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X Men Film Series / Tropes G to L

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Tropes beginning with the letters G to L for the X-Men Film Series.

  • The Gadfly:
    • While hosting guests or defeating enemies, Quicksilver loves to annoy them during his bursts of super speed.
    • X-Men: Professor X telepathically guides an anxious Logan—the latter has no idea where he is or why he's there, or why he's hearing a strange male voice inside his head, and because Dr. Jean Grey wanted to take a blood sample, Wolverine assumes that he's being experimented on—from the school's infirmary to Xavier's office, where Charles greets his guest with a polite "Good morning, Logan." Professor X is aware of the traumas that Wolverine had experienced, and it's a bit disconcerting that the former took advantage of the latter's paranoia for a little bit of fun, even if it was only for a short time.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: After Scott accidentally damages Professor X's most beloved tree on the estate, the latter, strictly speaking, didn't have to say anything about the tree being planted by his grandfather (especially when Charles had already made up his mind that he'll accept Scott as a new student), yet he did so anyway just to provoke a reaction from the teen. Scott doesn't want to be at the school (and thus one would assume that he would prefer to be rejected), yet he becomes extremely apprehensive over the possibility that Xavier is furious at him for ruining a priceless family heirloom. It should be noted that Scott is blindfolded, so he can't see Charles' facial expression to judge the latter's emotional state. Alex most likely informed his brother that Xavier is a very powerful telepath, and warned Scott (who has a tendency to be rude) that he should behave himself in front of the Professor. Scott obviously failed spectacularly in that regard, and Charles then teased the young man by making him wince for a moment.
      Charles: My grandfather planted that tree when he was five years old. I used to swing from the branches of it myself. [tree finishes falling apart] I think that was probably my favourite tree.
      Scott: (worried) Does that mean I'm-I'm expelled?
      Charles: (smiles) On the contrary. You're enrolled.
  • Genre-Busting: While the core series films are pretty clear-cut classical superhero movies, the spinoffs deviate much more from the general pattern:
  • Glamour Failure:
    • X-Men:
      • Mystique's shapeshifting isn't quite perfect. Her eyes flare yellow if she loses her concentration, and she can't quite mimic the scent of others (making her particularly vulnerable to Wolverine's sense of smell).
      • After "Bobby Drake" convinces Rogue that she should leave the school, his eyes turn yellow, revealing that it was Mystique in disguise. This occurs again with a Statue of Liberty sculpture and Senator Kelly at the end of the movie.
    • X2: X-Men United: Mystique can't seem to hide the scars Wolverine left behind on her. Likewise, Stryker isn't fooled when she masquerades as Wolverine. One thing he knows better than anyone is his own work.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Mystique's irises briefly become yellow when she assumes the identity of a Secret Service agent and Major Stryker. Moreover, when she duplicates Bolivar Trask, she doesn't get his face quite right.
  • A God Am I:
    • Bryan Singer acknowledges that Professor X "...could go inside Cerebro and rule the world, but he chooses not to." That being said, as much as he pushes for the equality of mutants and humans, Xavier is arrogant and he believes that he always knows what's best for someone and/or for the greater good, which leads to him occasionally abusing his psychic powers. He has no qualms briefly taking away an individual's free will with his Jedi Mind Tricks or "borrowing" them as a People Puppet, and he often reads the thoughts of others without asking for permission. Charles' ambition doesn't include turning the world into his personal playground, but his behaviour does prove that he "plays god" whenever the situation suits him. The power Cerebro grants him becomes a plot point in X-Men: Apocalypse, where Apocalypse empowers Xavier to the level he is at while in Cerebro, and Charles becomes nearly omniscient.
    • X2: X-Men United: Invoked by Magneto, who is a mutant supremacist, when he informs the impressionable Pyro, "You're a god among insects. Never let anyone tell you different."
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Inverted; En Sabah Nur claims that the various deities worshipped throughout history were just different names for him. Apocalypse is so powerful that Hank essentially acknowledges that the former might as well be a supernatural being ("It's all of us against a god"). Singer clarifies Apocalypse's "divine" status.
      "He's kind of more the God of the Old Testament, the vengeful God who wants the world in a certain order and wants to be worshipped—but he's also forgiving."
  • Gone Horribly Right:
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • The Sentinels were programmed to hunt and destroy mutants among the non-mutant populace and they proved extremely effective in this task. However, they soon began targeting people who could potentially have mutant children and then those who might have mutant grandchildren. Eventually, they began wiping out the entire human race to fulfill their purpose.
