Though it stands to one day become lost to time, as the X-Men and all their mutant-related intellectual property rights revert back to the hands of Marvel Studios with Disney's purchase of Fox's movie concerns, the decades-long run of movies from the studio broke a lot of ground and made a lot of great choices.
It also famously made a lot of bad choices and the dips and swells in quality and seriousness between movies have the potential to make it seem less accessible to a newcomer than something more uniform like the MCU. With this in mind, here are the top 10 X-Men movies according to the critical scores on review aggregate site Metacritic to create a clearer roadmap of the series' best entries.
X-Men: Apocalypse (52)
The final movie in the franchise from original director Bryan Singer was not the series' most unceremonious ending but it's undeniably one of them.
After the success of the previous movie, Days of Future Past, Apocalypse was a disappointing adaptation of the titular villain and their storyline as well as a reminder of one of the X-Men movies' lowest points which, as it happens, actually outranks the movie on this list...
X-Men: The Last Stand (58)
Though it's aged better than many superhero movies of the modern era, The Last Stand was, and still is, a big step in the wrong direction for the X-Men movie franchise.
Director Bryan Singer was replaced by Brett Ratner after departing for his dream project of Superman Returns and Ratner's lack of superhero movie credits since the threequel is indicative of his level of success with bringing together a comic book ensemble in a satisfying way.
The Wolverine (63)
The second standalone Wolverine movie may not be the crème de la crème of the franchise but it is, at the very least, the step in the right direction that fans and critics were hoping for.
Though director James Mangold's following Wolverine movie would prove to be his real success in the genre, The Wolverine is still a very well made and creative side adventure in the series that makes its own achievements in the field of genre hybridization.
X-Men (64)
Though it's rarely given the credit for it, fans have Bryan Singer's original X-Men movie to thank for ushering in the contemporary era of comic book movies with Sam Raimi's first Spider-Man movie following promptly and the rest, as they say, being history.
While fairly small-scale in terms of what audiences now associate with the genre, X-Men remains nonetheless a strange and compelling action experience that delivered iconic renditions of even more iconic characters.
Deadpool (65)
The first purely comedic segue of the X-Men movies proved to be exactly what the series needed and, after debuting as the character in the considerably less-loved X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Ryan Reynolds finally found his hit superhero persona.
Fans had been dying to see the title character done right in a live-action movie for a long time but the actors' talents synced up with the Merc with a Mouth so well that critics couldn't ignore its juvenile appeal either.
X-Men: First Class (65)
First Class arrived at what was probably the most uncertain moment in the franchise's entire run and, while not being as empathically successful as the series' highest notes, it reinvigorated interest from both fans and critics.
A stellar cast adds new dimensions to old characters and the period setting would prove to be one of the best creative decisions made in the mainline X-Men movies, even if it was eventually subject to the law of diminishing returns further down the road.
Deadpool 2 (66)
Even bigger and bolder than the first installment, Ryan Reynolds cements his take on the unkillable assassin as one of the X-Men movie franchise's biggest successes.
Josh Brolin's appearance as another fan-favorite character, Cable, rounds out an unusual–but highly-effective–ensemble that finds entertaining ways of breathing ingenuity into a heavily oversaturated genre.
X2: X-Men United (68)
Both the first major success of the X-Men movie franchise and 21st-century superhero movies in general, X2 amped up everything good about the original movie and added a layer of emotional intensity and thrilling action that had never really been seen before.
The only real major drawback to the movie is that it created a very high standard early on that the series itself would rarely ever live up to again.
X-Men: Days of Future Past (75)
Bryan Singer's return to the franchise following his departure after X2, Days of Future Past was an enjoyable–if somewhat short-lived–reset button for the inconsistent series.
Adapting the story of the comic series of the same name, the movie utilizes time travel to take things back to the 1970s (a decade after the events of First Class) to combine both sides of the franchise's timeline together into an overwhelming extravaganza that doesn't disappoint with its climactic finale.
Logan (77)
One of the most highly-rated superhero movies ever made among fans and critics alike, the Oscar-nominated Logan brought Hugh Jackman's groundbreaking 17-year run as Wolverine to an end in the most satisfying way possible.
Whilst still full of plenty of action spectacle, the movie is a much more grounded and emotional take on the genre that fleshes out the Neo-Western elements of The Wolverine and adds a pertinent level of political commentary.