Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness Repeats a Familiar X-Men Trope

Spoilers ahead for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and the X-Men movies!

Once again, Professor Charles Xavier has been slain on-screen by a woman in red who possesses godlike powers. 

During the highly anticipated, cameo-filled Illuminati sequence in Marvel’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Patrick Stewart’s Professor X is killed by Elizabeth Olsen’s Scarlet Witch. 

While entering the mind of the possessed Wanda of Earth-838, Xavier makes contact with the submerged consciousness of the Wanda whose body has been hijacked by a dream-walking Scarlet Witch. But the Scarlet Witch quickly appears and snaps Xavier’s neck, which also kills him in real life. 

Again, this isn’t the first time an all-powerful lady in red has offed Xavier. 

A similar thing happened to Stewart’s Professor X in 2006’s X-Men: The Last Stand where, like Wanda Maximoff breaking bad and becoming the Scarlet Witch, Jean Grey (Famke Janssen) has become fully consumed and corrupted by the powers of the Dark Phoenix.

During a confrontation with the X-Men and the Brotherhood at her childhood home, Jean’s Phoenix powers prove too strong for even the mighty telepath Charles Xavier to ward off. Jean disintegrates Xavier! 

As The Last Stand’s mid-credits scene reveals, however, Xavier’s body may be gone but he managed to transfer his consciousness into the mind of a comatose patient of his ally, Dr. Moira MacTaggert.

The going fan theory is that the patient is Charles Xavier’s braindead twin brother and that Xavier essentially possesses his comatose twin’s body – hence, why “Professor Xavier” is alive again in both the end credits scene of The Wolverine (much to Logan’s shock) as well as in X-Men: Days of Future Past.

There’s no hint from what happens in Multiverse of Madness that this Professor X was similarly able to escape (complete) death. No, he seems well and truly deceased, along with fellow Illuminati members Reed Richards (John Krasinski), Captain Carter (Hayley Atwell), Captain Marvel (Lashana Lynch), and Black Bolt (Anson Mount). Only Karl Mordo (Chiwetel Ejiofor) survives. 

But lest we forget, there is yet another (!!) time that Patrick Stewart’s Charles Xavier died on-screen.

In Hugh Jackman’s swan song to Wolverine, 2017’s Logan, Stewart’s enfeebled Xavier, degenerating from a form of dementia, is killed in his bed by Logan’s clone, X-24. Again, there was no transference of his consciousness. This Xavier is also well and truly dead.

Stewart’s Xavier has thus far died twice in the X-Men franchise and now once in the MCU. In each case, his death established that the villain was so powerful and far gone that if they could kill someone as mighty as Charles Xavier then surely our main heroes don’t stand a chance against them. (Spoiler: Each film’s hero still won, albeit at a high personal cost to themselves.)

How did you feel about seeing Professor X die on screen again? Is Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness essentially the best film version of the Dark Phoenix Saga? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.

For more Doctor Strange coverage, check out our review, our explainer on the character played by Charlize Theron, Clea, what to expect from the Marvel Illuminati like Reed Richards and Black Bolt next, our Multiverse of Madness ending explained, our biggest Doctor Strange WTF questions, and then see what Benedict Cumberbatch and Sam Raimi told us about making Multiverse of Madness.