Just a comic book or a political commentary?
The X-Men are one of the most popular comic book franchises in the world. Focusing on a group of genetically different mutants who are “feared and hated by a world they have sworn to protect”, many stories have centred on the struggle between professor Xavier and Magneto. While Xavier fights for peace and mutual understanding between humans and mutants, Magneto embraces a militant politics of autonomy and self-defence.
The first issue of X-Men was published in 1963. That same year the US American civil rights movement mobilized the March on Washington. Many have speculated that these issues were connected. Were the X-Men a metaphor for America’s struggles with racial inequality? And if that was the case, could that mean that Xavier was modelled after Martin Luther King, while the character of Magneto was inspired Malcolm X?
Watch this video (in Dutch) for an introduction to the X-men.