      • Bolivar Trask wanted to make the Sentinels to create peace, and got it, in the form of the apocalypse. The peace of the grave.
      • Played for Laughs in the film's ending, where it's revealed that as a result of Wolverine's timeline meddling, Jean Grey no longer died in this new version of history. Unfortunately for Wolverine, this also means that Cyclops didn't die.
    • Deadpool (2016): Ajax's experiments on Wade succeed in creating a mutation that grants him a powerful Healing Factor, which is exactly what allows Wade to survive everything thrown at him while hunting Ajax down.
    • Logan: Transigen wanted to create a Human Weapon successor to the Weapon X project. They got one, in the form of Laura. Who really, really doesn't like her Reaver handlers, and tears through them like a human blender when they try to recapture her after her escape.
  • Good Flaws, Bad Flaws:
    • Wolverine's fondness for cigars is part of his macho image.
    • X-Men: First Class:
      • Although the writers wanted to present Xavier as a very different person when he was young man, they can't give him too many negative traits because the character is still the Big Good of the franchise, so one of his "good" flaws includes being a womanizer.
      • Hank McCoy, who we learn in X-Men: The Last Stand is one of Charles' closest friends (and therefore his personality can't be changed too drastically), gets lack of self-confidence as one of his primary faults.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Past Xavier is no longer a cad like we saw in First Class, but he has developed additional "good" flaws such as alcoholism, drug addiction, cynicism, and cussing. The guy is utterly messed up, but the writer was careful not to make the character too "bad" (Charles has to eventually become an All-Loving Hero, after all).
  • Gotta Get Your Head Together:
    • X2: X-Men United: When Dark Cerebro goes off, all the mutants in the world (except for Magneto because of his helmet) clutch their heads.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: 1973 Charles does this when he misses a dose of his Power Nullifier serum.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Professor X grasps his head when he's overwhelmed by Jean Grey's "dream" of an impending apocalypse.
    • By the time of Logan, Charles has begun to succumb to Alzheimer's, and is prone to bouts of epileptic seizures which cause his powers to go out of control. The effect is similar to that of Dark Cerebro, and led to his accidentally killing the X-Men, and an unknown number of his students. He manages this with Logan's help via a number of medications.
  • Groin Attack:
    • X-Men: Mystique to Wolverine during their duel.
    • X-Men: The Last Stand: Wolverine to another healing mutant ("Grow those back").
    • Deadpool (2016):
      • Deadpool punches Colossus in the crotch, only to break his hand trying.
        Deadpool: Cock-shot! [CLANG!] OW! [grabbing his hand, which is now limp and broken at the wrist] Your poor wife!
      • Then he tries again with his other hand.
        Deadpool: [holding up his limp hands] All the dinosaurs feared the T. rex...
      • Executed successfully by Vanessa on "Fat Gandalf" for being rude to her.
      • Executed successfully by Angel Dust after she takes advantage of Colossus's modesty to sucker-punch him.
    • Logan: Bonebreakernote  pins Laura against a wall while trying to capture her during the fight at the smelting plant, and manages to catch her arm when she tries to stab him. Laura just kicks him in the balls. Fortunately for him she didn't use her foot claws.
  • Happy Flashback:
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: 1973 Charles briefly reminisces about the first time he met Raven, which was a much happier and more innocent period of his life than his current state of abject misery and self-destruction. One notable difference between his memory of the event and what we saw in X-Men: First Class is that Charles as a kid didn't say, "And that's a promise" right after he told Raven that she would never have to steal again.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • Magneto recalls a couple of cherished moments that he had shared with Charles in 1962. One line which wasn't featured in First Class is Xavier telling him, "And it needs you, Erik."
      • When Charles restores the memories that he took away from Moira, there's greater emphasis on the cheerful times they had spent together.
  • Heel–Face Turn:
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • Storm is initially one of Apocalypse's Horsemen, but she switches sides during the battle once she sees Apocalypse nearly killing her idol, Mystique.
      • Magneto also decides to go against Apocalypse thanks to a combination of a speech about family, courtesy of Mystique and Quicksilver, and remembering that Apocalypse's current target was ultimately his best friend.
  • Hell-Bent for Leather:
    • Wolverine is the best example as besides the X-Men body suit, he often wears a leather jacket.
    • In the original trilogy, Cyclops is frequently seen with a black leather jacket.
    • X2: X-Men United: Mystique has a black leather jacket while seducing a guard.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • Past Xavier owns a brown leather jacket.
