend in and survive, Mystique became deeply insecure that she is unlovable in her true (blue) form. After joining Magneto she does an 180, and now resents being forced to change her appearance to win the world's acceptance.
• Shapeshifter Weapon: She did this in X-Men with Wolverine's claws (which failed miserably against the real ones).
• Shapeshifting Seducer:
  • X2: X-Men United: She seduces a guard by taking the form of a hot blonde so she can use him in Magneto's escape from prison. She later utilizes it on Logan by trying to seduce him in the form of Jean Grey. Logan catches her, and she goes through several other forms, including Storm, Rogue and even Stryker, but he tells her to leave.
  • X-Men: First Class: She upgrades her age by about 15 years to please Erik, which doesn't really work for her until he tells Raven that he prefers her without the shapeshifted appearance.
  • X-Men: Days of Future Past: She does a sultry variation of her Raven form and pretends to be a disco-loving interpreter to gain access to a Vietnamese general's hotel room in order to steal his invitation to the Paris Peace Accords.
  • X-Men: Apocalypse: Her electric purple ensemble is quite revealing, and it's meant to be a distraction to the big, burly guards at the fight club venue; one underestimates her by calling her "little mouse."
• Shapeshifting Sound: Mystique always transforms with a distinctive slurping, hissing noise as her body reshapes itself to fit her newest disguise.
• She-Fu: Acrobatic, prefers hand-to-hand (kicks in particular), and even slides.
• Sibling Yin-Yang:
  • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Eleven years after X-Men: First Class, she and Charles have not only become estranged, but also polar opposites in almost every way, especially in regards to ideology and diplomacy. Her sparing of Trask and the president shows that she isn't quite as far gone as originally believed, though.
  • X-Men: Apocalypse: Although she and Charles are on better terms than in X-Men: Days of Future Past, they still strongly disagree over how humans in general treat mutants. He believes the world is gradually becoming more tolerant of their kind, but she has seen with her own eyes that there's still a lot of oppression. This article uses the metaphor of Mystique being an aggressive hawk and Xavier is a peaceful dove.
    Charles: I have plans for this place. I mean to turn it into a real campus, a university. Not just for mutants, either; for humans, too. Living and working, growing together.
    Raven: You know, I really believed that once. I really believed we can change them, after D.C.
    Charles: We did.
    Raven: Just because there's not a war, doesn't mean there's peace. You wanna teach your kids something, teach them that, teach them to fight, otherwise they might as well live in this house for the rest of their lives.
• Start of Darkness: X-Men: First Class depicts her as an insecure young woman looking for a purpose... and she finds it. Taken even further in X-Men: Days of Future Past, where she effectively becomes a Dark Action Girl. Xavier even states that her first deliberate murder of Bolivar Trask in the original timeline "is when Raven became Mystique."
• Statuesque Stunner: In the original trilogy, where she's 5' 11" (1.80 m). While young Mystique is not that much, Jennifer Lawrence's 5' 9" (1.75 m) makes only slightly shorter than Magneto.
• Take a Third Option: In X-Men: Days of Future Past, Erik asks her, "Are you still Charles' Raven... or are you Mystique?" (What Magneto is truly referring to with the latter is if she's still his soldier.) In the end, she chooses her own path. She doesn't adhere to her foster brother's pacifism, and she rejects her former lover's warmongering.
• Team Mom: Has more or less settled into this role as of the finale of X-Men: Apocalypse, although it should be noted that her position as the X-Men's drill sergeant does give her some Team Dad qualities. Mystique's "tough love" is meant to compliment Professor X's strong nurturing tendencies.
• Technically Naked Shapeshifter: Her true form is a blue-skinned humanoid. She almost never wears clothes (her skin, which is scaled, it presumably more resilient to changes in temperature than that of non-mutants), granting her the freedom to shift the surface of her skin into clothing appropriate for whatever form she takes.
