In a bold and somewhat baffling move this week, the official Netflix Twitter account, @NXOnNetflix, decided to post the company’s official thoughts on the X-Men of Marvel comics, ranking them with a system of being either “overrated,” “correctly rated” or “underrated,” which has caused some stir among fans of both the streaming giant and the characters, many of whom are already annoyed with Netflix for its recent slew of MCU cancellations. You can check out the initial post below:
Wolverine: Overrated
Gambit: Overrated
Storm: Correctly Rated
Kitty Pryde: Underrated
Nightcrawler: Underrated
Rogue: Correctly Rated
Beast: Underrated
Colossus: Overrated— NX (@NXOnNetflix) February 19, 2019
Not that surprisingly for a post that looks to have been designed to be somewhat controversial, they rank well-known X-Men like Wolverine, Gambit and Colossus as “overrated,” which already has some fans heated, while claiming that Storm and Rogue are “correctly rated” and, in my opinion, giving the cliched answer of saying Kitty Pryde and Nightcrawler are “underrated.” They also marked Beast as “underrated” but I don’t know if I agree with that one either, as I think Beast is “correctly rated” myself. He is in a lot of stories and media, never comes across all that bad, but in the end, his powers are not that cool, yet he comes off well because he is very smart.
Netflix has also been very good about keeping this X-Men conversation going with some smart responses to the fans, such as when one fan asked why Jubilee was left off the list, and they quickly gave her (and her vampire form) a rating, which you can see below:
Jubilee: Underrated
Vampire Jubilee: Also underrated— NX (@NXOnNetflix) February 19, 2019
Same goes for when the question was raised about why Cyclops was not on the initial list, him being a founding member of the team and all, and Netflix replied with a thought-out answer explaining their current thoughts on the character:
Underrated. His transformation in the comics from loyal soldier to rebel was super cool, even if he ultimately became something of a villain.
— NX (@NXOnNetflix) February 19, 2019
Surprisingly, no one has asked why other classic X-Men have yet to be ranked, characters like Jean Grey, Ice-Man, or even Professor X, though I’m sure Netflix would be quick to respond if someone inquired. Of course, why the Netflix Twitter took the time to rank the X-Men is anyone’s guess, though I wonder if it is a PR move to help smooth over Marvel fans who are angry at them for cancelling ‘The Punisher’ and ‘Jessica Jones’ this week. Maybe the idea was to distract with a random Marvel discussion about the X-Men, Marvel heroes very far removed from the main MCU. Either way, it certainly got the fans riled up, and if you happen to have an opinion on the matter, feel free to share it in our comments below, or find @NXOnNetflix on Twitter and give your own thoughts on how they ranked the X-Men.