      • Quicksilver is fond of his silver leather jacket.
    • Deadpool (2016): Negasonic Teenage Warhead's signature look includes a black leather jacket or long coat.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • Both Raven and Warren are dressed in a studded black leather jacket.
      • Scott's leather jacket is mostly artichoke green with some blue on the front.
      • Kurt's Thriller jacket is made out of red leather.
      • Peter sports silver leather pants and a silver leather jacket with black sections.
  • Heroic Neutral: The X-Men themselves. In the comic books, they make active efforts to improve mutant-human relations and act as traditional superheroes, like The Avengers and the Fantastic Four. In the movies, they pragmatically maintain a low profile and avoid getting too involved in the outside world unless a certain problem (Magneto, Sentinels, Apocalypse) is too big to be ignored.
    • However, according to Simon Kinberg, by the time of Dark Phoenix, this is averted and the X-Men are a proactive superhero team.
  • Heterosexual Life-Partners:
    • X-Men: First Class: Considering that Charles' and Erik's friendship only lasted a few months, it was unusually intimate on an emotional level.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • Played straight with the elderly Magneto and Professor X (the moment where they're holding hands is the closest that we've seen them since First Class), but averted with their younger selves. In 1973, Charles never once calls Erik "friend" (although Erik uses the endearment twice), which goes to show how broken their relationship is.
      • Hank and Charles are each other's Only Friend in between 1963 and 1973, so it's inevitable that they would develop a very close bond. There are moments of non-verbal (and non-telepathic) communication between the two men, like when Xavier gently taps Beast on the chest after he mutters to Logan, "I think I'd like to wake up now." McCoy immediately understands that the gesture means, "You can calm down now, our visitor is not a threat," and he reverts back to his human form.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Charles and Hank retain their close friendship from Days of Future Past, and it's a lot healthier now because McCoy is no longer Xavier's enabler, and they've ceased to be codependent. They also behave more like peers, as Hank is a teacher, and he has grown out of being needy of his former mentor's approval.
  • Hide Your Otherness:
    • X-Men: Professor X informs Logan that "Anonymity is a mutant's first chance against the world's hostility."
    • X2: X-Men United:
      • After Artie sticks out his dark, forked tongue at a girl who is eating ice cream, Storm chides him with "Not here."
      • At the museum's food court, Xavier admonishes Pyro for activating his fire-enhancing ability to play a prank on a rude young man.
        Professor X: The next time you feel like showing off, don't.
    • X-Men: The Last Stand: The film starts with a little Angel who tries to cut off his own wings in his desperation to be normal. Considering that he did successfully remove them, but he still has the wings as an adult, they must have kept growing back.
    • X-Men Origins: Wolverine: A young Victor Creed folds his arms behind his back to hide his claw-like nails from John Howlett.
    • X-Men: First Class: Fearful of humanity's negative reaction to mutants, Charles and Hank firmly live by this philosophy. Raven was initially influenced by her foster brother, but she has already grown frustrated with concealing her blue form in public when we first see her as an adult. Professor X tells Moira, "For us, anonymity will be the first line of defense."
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: 1973 Magneto invokes this as he's shouting at Xavier, "Hiding, you and Hank, pretending to be something you're not!" Beast in particular is very uncomfortable with his blue, furry form, and he creates a serum which temporarily suppresses his mutation so that he can appear human.
  • Hollywood Evolution: In this universe, the concept of evolution is that people who are born with the X-gene will develop a random super(natural) power when they hit puberty or experience a very emotional event.
  • Homoerotic Subtext:
    • X-Men: First Class:
      • According to co-screenwriters Ashley Miller and Zack Stentz in the "Second Genesis" featurette (which was included on the DVD/Blu-Ray release), this movie is essentially a love story between Charles and Erik, with Raven and Hank being the Beta Couple:
      Miller: The story between Charles and Erik is on some level this tragic romance. You gotta arrange the other elements in that way, too.
      Stentz: Yeah, in this case you have Hank and you have Raven who end up being kind of the B-story version of the same thing you're seeing playing out with Charles and Erik. It's the making and breaking of a relationship.
      • In the rare "Magneto the Survivor" featurette, First Class producer Simon Kinberg refers to Professor X's and Magneto's separation as a divorce when he discusses their older counterparts.
      "What I love between Ian [McKellen] and Patrick [Stewart] in X1, 2, 3 is the sense that they're disappointed in each other. They actually wish that the other one would just come back to them, come back to their side, you know, 'we could be so great together.' It really is a post-divorce story. Understanding the origin of their conflict was the thing that was most interesting to me in this film. Understanding the beginning of their political fissure and their emotional fissure."
