Will Patrick Stewart return to MCU as Professor X? Exploring theories of his return with X-Men after cameo in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Professor X has been a critical character in the Marvel Universe as the leader of the X-Men. The powerful psychic mind of Professor Charles Xavier has defeated several foes from mysterious worlds and hence created and trained gifted mutants from across the universe to be a force to protect their reality.

Note: This article contains major spoilers!

With his recent outing in Marvel Studios' Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, fans of the MCU went wild watching Patrick Stewart appear in his yellow wheelchair, a direct ode to the classic X-Men comics. The film also introduced followers to the Illuminati, a secret organization built by Doctor Strange and Tony Stark of Earth-818.

The Illuminati consisted of members such as Karl Mordo (Chiwetel Ejiofor), Captain Carter (Hayley Atwell), Maria Rambeau/Captain Marvel (Lashana Lynch), Black Bolt (Anson Mount), and Mr. Fantastic (John Krasinski). The organization's purpose was to prevent incursions, a phenomenon caused when two universes merge and destroy one another, ticked by a Doctor Strange of another universe.

However, even after Mordo decided to eliminate Doctor Strange and America Chavez, who dropped to Earth-818 from Earth-616 after they fought Wanda and opened a portal, Charles saw the good in Strange. He decided to give them a fighting chance, which Strange did not expect.

But before both could have an in-depth word about it, Earth-818's Wanda started wreaking havoc after being controlled by The Scarlet Witch on Earth-616, who was residing in the Wundagore Mountains. Wanda began battling members of the Illuminate one by one, thus eliminating them all.

One member who almost went to control Wanda's mind was Charles Xavier, who The Scarlet Witch also killed after a while. As a result, fans were shocked to see the death of all the multiversal characters they had been waiting for, especially Professor X.

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Will Patrick Stewart return to the MCU as Professor X?

Patrick Stewart has graced the screen several times for pop culture fanatics in Star Trek and X-Men. The roles he portrays become his signature, and he defines the character and their origins.

With his role as Charles Xavier/Professor X, Stewart has been quite outspoken about his cameo in Doctor Strange in The Multiverse of Madness even before its release.

However, the Earth-616 version of Professor X did not have a similar yellow wheelchair to his Earth-818 version, which is closer to comic origins.

Before Disney acquired 20th Century Fox, MCU films did not have the right to use the word Mutants or X-Men. They referred to Wanda Maximoff in the MCU as "The Enhanced," first heard in Avengers: Age of Ultron.

But ever since the arrival of 20th Century Studios' X-Men and Mutants universe, Marvel Studios' Kevin Feige has been curious and excited to introduce them in the MCU. He finally took the shot after Evan Peters' Quicksilver made a cameo in WandaVision.

The subsequent arrival from the X-Men universe was of Professor X in the MCU, and the only way they did this was in the multiverse. However, it lasted only a short while, gaining significant fan reactions.

After the film, when Patrick Stewart was asked after the world premiere about a future possibility of his role as Professor X in the MCU movies, he said:

"Charles Xavier? Yeah. There may be. You know, the whole X-Men comic series is so huge, so vast, there might be an opportunity in which he comes back. We'll see."

This strongly hints that Professor X of Earth-616 or any other multiverse can make a potential return to the MCU. Patrick seems enthusiastic about his reprisal of the role and wishes to continue playing Charles Xavier in several MCU films.