X-Men: The 11 greatest characters of all time

8. Cable

The story of Cable is one that makes you appreciate the convoluted nature that exists within the X-Men comic. Cable was born Nathan Summers, to Scott Summers (aka Cyclops) and his wife, Sinister’s clone of Jean Grey, Madelyne Pryor. The birth of Nathan pitted the X-Men against Sinister who thought that the Summer’s child would help in the fight against Apocalypse. Instead, Sinister’s actions got the Nathan kidnapped by Apocalypse who infected him with an incurable infection.

For his protection and a way to cure the techno-organic disease, baby Summers would be sent to the future. It would be a desperate move by his father Cyclops who agreed to send him to an alternate future known as, Clan Askani. While it wouldn’t be revealed right away, it turns out that Nathan and Cable were in fact the same person. The adult version of Nathan would make his first appearance in Volume 1 issue 87 of New Mutants.

He was introduced as the mutant Cable, the now half cyborg half man thanks to the disease. Like his mother, he possessed great telepathic abilities with an intellect that rivals Reed Richards, a powerful cybernetic arm, and wields a psionic blaster. Cable’s calling was to help protect the word against a great enemy, Stryfe. In 2013 Marvel published a series, Cable and the X-Force which became wildly popular. It follows a group of mutants led by Cable that includes Domino, Colossus, and Forge, to name a few. It also features Hope Summers, who Cable has raised and other X-Men. The wildly popular comic further increased Cables popularity and Fox has opted to feature him in the sequel of our No. 5 X-Men.