      • James McAvoy called the movie a "love story" between Xavier and Magneto, even though, when pressed for clarification, he admitted they were not gay. The film certainly concentrated heavily on the two's relationship, and the final scene, in which the two split and their surrogate children chose sides, played out like a couple's divorce.
      McAvoy: It is a little bit of a mini-tragedy that [Xavier] and Magneto don't, you know, have sex and become married and become best friends.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • Simon Kinberg has said that Apocalypse is the third chapter of a love story between Magneto and Professor X.
        "If First Class was Erik's story and Days of Future Past is Charles' story, then Apocalypse will be both of their stories. The first movie was about Erik becoming empowered. That's the origin story of a man's power. Days of Future Past is about a guy who is a mess, masterminding the end of this massive movie. So they are both at their peak powers at the start of Apocalypse, so Apocalypse for me is the culmination of that three-act love story."
      • Kinberg later adds that when Erik calls Charles by his professor title for the first time in the movie series, it's a sign of respect and love which is greater than "old friend" because in the Alternate Timeline, Xavier is less pacifistic than in the original timeline.
        Simon Kinberg: 'I feel a great swell of pity for the poor soul looking for trouble.' The way that James said that line, to me, it's almost a Magneto delivery. It's a threat. And there's a response from Fassbender where he gives a little smile. And the little smile to me, that I read that smile and Michael and I talked about that smile, the smile was Magneto understanding Charles has learnt my lesson. That's a militant Charles Xavier. Erik says, 'Good luck, professor.' It's the first time he ever called Charles 'professor.' And it sort of shows respect that I found it really beautiful that Michael said it subtly loving.
      • While promoting Apocalypse at SDCC, James McAvoy summarized his character's love-hate relationship with Erik (and Michael Fassbender agrees).
        McAvoy: It's that thing in a love story where you don't always like the person you're in love with, but you still love them. Charles and Erik always hated the way [the other] approached things. It's like, "Argh, he's always wanting to kill the humans! He's always going about the same old shit," and yet I just love the guy. I can't kill him, I don't want to mind-control him, I love him.
        Fassbender: That's right.
  • Hospital Hottie:
    • X-Men: Dr. Jean Grey is a medical doctor who is engaged to Scott Summers, and this doesn't dissuade Logan in the slightest from pursuing her.
    • The Wolverine: Dr. Green (a.k.a. Viper) is this according to Logan, who congratulates Yashida upon finding out she's his oncologist.
  • Hot Teacher:
  • Hotter and Sexier:
    • X-Men: First Class: Who knew that Charles Xavier was a charming, Pretty Boy cad or that Erik Lenhnsherr was a brooding, Tall, Dark, and Handsome "bad boy" during their youth? This film also provides the most scantily-clad females in the entire franchise.
    • Deadpool (2016): With its R-rating, it contains a lot more nudity and sexual situations than any other X-Men film.
  • Humans Are the Real Monsters: Played with as a motif for the series. The humans for the most part are shown to be intolerant and hateful of mutants (with some like Col. Stryker going that extra mile to make things a living hell for mutants), wishing they could eradicate their kind, while mutants themselves don't want to harm anyone and just live peacefully among humans. Professor X tries to bridge this gap and be a goodwill ambassador on behalf of mutantkind, hoping humanity will lower their guard and learn tolerance while Magneto loathes humanity and wants mutants to use their higher abilities to step over these hateful beings and become the one true inheritor of the planet. However, his methods are often excessive and definitely give good pause to humankind's fear and shunning of mutants, so he's not helping his case. And of course, there are those mutants like Sebastian Shaw who genuinely are evil and destructive, caring not for humans or even fellow mutants (regardless of what rhetoric they try to convey).
  • Human Weapon: Numerous examples in the films with various attempts to weaponize mutants as part of the U.S. military's "Weapon X" and their successor Transigen.
    • Wolverine's adamantium skeleton is the result of Colonel William Stryker trying to turn Logan into a military weapon, as shown in X-Men Origins: Wolverine. This ended up backfiring when Logan overheard them talking about wiping his mind and broke free. So he used Wade Wilson's body instead.
    • In X2: X-Men United, Stryker has turned various other mutants, such as Lady Deathstrike, into his personal foot soldiers, using a mind control serum harvested from his own psychic son to control them.
