After all those hints, [REDACTED] are finally officially in the MCU

Warning: spoilers ahead!

Before we get to the good stuff, we must first have a little history lesson. The first X-Men movie arrived in the year 2000, before comic book movies were the world-ruling juggernaut genre that they represent today. 20th Century Fox owned the rights to the X-Men (along with the Fantastic Four, Daredevil and Deadpool), which meant that when Disney kicked off the MCU, it couldn't use any of those characters, even though they were all very heavily related within the Marvel comic books. This also meant they couldn't even allude to the idea of powers arriving through mutations, which is why we got that god-awful TV series Inhumans (which they hoped might their answer to the X-Men. Spoilers – it wasn't!), and why certain characters like Pietro and Wanda Maximoff are referred to as 'enhanced' during Age of Ultron. 20th Century Fox, you see, literally had the copyright on the use of the word 'mutant' in this context. Jump forward to 2019, and Disney purchased 20th Century Fox and all of its copyrighted properties, including parts of Marvel. Since then, fans have been waiting to see when - not if, when - we would see the return of the X-Men. It has been hinted at for quite some time, but none of it has really been a part of the MCU as we know it. There is a show coming in 2023 titled X-Men '97, which is a continuation of much-loved animated show, but it has been announced that this show actually won't take place within the MCU. Additionally, the appearance of Patrick Stewart as Professor Xavier in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness got us closer again, but that event took place within a timeline that, again, wasn't a part of the main MCU. And so it fell to the final episode of Ms. Marvel to actually confirm the return proper of the X-Men to the main MCU timeline. Towards the end of episode, Bruno tells Kamala that he has been doing more tests on her blood to find out why she has discovered these powers, to which he explains "Kamala, there is something different in your genes" and goes on to say... Yep, he used the big M word! That is followed by that awesome X-Men musical sting, but Kamala just brushes it off as another label she'll have to deal with. Which... yeah, fair. With recent discussions about potential casting within the X-Men - including a frontrunner for the new Wolverine - Disney is clearly getting all of its pieces in place for the full-on return of the mutants. Having this revelation followed up by the out-of-nowhere appearance of Brie Larson as Captain Marvel (as well as the sudden disappearance of Ms. Marvel) was a great one-two punch, but at least we'll know when we'll definitely be seeing those two again. The Marvels arrives in Irish cinemas on 28 July 2023.