Thus, by the time that she begins her superhero adventures, Storm has known what it is like to be worshiped and despised. She knows what it’s like to command the winds with a thought and what it’s like to go hungry, not knowing when her next meal will come. She’s experienced American racism, solidarity with her people, and the hatred towards mutants.
That alone makes Storm one of the most complex characters in her class, even when she’s just one of several characters being developed in the 1970s. Claremont quickly realized Storm’s potential and moved her to the front, letting her take a leadership position initially alongside Cyclops, and then in his place when he retires after the Dark Phoenix Saga. In that time, Storm repeatedly demonstrates the expanse of her powers and the depth of her compassion. She’s one of the few characters to silence Wolverine, who was written as a far more feral and untamable person in the ’70s, with just a word, and she would regularly retire to her attic bedroom to care for her plants.
The ability to control the weather easily makes Storm an Omega-Level mutant, among the most powerful on Earth. And yet, some of her best stories don’t involve her powers and occur during the period when a battle with Rogue, initially a villain, left her powerless: she defeats Callisto to take leadership of the Morlocks, she beats Cyclops to remain team leader, and her soul-searching period alone with Forge during the Life-Death stories. Even her more recent best stories don’t emphasize her powers. When she relocated to Mars in the pages of X-Men: Red, she lived along the mutants of Arakko, a group far more powerful than those on Earth, and it was her character that allowed her to lead them, not her strength.
Almost none of that shows up in any of the X-Men movies so far. Sure, Berry’s Storm conjures some tornados, and yes, Shipp’s Storm is a street thief. But they serve such minor roles in the stories that we would forget them, were it not for a few terrible lines of dialogue.
All of which makes Boyd’s casting so interesting. She’s not coming off of a buzzy Netflix show or a hit indie horror film, so Boyd’s receiving less attention than her casemates Sadie Sink, Kit Connor, and Inde Navarrette. In fact, X-Men marks Boyd’s screen debut, after acclaimed runs on stage in Merrily We Roll Along and & Juliet. However, this isn’t the first time an unknown actor with a strong stage background was cast in an X-Men movie, and that worked out pretty great for Hugh Jackman and Wolverine.
Still, the biggest question isn’t with Boyd’s acting. It’s with the abilities of director Jake Schreier and screenwriters Joanna Calo, Lee Sung Jin, and Michael Lesslie. If they can even gesture at the power of Storm, at her strength and vulnerability, then they’ll do better than any of the X-Men films we’ve had so far. And if they can match any of the heights of her best stories, then the MCU X-Men may be the best look at Marvel’s mutants the movie-going public has ever seen.