    • In Logan, Dr. Zander Rice has been performing illegal experiments on child mutants cloned from earlier specimens, including X-23, Logan's daughter. They tried killing them all off when they decided the experiment had run its course, which caused all of them to escape from Transigen.
  • Hypocrite:
    • X-Men: Magneto is willing to sacrifice Rogue, but not himself in the advancement of his cause. Beautifully called out by Wolverine, who tells him: "You're so full of shit. If you were really so righteous, it would be you up in that thing." The biggest irony of that is, if he had been willing to sacrifice himself, the plan would have worked.
    • X-Men: First Class: Despite claiming to be out-and-proud about all mutations, Raven doesn't want her brother reading or touching her mind in any way, even if that means just innately brushing up against it. Mutations are fine, so long as they're not telepathy or any other mind/emotion-reading gift. Her objection juxtaposes Hank's attitude, who never once tells Xavier not to read his mind even though McCoy had met Charles 18 years after Raven.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • At the climax, Magneto's past self has his most blatant moment of hypocrisy in the entire film series. After all the bravado both before and after about protecting mutantkind, he deliberately pits a Sentinel against Wolverine and Beast, ordering it to "do what you were made for."
      • In the plane, Erik calls Xavier out for abandoning the mutants out there to be killed or experimented on. Given how First Class ends, Xavier can reasonably say that Beast, Havok, Banshee and himself (who was newly shot in the spine) could have easily ended up as guinea pigs for either the US or the Soviet Union because Magneto left them stranded in Cuba with no transportation.
  • I Am a Monster:
    • In one of the TV spots for X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Sabretooth utters this chilling line.
      "I'm not your friend... I'm an animal who dreamed he was a man. But the dream is over... and the beast is awake. And I will come for you, because it's my nature."
      • This is either a Shout-Out or a ripoff of Seth Brundle's "insect politics" speech, which itself is an homage to the Japanese poem, "I dreamed I was a butterfly, flitting around in the sky; then I awoke. Now I wonder: Am I a man who dreamt of being a butterfly, or am I a butterfly dreaming that I am a man?"
    • X-Men: First Class: Erik Lehnsherr calls himself Frankenstein's Monster, believing that it was Sebastian Shaw's (whom he views as his "creator") experiments which turned him into a freak of nature.
  • I Was Quite a Looker:
  • Iconic Item: When people think of the X-Men movies, the two things that really represent the entire series is Cerebro, the Giant Dome-shaped room (not surprising since it's featured prominently in the first two X-Men movies), and likewise Magneto's Plastic Prison.
  • Icy Blue Eyes:
    • Magneto's eyes are quite a striking blue, which is a good match for his rather cold-hearted view on things.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Professor X's steely gaze when he looks directly at the camera is the very last shot of the movie. It's unique and significant for the character because James McAvoy's iteration either has Innocent Blue Eyes or expresses that he's in excruciating pain due to a Break the Cutie ordeal or being a Broken Bird. It hints that McAvoy's Xavier is tougher than Patrick Stewart's in the original timeline because the former had undergone horrific torture by Apocalypse, and is nearly murdered by him, and what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger. Charles had already fallen apart at the seams once before, and he refuses to do this again even though the hell he was forced to endure in this film is much worse, so the fierce determination in his eyes is a warning that no one should mess with him or his X-Men.
  • Immune to Mind Control: Sebastian Shaw originally used a special helmet that prevents psychic mutants from reading his mind or taking it over. Sure enough, as soon as he loses it in the climax he's finished. This same helmet is later adopted by Magneto, who uses it on multiple occasions throughout the series, particularly against his former partner Professor Xavier.
  • Implied Love Interest:
    • X-Men: First Class:
      • The relationship between Magneto and Mystique is a little vague.
      • Sebastian Shaw and Emma Frost; his term of endearment for her is "love," and he calls her "the most exquisite thing I've ever seen in my life." There's also this line:
        Emma Frost: If that telepath gets inside your head, he won't be as much fun as I am.
      • Charles and Moira may have developed a romance while he was recovering from his injury because he kisses her at the end.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • Much like The Last Stand, it's left rather vague whether or not Bobby and Kitty had anything going on. The Rogue Cut makes it explicit because they kiss twice. Come Cosmic Retcon, Bobby is back to being in a relationship with Rogue. Kitty and Colossus co-teaching a class may mean something between them as well.
      • Erik and Raven. When she's holding a spike to his throat, he just quips, "It's been a while since we were this close." There is also a hint when Charles asks Erik for the second time, "How is she [Raven]?", and Charles' facial expression when he hears the answer reads, "Oh, god, he has slept with my sister."
