How Did Professor X Come Back After ‘The Last Stand?’

‘X-Men: The Last Stand’ marked the ending of the original X-Men trilogy and provided us with some shocking and emotional scenes. After Jean Grey became the Dark Phoenix, she lost control over her powers and emotions, which resulted in many people getting hurt. One of those people was Charles Xavier, who tried to help Jean, but she killed him out of anger and despised him because she thought he wanted to control her. Luckily, Charles found a way to survive, and in this article, we’ll discuss how Professor X came back after ‘The Last Stand.’

Charles lectured his students about the morality of transferring one’s consciousness into another person’s body. And later on, before Jean killed him, Professor X transferred his consciousness into the body of a man born with fully functional organs but without consciousness. This is demonstrated in the movie’s post-credit scenes. All this means that he never truly died in the first place.

Professor X was always there for his students and gave his life trying to help Jean and save her from the uncontrollable power and desire raging inside her. When Jean killed her tutor, it was one of the most shocking scenes in the movie, but it is later revealed that Charles managed to save himself. Let’s see how it all went down.

What was ‘X-Men: The Last Stand’ about?

‘X-Men: The Last Stand’ revolved around two important events. The first one was that the ‘mutant cure’ was invented thanks to a mutant child who could suppress the powers of any mutant that got near him. The second event was the return of Jean Grey, her alter ego unleashed, and she became the most powerful mutant out there.

Ever since Jean was a little girl, Charles and Eric were aware of the magnitude of her powers and the potential dangers inside her. Of course, Professor X was always careful and wanted Jean to control her powers, while Magneto was fascinated by everything she could do.

Professor X always taught his students that mutants are needed in the world and that they are special. The wisdom he always strived to spread was that every mutant has a choice: will their powers be used for the greater good or the personal gain and destructive ends?

He also debated with his students whether transferring one’s consciousness inside the other person’s body is acceptable and where the boundaries stop. For example, his colleague, Moira MacTaggert, had a fully grown male patient with all his vital organs perfectly fine, but he had no consciousness.

Charles wondered whether the concept of the greater good applies in such cases and whether it would be fair to transfer the consciousness of a terminally ill father of four to the other body, which is just a vessel.

These were rhetorical questions, and Charles never gave an explicit answer, but it’s fair to say that he demonstrated what he thinks about all that when he transferred his own mind. But, more about that later.

A lot was going on in the mutant world all of a sudden. With the ‘mutant cure’ being available to the public, opposite sides formed, one for the cure and the other against it. Magneto and his Brotherhood stood firmly against it, and their goal was to find the mutant child that started it all. Of course, Magneto also wanted Jean on his side because he would be unstoppable with her as an ally.

What happened to Professor X in ‘The Last Stand?’

When Charles discovers that Jean has left the mansion and that the Phoenix has taken over her mind, he takes Storm and Wolverine back to Jean’s childhood home to find her. Magneto and his Brotherhood members were already there, and Eric tried to get Jean on his side of the upcoming war with the humans.

Nobody wanted the situation to escalate, so Professor X and Magneto entered Jean’s house alone, and she was there, waiting. Charles wanted to help Jean and bring her back to the X-Men mansion, but there was no way the Phoenix inside her would ever allow him to be bound again. Eric’s cunning comments from the side also just made the situation worse.

Jean became more angry and upset until Pheonix took over her completely. She used her powers and had only one thing in mind – to kill Charles. With her telepathic abilities, she lifted Professor X from his wheelchair and the whole house in the air. Little by little, Charles’s body started to vanish, and Jean then struck the final blow. Professor X was gone, with everyone around in disbelief and shock.

After Charles’s death, the school’s future hung in the balance. Luckily, his main confidants, led by Storm, decided to continue in the footsteps of their mentor and fight for the cause he thought them to.

Wolverine eventually killed Jean, and Magneto’s army was stopped as well. Humans and mutants decided to bury the hatchet and work together toward the overall betterment of humanity.

In the post-credit scenes, it was revealed that Professor X did not die, as he transferred his consciousness inside the previously mentioned Moira MacTaggert’s patient, which is how he survived.

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