Later this week, Marvel is releasing Deadpool & Wolverine, the third movie in the Deadpool series and an R-rated slug fest that could reshape the future of the MCU. It's no secret that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been struggling these past few years after inundating fans with so many shows and movies that it's made each one feel a little less special.
That's about to change. Deadpool & Wolverine is the first and only Marvel movie being released in 2024, and from the positive early critic responses, it sounds like it's going to be a blast. Not only is it a sequel to the fantastic Deadpool movies starring Ryan Reynolds, but it sees iconic Wolverine actor Hugh Jackman put on the claws one more time. This is a team-up fans have wanted for years, and it's making Deadpool & Wolverine feel like a huge event movie in the vein of Avengers or Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Now that Disney owns 20th Century Fox, who put out all the previous X-Men live-action movies, the sky's the limit on what references, cameos, and quirky fourth wall-breaking nods Deadpool & Wolverine can deliver. There are 13 X-Men movies total, not including this latest. As such, it's pretty reasonable to wonder which ones you might want to watch to brush up before Logan and Wade Wilson tear up the screen in their latest adventure.
Below, we've compiled a watch list to get the most out of your X-Men marathon, and help you know which ones you can skip. To the X-Jet!
1. X-Men (2000)
The original 2000 X-Men movie launched the superhero boom in Hollywood as we know it. I won't lie to you, this one has aged...but despite that, it's still very much worth a watch. It's the origin story for how Logan first comes into contact with characters like Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), Scott Summers (James Marsden), Rogue (Anna Paquin), Storm (Halle Berry) and Jean Grey (Famke Janssen), as well as villains like Magneto (Ian McKellan), Toad (Ray Park), Mystique (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos) and Sabertooth (Tyler Mane). If you want to see where this entire franchise started, X-Men is the first movie you should load up.
2. X2 (2003)
If X-Men has aged, X2 is the exact opposite. Yes, it's an early 2000's movie, but this thing still slaps like an adamantium-imbued punch to the face. It's an excellent film which features tons of new mutants and a twisty plot that keeps things interesting right down to its epic conclusion. X2 is also an important movie for Logan in particular, since it's the first one that starts to dig into his backstory and how his skeleton ended up laced with adamantium. Succession's Brian Cox plays William Stryker, the man responsible for so much of Logan's misery, and he's a great foil to Jackman's powerhouse performance as Wolverine.
3. X-Men: The Last Stand (2006)
Look, I'm not going to tell you you need to watch X-Men: The Last Stand. There's no way around it: this is such a bad movie that the franchise needed multiple reboot films to get back on its feet afterward. It's just a mess, top to bottom, and if you want to skip it for your sanity you should.
However, in terms of the X-Men lore and Wolverine as a character, it also happens to contain one of the most singularly important moments in the franchise: the death of Jean Grey. Yes, I just spoiled an almost 20-year-old movie, but if you've seen any X-Men movie since, you've probably watched Logan do a fair amount of brooding over the fact that Jean is gone. This informs a lot of Logan's character growth. It's worth seeing once just to know all the details, but don't expect it to blow your mind.
4. X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)
Now we're into the meat of it. If you wanted to speed run the X-Men films leading up to Deadpool & Wolverine, the most important ones would be the Wolverine trilogy and the first two Deadpool movies. X-Men Origins: Wolverine is, as the name implies, the start of the Wolverine trilogy, and it's all about how Logan became the man we know by the time of X-Men.
This movie wasn't very well received when it came out, but on the rewatch it's not a terrible film, just one that made some very weird (and often hilarious) choices. It explores Logan's childhood, his relationship with Sabertooth (played here by Ray Donovan's Liev Schreiber), his seedy history with William Stryker, and even features the first-ever appearance by Reynolds as Deadpool. This movie fumbled Deadpool as a character so badly that Deadpool 2 included a post-credits stinger where the Merc with a Mouth popped over to this timeline just to murder his alternate self. In spite of all that, it does give us a window into Logan's past that lends clarity to many of his future actions.
5. X-Men: First Class (2011): OPTIONAL
Of all the movies on this list, X-Men: First Class is the only one that's truly optional. It has practically no ties to either Wolverine or Deadpool, and as such I'm not expecting it to be incredibly relevant to Deadpool & Wolverine either. The main reason to watch First Class is that it introduced a whole different X-Men cast, with James McAvoy playing Xavier, Michael Fassbender playing Magneto, Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique and Nicholas Hoult as Beast. I wouldn't be surprised to see someone from this movie cameo in Deadpool & Wolverine, especially since a couple of these cast members briefly appeared in Deadpool 2. But since it doesn't feature either Logan or Wade, it just doesn't feel as essential.
The main reason to watch First Class in this marathon is if you want to brush up on who all these younger cast members are before Days of Future Past, which is a huge crossover event that combines X-casts. If you've never seen First Class, it's very much worth watching. But if you've seen it at least once, you can probably forge ahead to The Wolverine.
6. The Wolverine (2013)
The Wolverine is the second movie in Logan's standalone trilogy, and it's a fascinating one. This was the first X-Men movie helmed by director James Mangold, and it marks a shift for the tone of the Wolverine films. It's very dark, very gritty, and is an important chapter in Logan's life.
