The "Ms. Marvel" Finale May Have Opened the Door For the X-Men

The season finale of "Ms. Marvel" is packed with big showdowns and equally big revelations, but one of the most important moments of all is hidden away in a single bit of dialogue. Following the finale, the question on everyone's mind is: is Kamala Khan actually a member of the X-Men?

The reveal comes near the end of the finale, after the final battle has wrapped up. Bruno pulls Kamala aside to give her an update that throws a new wrinkle into the mystery behind her powers. He's taken a closer look at her DNA, and while her family connection still plays a role in her access to superpowers, it seems like her particular abilities are linked to something else, which he calls "a mutation." Kamala brushes it off as "just another label," but sharp-eared viewers will recognize the music that plays over his line: the theme music from the '90s animated "X-Men" series.

The X-Men hint is particularly interesting given Kamala's comic-book origins. In the Marvel comics, Kamala is not a member of the X-Men but has Inhuman origins. Inhumans have their latent powers awakened when they come into contact with the Terrigen Mist, a process called Terrigenesis.

Over the past several years, the Inhumans have appeared in several Marvel properties. In 2017, ABC aired the first (and only) season of "Inhumans," a TV show following the "royal family" of the Inhumans. The longest-running Inhuman storyline in the MCU so far comes from "Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.," in which hacker-turned-hero Skye (aka Daisy Johnson) is exposed to the Mists, gains powers, and unlocks several years' worth of battles involving both good and evil Inhumans.

If "Ms. Marvel" is following the comics storyline closely, then Kamala should be picking up the reins of the Inhumans storyline for the next phase.

This X-Men Easter egg in the "Ms. Marvel" season finale seems to suggest they're going in a slightly different direction with the Inhumans storyline.

Prior to 2019, Marvel Studios didn't have the film rights to X-Men because they were licensed to 20th Century Fox. As a result, Marvel had to create different backstories when using characters like Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver, who are X-Men in the comics.

With Disney's acquisition of Fox, Marvel regained the rights to the X-Men. Since then, however, the X-Men have barely been a blip on the radar in the MCU, with the most notable reference being an alternate-universe version of Patrick Stewart's Professor X appearing in "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness."

This hint in "Ms. Marvel" seems to suggest that a new version of the X-Men isn't too far away after all, and we can't wait to see what happens!