      Erik: She was... we were... I could see why she meant so much to you.
      • In the "Double Take: Xavier & Magneto" featurette on the Blu-Ray release, Michael Fassbender mentions that his character is "...very close to Mystique, he has very strong feelings for her." On one of the commentaries of The Rogue Cut, Bryan Singer states matter-of-factly that Erik was Mystique's lover.
  • In Name Only:
    • While deviations are to be expected in adaptations, certain characters (especially in The Last Stand) are absolutely nothing like their comic book counterparts. Callisto, Kid Omega, Psylocke, Agent Zero, and Origin's version of Deadpool are among the most drastic examples.
    • First Class does little better. While at least keeping the powers of most of the cast and a few elements of their personality, most of the mutants bare little resemblance to their comic counterparts.
      • Havok: Scott's younger brother in the comics, here depicted too old for that to be possible, and a Jerk Jock soldier.
      • Angel Salvadore: a troubled-though-well-meaning Hispanic 14-year-old mother in the comics, here a much older stripper who turns evil.
      • Azazel: a half-demon immortal warlord trapped in another dimension with a handful of powers, here an evil Renegade Russian Nightcrawler reskin.
      • Mystique: a sociopathic, morally myopic, bisexual Dark Action Girl and frequent leader of various Brotherhood of Mutants teams, here Xavier's troubled sister who struggles with self-esteem issues thanks to her powers.
  • In the Blood: Although Charles grew up resenting his mother's Parental Neglect, he nevertheless shares some traits in common with her. He picked up her posh English accent, her genteel mannerisms, her vanity, and he's so proud of his English heritage that he had spent several years studying at Oxford University. His heavy drinking in X-Men: Days of Future Past is a Mythology Gag to Sharon Xavier's alcoholism in the comics.
  • Informed Attribute: Government-related parts aside (that being a common thing for the superhero genre), it honestly feels like the first two movies spend more time talking about how much normal humans hate and fear mutants than actually showing it. This is somewhat remedied in The Last Stand, but still nothing like the comics.
  • Innocent Blue Eyes:
    • X-Men: First Class: Charles Xavier's bright blue irises represent his goodness and naïveté. After the events of the film, he is still as idealistic, but has been rather blind-sided by reality and is much more cautious and reserved.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Since this movie partly recycles Charles' arc from First Class, his radiant blue eyes are once more a symbol of him being too optimistic for his own good.
  • Internal Homage:
  • Ironic Echo:
    • X-Men: Professor X asks Magneto "Why do you come here?", referring to the Mutant Registration Act hearings; Magneto replies "Why do you ask questions to which you already know the answer?" The roles are reversed at the end when Erik is in prison and Charles comes to visit him.
    • X-Men: First Class:
      • "First, I'm going to count to three. Then, you're/I'm going to move the coin."
      • "Mutant and proud."
      • "Just following orders."
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Wolverine's initial attempts to recruit Charles to help him ends with Charles recognizing Logan and telling him to "fuck off."
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: When Professor X uses Cerebro to locate Magneto, Apocalypse takes the opportunity to take control of Charles; later, after Apocalypse has tried his Grand Theft Me ritual on Xavier, Charles takes the opportunity to get inside Apocalypse's head.
      Apocalypse/Charles Xavier: Thank you for letting me in.
  • I've Never Seen Anything Like This Before:
    • X-Men: When examining Wolverine's X-rays scans, Jean informs everyone about his adamantium-covered skeleton, and Xavier ominously says, "Experimentation on mutants isn't unheard of, but I've never seen anything like this before..."
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: The following quote is especially horrifying because it's coming from Wolverine, whose Bad Future self is 191 years old and has witnessed more atrocities in his life than most normal people could possibly imagine.
      Logan: I've been in a lot of wars... but I've never seen anything like this...
  • Lampshade Hanging: Wolverine gets a lot of screen time, just like in the comics. Magneto likes to point this out in the original trilogy: "Once again, you think it's all about you."
  • Laugh of Love:
    • X-Men: First Class:
      • We get the following exchange between Charles and a young woman he meets at a pub named Amy:
      Amy: [to Raven] Charles here was just telling me that I'm like one of the first sea creatures that grew legs.
      Charles: A tiny bit sexier.
      [Amy giggles]
      • Raven and Hank tend to giggle when they're around each other, and they eventually kiss. In an interesting twist, their actors also dated for a while.
