Villain Profile: Mystique

Shapeshifting conceptually is an interesting power. To instantly be able to change any part of your body, to take on another person’s face and possibly hijack their life, it’s a little terrifying. There have been a few shapeshifters in comics and superhero history, but I doubt that there is one more famous than the elusive Mystique. The blue shapeshifter has cut a bloody path across the globe for decades and shows no sign of stopping. Let’s get to it.

I bet we all wish we could look this good
at maybe a hundred and thirty.

Mystiques origins are shrouded in mystery. It’s even unclear if her most common name, Raven Darkholme is even her real name. Heck, I’m not even one hundred percent sure her blue skinned form is her ‘real’ form, or just Mystiques favorite look. From the tidbits that have been gathered about her life, it’s safe to say that she is rather old. It’s been said that she met her best friend and at times girlfriend Irene Adler, better known as Destiny, at the dawn of the twentieth century. That puts her birth year, at minimum, to be 1870-90, assuming “dawn” means anywhere from five to ten years after the century turns over. So that puts her at over a hundred and twenty. I’ll explain how the heck that works in her powers section.

The only way to really track Mystiques movements for a while were based on her children. Somewhere in the 1950s she worked as a spy, for who is hard to tell. On paper she was working for the west, but Mystique has been known to double or even triple cross folks. She took on the identity and looks of a German secret agent, Leni Zauber and was partnered with Victor Creed aka Sabretooth. They were tasked with assassinating an East Berlin scientist. The mission is successful, considering who was involved that’s no big shock, but the two must have been spotted because they were forced to hide out for several weeks. During that time they became romantically involved, but because Mystique has commitment issues she faked her death a short while later. The unexpected consequence of this relationship was their son, Graydon. Some story depict Mystique abandoning the baby to fend for himself, and others show that she made certain that Graydon would be taken care of. Regardless, once he hit his teens and it became clear that somehow two mutants made a human, Mystique abandoned Graydon completely.

A short time later she settled down and married a German Baron, Christian Wagner. It’s a good arraignment, Wagner’s position in Germany assured a life of comfort and he was a loving husband, but the thrill seeking Mystique grew bored with things after a while. She began to use her shapeshifting powers to seek excitement in the local town. I think we all know what sort of excitement I’m talking about. After doing this for a while, she met and was entranced by a mutant named Azazel. The powerful, demon looking Mutant claims to be the ruler of a small island, called the Island of Demons. Subtle. Azazel and Mystique have relations, and the unexpected consequence of that was another pregnancy. Baron Wager and his father were slightly suspicious, Christian was sterile but I don’t know if he was aware of the fact, and plans to get a blood test to verify the child’s father. Mystique kills them both, don’t ever cross her, and buries them. She most likely planned on taking on one or both of their identities and raise her child in comfort after the birth, but things didn’t work out so well. Her son Kurt was born with blue skin, yellow eyes, three fingered hands and feet, and a pointed tail. Kind of hard to cover up those kinds of…irregularities. The locals are convinced he and Mystique are some kind of demons and run them out of town. Again, two different stories about the separation, one is that she lost Kurt in a river while fleeing, and the other is she just leaves him in the woods. Either way, Kurt is picked up by Gypsies and given his name.

The classic. Skull on her forehead is a
creepy touch.

Sometime later Mystique and Destiny become the guardians of Rogue, a young runaway in Mississippi. Destiny’s future sight tells her Rogue will be important, and the two take her in. Mystique becomes very protective of Rogue, possibly due to displaced feelings regarding her sons. At the same time Mystique had taken on the guise of Rave Darkholme quickly rises through the ranks of the US Civil Service until she became deputy director of DARPA in the Department of Defense. She used this position to steal government secrets and tech to fund her criminal enterprises. She also beats Ms. Marvel’s boyfriend to death and then sets her sights on the human/Kree highbred. To that end she forms her own version of the Brotherhood of Mutants. The team consisted of herself, Avalanche (earth manipulating powers), the Blob (super strong and UNBELIEVABLY Obese), Destiny, and Pyro (flame manipulating powers).  Their first mission was to kill Senator Robert Kelly, a vocal Mutant hating politician. Things did not go well for the villain team, as the X-men stepped in and saved the day. Mystique is the only one to escape. She quickly trains Rogue for the rescue attempt. The plan was to have Rogue steal Ms. Marvel’s powers, along with the Avengers abilities. Phase one, getting Ms. Marvel’s powers, and Phase two, free the Brotherhood, go off without a hitch but things go south when the Avengers get involved. As things often do for the bad guys. Rogue and Mystique escape. Mystique is captured a short time later at the pentagon by Wolverine, Storm and a powerless Ms. Marvel. The Brotherhood eventually escapes, but Rogue leaves to join the X-men.