Following the death of Jean Grey, Logan is whisked off to Japan by an old acquaintance. There, he enters into a complicated game of chess between heirs to a business empire, finds new love, and rediscovers what it means to be a hero after secluding himself in the wilderness for years. The Wolverine draws some parallels to Shōgun, not the least of which is that Logan's love interest is named Mariko after the heroic Toda Mariko of that story. The Wolverine flew more under the radar than most X-Men films, but if you're trying to brush up on Wolverine's journey, it's an essential piece of the puzzle.
7. X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)
To many fans, X-Men: Days of Future Past is the pinnacle of Fox's run of X-Men movies. It was a true crossover event film, which used time travel shennaigans to combine the cast from Fox's original X-Men trilogy with the newcomers from the First Class era. Even today, it remains one of the best X-Men movies. This thing took immense risks, and they paid off.
In terms of Logan's story, Days of Future Past is an ending and a beginning. In a timeline where the robotic Sentinels have wiped out most mutants or put them into internment camps, the X-Men come up with a daring plan to send Wolverine's consciousness back in time to the 1970s, where he can help avert the rise of the robots by stopping an assassination attempt on their creator, Bolivar Trask (played by Game of Thrones' Peter Dinklage). By the time the dust settles, the X-Men have succeeded...but it's not quite clear how things have changed. Does Days of Future Past set up new timelines, or just alter the existing ones? I imagine we may finally get an answer to that question in Deadpool & Wolverine.
8. Deadpool (2016)
At last, we're into the Deadpool movies! While this is marked number 8 on the list, you can really watch it any time to get your hype up. Deadpool stands mostly on its own from the rest of the X-Men movies, barring some references to both the First Class and original trilogy eras.
Does this movie need any introduction? It's the origin story for Wade Wilson, showing how he became the titular Deadpool and started murdering bad guys while cracking non-stop jokes about it. Since Deadpool & Wolverine is technically the third film in the Deadpool series, this one is required viewing. There's no doubt at all that the new film will lean heavily on plot elements and characters introduced here. Plus, it's just an absolute banger of a film! Deadpool has such a unique spin on being a superhero, and Reynolds and the team behind this movie did an amazingly fun job of bringing it to life on the big screen.
9. Logan (2017)
From arguably the funniest X-Men movie, we head next to the most dour. After playing Wolverine for 17 years, Logan was designed as a send-off for Hugh Jackman's run as the character. It shows a version of the world where Logan's aging has finally stopped working, allowing him to become an old man. Most of the X-Men are gone, and Logan is just trying to bide his time until he dies. Into that mix comes X23, a young mutant played by Dafne Keen who forces Logan to step up as a hero once again. Logan is an artsy, violent film that very much earns its R-rating, and a surprisingly moving capstone to Jackman's time as an X-Man.
Ryan Reynolds has said that Deadpool & Wolverine won't reverse the ending of Logan, which means it will have to explain how we end up with a living version of the character after we all watched him die in this one. Anything's possible in the Multiverse!
10. Deadpool 2 (2018)
We end our X-Men movie marathon with Deadpool 2, the second movie starring Ryan Reynolds as the Merc with a Mouth. Since Deadpool & Wolverine is a direct sequel to Deadpool 2, this is probably the most important movie on the entire list to watch before you head to the theater. It features a huge, emotional arc for Wade Wilson, introduces Josh Brolin as the time traveler Cable, and ends with Wade getting up to some nonsense which is probably going to upset the Time Variance Authority, now that he's part of the MCU.
Deadpool 2 is just as good as the first, albeit with a bit more emotional weight and slightly fewer laughs. It's the perfect warm-up for Deadpool & Wolverine, and a great way to end a marathon rewatch of the X-Men movies.
What about the other X-Men films?
You may have noticed that there are a few X-Men movies missing from this list. Both X-Men: Apocalypse and X-Men: Dark Phoenix take place in the alternate timeline of X-Men: First Class, and since they happen after Days of Future Past, there's no real connection between those movies and either Wolverine or Deadpool. Watching them doesn't really add anything to our understanding of those characters. Think of it as a branching timeline that heads off into a dead end, since Dark Phoenix didn't do well enough to convince 20th Century to continue with the series.
The last X-Men movie to mention is The New Mutants. That was the final X-Men film to release after Disney acquired 20th Century Fox, and it was a tightly focused story about a group of teenage mutants breaking out of a science facility. Any connections it has to Deadpool or Wolverine are so fleeting that there's no real need to watch it ahead of the new film unless you're a completionist who wants to see 'em all.
At the end of the day, any amount of X-Men you watch ahead of Deadpool & Wolverine will enhance your experience. With so many films in the franchise, it can be intimidating to go back through them for a rewatch. As such, I'd recommend taking this list as a broad guideline, rather than something you need to follow to the letter. Don't be afraid to skip a movie if it makes you exhausted to think of watching it! The most important thing is to have fun, refresh your memory about who all these disparate characters are, and get hyped!
Deadpool & Wolverine hits theaters on Friday, July 26.
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