    • In Deadpool (2016), Vanessa and Wade tend to do this when they're enjoying spending time together, particularly during sex. Vanessa also laughs quietly when she says that she'll get used to Wade's scarred appearance at the end of the film.
  • Leitmotif:
    • In the original trilogy, Mystique has a particularly exotic one that lets you know when it's really her.
    • X-Men: First Class:
      • Erik has a brooding guitar theme. If you've made an enemy of him and it kicks in, things are about to get unpleasant for you.
      • When listening to the complete score on the Blu-Ray release, Charles is associated with a simple orchestral violin melody which gradually evolves into the X-Men: First Class theme. This makes perfect sense because he's the leader of the group. "Rage and Serenity" is actually a combination of Charles' and Erik's themes.
      • Raven's scenes are usually accompanied by a piano tune.
      • Schmidt/Shaw plays a record of Edith Piaf singing La vie en rose as an establishing motif in 1944 and 1962.
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past:
      • Composer John Ottman elaborates on Professor X's theme in this interview.
        Radio host: We talked about Xavier's theme which almost acts as the central theme for the film because his story is so important, and it hovers around him. Since the film is about hope, and his character is about hope and rediscovering his hope, kind of a lost soul, where did you really draw the music from [...]?
        John Ottman: [...] I knew what the character's challenge was, what the film was about, so I tried to create a piece of music or a theme that could play both sides, sort of despondent and tortured, but also be designed so that it can be hopeful as it evolves later in the movie. I started sketching on an electric piano, and it sounded so cool and vintage [...]. Early in the movie, when it's just very subtly underscoring him, it's a lot of electric piano within the strings.
      • In this featurette, Ottman brings up Magneto's theme.
        John Ottman: Magneto's theme is a very simple "baauum baaaaw." That's basically it, it's so simple you can identify with it and feel it. [...] When he does his stuff at the end and you hear that big sound, it's bigger than it ever was before, and it ties things together.
  • The Leader:
    • Professor X is primarily the Charismatic type. He's The Heart of the X-Men; the love, admiration and respect that his students and friends feel for him are what mainly holds the team together.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • Bryan Singer has said many times that Apocalypse's greatest non-superpower skill is persuasion, so he falls under the Charismatic category.
      • Mystique is 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.
      • Scott takes the initiative when he, Jean and Kurt decide that they should try to save Hank, Raven, Peter and Moira from Stryker. Cyclops is the Levelheaded type because he's always thinking about the best strategy to circumvent whatever obstacles they encounter.
  • Leaning on the Fourth Wall:
    • Deadpool (2016): Although Weasel isn't aware he's in a film like Wade post-mutation, he still comments at one point "Deadpool, sounds like a fucking franchise." He also earlier states, when referring Wade to the Recruiter, "You should talk to him, it might advance the plot."
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: The passage from The Once and Future King that Professor X reads to his class is: "The past must be obliterated and the new start made. Let us now start fresh without remembrance rather than live forward and backward at the same time." For the audience, the underlying message is that we should ignore the Ret-Gone original timeline of the X-Men movie series and focus on its Alternate Timeline.
  • Lesser of Two Evils: Xavier invokes this trope when speaking to Logan in X-Men: The Last Stand with regards to the psychic blocks he placed over the Phoenix without Jean Grey's knowledge or consent.
    Professor X: I had a terrible choice to make; I chose the lesser of two evils.
  • Light Is Not Good:
    • X-Men: First Class: Emma Frost is clad in white and can turn her body into a mass of shining diamonds, but she has no discernible morals.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Archangel with his angelic motif and being a Horseman of Apocalypse.
  • Like Brother and Sister:
    • X-Men: First Class: Charles and Raven grew up together as foster siblings for 18 years, 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: Lampshaded by the older Professor X when he mentions that Mystique 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." On the plane ride to Paris, Charles argues that he had raised Raven to be something better than a killer. Erik is quick to point out that Charles didn't raise Raven, they grew up together. This is what it takes for Xavier to realize that Raven is not his to control.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Mystique tells Magneto, "I'm going to go fight for what I have left," which specifically refers to her foster brother Charles.
  • Like Cannot Cut Like: Adamantium blades, such as Wolverine vs. Lady Deathstrike and Wolverine vs. Deadpool.
  • Literal Transformative Experience:
    • In the first film, the arrogant anti-mutant Senator Kelly is transformed into a mutant by Magneto's doomsday device. After getting to grips with his unstable new powers - and being regarded with fear by other human beings - he swallows his pride and seeks help from his former enemy, Jean Grey. Tragically, his mutation proves fatal, and he dies while sharing a heart-to-heart moment with Storm.