After Rogue leaves Mystique does try to go straight, reorganizing her team into the Freedom Force, a government sponsored Mutant Team. Things go well for a while, they arrest Magneto, capture a few mutant terrorists, and so on. Things go bad when two members, one of the Destiny, ae murdered by a possessed Legion, Xavier’s estranged, powerful and emotionally unbalanced son. Things get even worse when she is forced to take part in a government conspiracy, part of which involves her son Graydon’s bid for the Presidency. In order to keep mommy dearest in line, Graydon has the grandson of Destiny (She’d been married and started a family while Mystique was globetrotting) beaten to death. Now whatever maternal feelings she may or may not have had for Graydon were initially suppressed by unbridled fury at the death of her best friend/girlfriend’s grandson, but she keeps her anger in check. Especially when she is told anonymously that someone was setting up Graydon to be killed, so he could be a Martyr for the Anti-mutant cause. She plans on keeping Graydon alive to prevent said Martyrdom, but fails.  Mystique spend the next several years trying to uncover just what happened to Graydon, and was shocked to find that Destiny was a founder of the conspiracy that killed Graydon, and that she herself (time displaced) pulled the trigger. Sad ending to that tale.

This is her "I'm gonna mess you up face." Don't let her make
that face at you.

Mystique’s life since has been about as interesting as a shapeshifter’s can be. She was a fashion model for a while, then Magneto’s number two, a temporary X-man, a member of Mr. Sinister’s Marauders, and a member of few other teams at various times. She never sticks with one group for long. One story reveals that her time as Mr. Sinister’s lackey was part of an elaborate plan to use a baby, the first mutant born after M-Day later named Hope Summers, to purge Rogue of a deadly virus that made her sickening touch deadly. So, good step-mom. During Norman Osborn’s time as head of HAMMER she was placed in charge of the Dark X-men, taking on the forms of Professor Xavier and Jean Grey to boost the groups PR. She is perhaps the most elusive of villains.

Mystique has power over every cell of her body. This allows her to change her shape in any way imaginable. She can change her body to appear like anyone, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Her powers allows her to completely reorganize how biology set up her body works. She can move her organs around, so that her heart, brain, lungs and so on are contorted and placed in such a way that head or chest shots don’t stop her. Mystique’s cell also can replicate endlessly, kind of like a cancer cell. This lets her regenerate at an absurd rate and remain pretty much forever youthful. Initially only able to mimic a human’s appearance (and their clothes), her powers have evolved to allow her to mimic animals and inanimate objects as well. She can now also mask her scent, so guy’s like Wolverine can track her anymore.

I also want to stress that she only takes on their appearance. If she shapeshifts into Cyclops, she doesn’t get his optic beam. If she turns into Wolverine, she gets metallic looking claws, but they aren’t nearly as strong. If she turns into Colossus, she can make her skin look metal but it’s not as strong. Her powers are only skin deep. More or less. Mystique is also a master infiltrator, having dozens of years of training in espionage. She’s a crack shot and a master of hand to hand combat.

There are a couple of scenes in the movie where she accuses
dudes of not thinking she's pretty like this. Do you know what
sane men's response to that question is? Blue is my favorite
color. A blue Jennifer Lawrence is still Jennifer Lawrence.

Mystique has appeared in several X-men related series, usually as Magneto’s number two.

She appeared in X-men the Animated Series as a recurring villain. We cover the biggest plot points involving her character, “A Rogue’s Tale” detailed her time as Rogue’s surrogate parent, and Bloodlines shows a convergence of Mystiques children as her deranged son Graydon tries to prune the family tree. It’s interesting to note that this is the one show where she almost never worked with Magneto. She worked with Apocalypse while he was kidnapping Mutants to turn into his Horsemen. And she worked with Mr. Sinister on several occasions helping him to gather “test subjects” but to my knowledge she only work with Magneto once. It was in the multi-parter “Beyond Good and Evil.” In it she helps Apocalypse, along with most of the series villains, gather psychics for his final master plan. When it became clear that his master plan was to destroy reality to remake it in his own image, she sides with Magneto and tries to take Apocalypse down. Tall order.

I have an even harder time believing th
Xavier sibling angle now that I know
she's about as old as Wolverine.