• That Man Is Dead: Near the beginning of X-Men: Days of Future Past, Mystique tells Alex that Raven isn't her name anymore. Given how the film ends, it's ambiguous if she still feels this way.
• Thou Shall Not Kill: Despite the Viral Marketing for the film implying that she was the one who had assassinated President Kennedy, X-Men: Days of Future Past establishes that she never took a life prior to her attempts to kill Bolivar Trask.
• Time-Shifted Actor: Played by Rebecca Romijn in the original trilogy; her younger self is portrayed by Jennifer Lawrence. Morgan Lily plays her child self.
• Took a Level in Badass: In comparison to X-Men: First Class where her only physical scenes involve weight training and her shape-changing abilities used only as a distraction to aid someone else, in X-Men: Days of Future Past, she has developed into using some of the acrobatic fighting style that her older counterpart from the first trilogy excels at.
• Took a Level in Jerkass:
  • Between First Class/Days of Future Past and the original trilogy, her personality changed substantially, from a relatively Nice Girl to a remorseless killer. This is because the "scientific experiments" she went through after killing Trask destroyed any sympathy she felt towards regular humans.
  • Downplayed to Took a Level in Cynic in X-Men: Apocalypse. Even though she's back on the side of good, Raven nonetheless has a more hardened personality and worldview in contrast to both Erik and Charles. She's only slightly less militaristic than the former, who slipped back into evil for a time after losing his Polish family, but is much more realistic and aggressive about relations between mutants and humans than the latter.
• Tranquil Fury: It must've rubbed off from being with Magneto, but throughout most of X-Men: Days of Future Past, she is searing with rage and on her way to becoming the remorseless killer she was in the original trilogy. Until the end where she spares Trask's life and thus creates a new timeline.
• Unholy Matrimony: Mystique is shown starting a relationship with Magneto in First Class. However, it is thoroughly broken by X-Men: Days of Future Past, where she and Magneto try to kill one another.
• Unlucky Childhood Friend: For Charles in X-Men: First Class. Xavier does a lot of flirting with other women, and she is clearly jealous. It's hard to tell whether she actually had strong romantic feelings for him, or if she just wants to establish that she's worthy of romantic interest, but either way, he says that he can't see her as anything but a sister and someone to protect.
• Unrelated in the Adaptation: In the comics she is the biological mother of Nightcrawler (later retconned into being his "father") and the adopted mother of Rogue. Neither of these relationships are present in the films.
• Voice of the Legion: Her voice in the original trilogy has a definite reverb at times, most notably when she appears for the first time.
• Villainesses Want Heroes: She attempts to seduce Wolverine in X2: X-Men United, disguising herself as Jean and briefly making out with him before he discovers her true identity. She claims it was because he defeated her in the previous film, complimenting him "nobody ever left quite a scar like you did." Though once Wolverine rejects her advancements and tells her to leave she does so, and doesn't show any further attraction to him in the future films.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Along with Magneto, she agrees with his efforts to allow mutants to come out of hiding and gain acceptance of themselves, but at the same time opposes humans who would threaten them, believing war is inevitable.
• Woman Scorned: In X-Men: The Last Stand, once Magneto dumps her, she reveals his hideout's location to the authorities.
• Yellow Eyes of Sneakiness: One of the few ways to identify Mystique while she is in another person's form is by taking a close look at her eyes, which flash to their signature yellow colour whenever she loses her concentration. This is what allows Storm and Cyclops to realize she survived the events of the first film and usurped Senator Kelly's place.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Downplayed. In X-Men: The Last Stand, Magneto leaves her behind when her mutation is removed and genuinely feels bad about it. She repays him in kind by working against him. It makes a bit more sense when you consider the original ending of the movie. When Magneto is at the park bench at the end, she was supposed to be sitting next to him, implying that Magneto's rejection of her and her subsequent betrayal were both actually staged to lower the defenses of Alcatraz Island later.

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"This is what family does. We take care of each other."