    • Throughout X-Men: First Class, Mystique uses her shapeshifting powers largely to pose as an ordinary human being, and is actually quite shy compared to her future self. However, as her relationship with Magneto grows, he begins encouraging her to spend more time in her true form; now inclined to regard her scaly blue real self as beautiful, she gains more and more confidence - until at last she becomes the sly, acrobatic temptress encountered in the first trilogy.
  • Little "No":
    • X-Men: First Class: To avert World War III, Charles forces the Russians to fire on their own transport ship; neither side knows that the crew is already dead. Azazel is at the helm and lets out a short "nyet" before teleporting away just before the missile hits.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • When Charles senses Peter's and Raven's imminent executions at Apocalypse's hands, and especially the latter's suffocation, he sobs one when Moira tells him he can't sacrifice himself for them without dooming the world as well.
      • Erik also murmurs several of these while holding his wife and daughter after they are accidentally killed by a Polish policeman.
  • Living Emotional Crutch: In X-Men: Days of Future Past, Hank is this to the dispirited Charles; the latter is so desperate to escape from his mental pain that he would most likely have died from alcohol poisoning if McCoy wasn't around to supervise him. But it works the other way around, too, as the approval-seeking Hank has voluntarily suppressed his individuality (i.e. he has no career, hobby, or social life) just to attend to Xavier's needs 24/7, and is thus defining himself exclusively through his dutiful service to his ex-mentor. These are strong indicators that they are both trapped in an unhealthy codependent relationship.
  • Logical Weakness:
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: The future Sentinels exploit several logical weaknesses in their battles with the future X-Men. They deliberately focus firepower on Bishop and force-feed him so much energy that it overloads him, use extreme heat and fire to negate Iceman's powers, and after all the other X-Men are dealt with, they focus on swarming Blink, attacking her from so many angles that she can't think to make portals fast enough. They're also made of an advanced polymer, meaning Magneto has to fall back on using outside sources of metal to fight them, making it easier for them to take him on.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse: Jean Grey's Jedi Mind Trick is useless against security cameras. No matter how powerful the psychic, it doesn't matter against something that doesn't have a mind.
  • Logo Joke: The original trilogy features the "X" in the 20th Century Fox logo fading out a fraction of a second later than the rest of the logo.
  • "London, England" Syndrome:
    • X-Men: We have a vaguely-defined province, country example with "Northern Alberta, Canada."
    • X-Men Origins: Wolverine:
      • A variation with territory and country listed occurs in the case of "Northwest Territories, Canada." The American writers clearly didn't do their research because a portion of this region didn't enter the Canadian Confederation until 1870 (and the other sections were later divided up into separate provinces and territories over the next few decades), so in 1845, it should've been referred to as "North-Western Territory, British North America." James Howlett and Victor Creed were therefore born as British citizens (although presumably it would've been easy for them to obtain Canadian citizenship after the Dominion of Canada was founded in 1867).
      • "Lagos, Nigeria."
    • X-Men: First Class:
      • "Geneva, Switzerland," "Villa Gesell, Argentina" and "Moscow, Russia." (In 1962, it should have been called "Moscow, USSR," as Russia was only a Republic within the Soviet Union.)
      • A variation which features a specific location and country is "Oxford University, England" (the correct term is the formal "University of Oxford").
    • X-Men: Days of Future Past: Surprisingly averted. The cities of "Moscow," "Saigon" and "Paris" are listed without the corresponding country.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse:
      • "Pruszków, Poland"; "Cairo, Egypt."
      • Averted with "East Berlin."
  • Long-Haired Pretty Boy: The lovely Charles proudly styles his luscious tresses into a feathered mullet. In essence, he combines his prettiness from X-Men: First Class with his long, wavy mane from X-Men: Days of Future Past (but updated to an '80s hairdo). This is the character at his most vain because he revels in being beautiful and flaunts it. Apocalypse also plays up Xavier's nurturing qualities, so long hair (which is generally associated with femininity) denotes his androgynous mindset. His lips are a deep magenta instead of cherry-red like in First Class, and their rosy shade matches with his lilac shirt. For viewers who had never seen an X-Men movie before, there is absolutely no doubt that Professor X is In Touch with His Feminine Side based on his physical appearance.
  • Loser Protagonist: In X-Men: Days of Future Past, Past Xavier is the central figure, and he has been a totally unproductive member of society in between 1963 and 1973 because he's clinically depressed. He's a heavy drinker and substance abuser.

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