In the TV show X-men: Evolution she is portrayed as Magneto’s top Lieutenant. The first season has her posing as “Ms. Darkholme,” the principle at Bayville High, the school the X-kids go to for some reason. She uses her position there to recruit her own Brotherhood Mutants for Magneto. Discontent is hinted at in several episode, but comes to a head in “Shadowed Past” where her connection to Nightcrawler is revealed. This show implies that Kurt Wagner’s more demonish appearance may be due to experiments Magneto put him through in an attempt to enhance his powers. The two part episode “The Cauldron” is final straw. In it, Magneto is gathering the best Mutants together on Asteroid M to enhance their powers and start his Mutant master race. Mystique is infuriated when it’s clear even she has to fight for a spot. Against Storm. Tough luck Mystique. She does eventually make it to Asteroid M with the X-men for a rescue mission. She enters the enhancement machine and is augmented. Season 2 onwards shows her using her enhanced powers to stalk her foster daughter Rogue in the guise of a high school girl named Risty and working to hunt down Magneto. Season Three has her working alongside the Mutant Mesmero to release Apocalypse, they mention something about her doing this to safeguard her and Rogue’s future. Kurt’s really feeling the love Mystique. She’s apparently turned to stone while releasing the final lock on Apocalypses prison. She was in fact turned into one of his Horsemen and is placed in charge of guarding him while he completes his work. After the battle she tries to reconcile with both her children, but Rogue, speaking for her and Kurt, tells her to basically “buzz off and leave us alone.” I’d feel worse for her if I hadn’t seen all the evil stuff she’d done up to that point. Payback is a bitch, Mystique.

A reminder that she still has things she cares about.

Mystique is one of the most recurring villains of the X-men Movie franchise, appearing in all five main series films thus far. And she’s going to appear in the sixth. She is portrayed in the first three movies by Rebecca Romijn. Movie one shows her using her shapeshifting to get close to Senator Robert Kelly to use as a test subject for Magneto’s Mutation Machine. She also tricks Rogue into leaving the X-mansion by posing as Ice-man and lying to her, and poisons Xavier before leaving. She helps defend Magneto on Elis Island. She’s eventually skewered by Wolverine. She survives and takes on Robert Kelly’s identity. In X2 she frees Magneto from Prison, after gleaming enough information form William Stryker and his lesser subordinates, and helps the X-men and Magneto infiltrate Stryker’s base of operations. She flees at the end of the film with Magneto and Pyro. X3 has her captured by the US Government before being freed by Magneto, alongside Juggernaut, and Multiple Man. She’s shot by the Cure weapons, stripping her of her powers. She’s promptly abandoned by Magneto, and turns on him out of spite. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

Mother Daughter moment ruined by attacking the boy
Rogue likes. Bad Call Mystique.

She is reintroduced in X-men: First Class, this time portrayed by Jennifer Lawrence. First Class shows her as Xavier adopted sister, and major confidant. Which is defiantly weird when you consider all the hateful things she did to Charles. I know times change, but can any amount of hate make one willingly poison their ‘brother?’ I’m not buying it. Their relationship changes after they join the US government and meet Magneto. The young Master of Magnetism continually encourages Mystique to embrace her more Mutant appearance rather than hide behind her favored form. In the end, Mystiques sides with Magneto and runs off. Days of Future Past shows her as the “lynchpin” character to stopping the hellish future Wolverine is traveling from. Her killing Bolivard Trask and then being captured by the Government is what allows them to enhance their Sentinels with adaptive technology. Something that is hard to believe, in regard to “how do you make machines mimic a biological process?”, and impossible because, I repeat, HER POWERS DON’T WORK LIKE THAT. God, someone read a wiki on your characters before setting up a movie plot.

Before my summation, I feel I need to address a characters costume once again. I don’t know why Mystique is naked in the movies. She’s clothed in comics, and in the TV Shows. FC gives some BS from Magneto, having him encourage her to go all natural by comparing her to a tiger or something like that, but seriously, Magneto, you had no qualms telling your only friend’s sister to walk around in her birthday suit? Dick move man. And if you want to argue it’s more believable with her powers, that being nude lets her shapeshift better, I counter that with the climax of FC, where she morphs into Sebastian Shaw, clothes and all while fully clothed, no problem. Your argument is invalid. It’s just something that’s been bugging me for a while.

Mystique is an interesting villain. She’s got enough qualities of a horrible, amoral killer and a tragic heroine shaped by circumstance to make her the perfect morally gray character. Time and again she’s shown to not really be on anyone’s side but her own, and given her past I can’t necessarily blame her. I will say that of all her appearances, I like the Jennifer Lawrence version the least. Not because Jennifer Lawrence is a bad actor, on the contrary, my dislike stems from the fact that she’s too nice. Could you ever believe that Jennifer Lawrence is a selfish character, acting out her own agenda at the detriment of others? I can’t, which made hating Mystique difficult which made my feelings for the character confusing. But that’s my problem, not yours. I look forward to seeing how her story ends in X-men: Apocalypse and seeing her in other things in the future. She’s the elusive, vindictive, morally gray blue shapeshifter, Mystique. Next time, my review and Doing it Better of the original X-man movie. 

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