Top 5 Costumes: Nightcrawler



Bamf! There are many characters we have a deep fondest for that we get really excited over covering in our Comic Closet features, more so than others. Our favorite blue elf definitely falls into that category. He may not have been one of the original X-Men, but he made his first appearance during the teams Renaissance in Giant Size X-Men #1 with several other greats. Ever since then he has been in our hearts, while coincidentally always being the heart and conscience of the X-Men. As with all of the X-Men, he has gone through many costumes over his lustrous career as a superhero. Of course not all were great costumes, there were some misses along the way (one of which we feature below as our Dishonorable Mention of the week), but in majority we liked much of what he wore. However, for two of our favorites we had to dig a little deeper, outside of the normal 616 Marvel Universe. We pulled our top five from his collection and present it for your viewing below. As always feel free to let us know what your top picks for Nightcrawler are in the comments below. Bamf!

5. Age of Apocalypse: This is the first costume we met the Age of Apocalypse version of Nightcrawler in. The costume is fairly plain, even more so than most of his other. We like the basic black suit, and then find ourselves more mixed on the red metal sheathing. The shoulder pads and knee/shin guards actually work well together, but the wrist guards are just to big and come to that hideous point.

4. Excalibur: Armored looks for characters that don’t need armor typically bother us. In this case it luckily isn’t over done. The red chest plate is definitely more aesthetic than function, but we think it actually looks very good, especially turning into a semi X. The shoulder plates are a bit much (they almost look like boomerangs), but they’re not enough to turn us off on this suit.

3. AoA Uncanny X-Force: We’re always big fans of the basic black and white Uncanny X-Force uniforms, but especially for Nightcrawler. Whether it is the darker Age of Apocalypse Nightcrawler or even the 616 kinder, gentler one, it actually fits the character well. His powers complement the shadows well and this works perfectly for his stealth approach.

2. Uncanny X-Men: When Nightcrawler took over as the leader of the Uncanny X-Men, he received this new costume. Like his original, this costume has very clean lines. We like that they kept his white, black, and red, but played with them is different percentages. We are always up for an X logo on the character’s costume. His being right in the middle of his chest just works perfectly to pull everything together.

1. Original: Nightcrawler’s top costume always had to be his original. It is iconic, at least as long as he’s wearing it. If Wolverine, in his grief over Nightcrawler’s death, painted his face blue and wore this, it might be a tad awkward. After coming back from the dead, Nightcrawler even started wearing it again just because it is that awesome. The costume has a superhero look to it, but it still is a very personal costume for the character, paying homage to his time in the circus before he joined the X-Men. Even the extended, pointed shoulders which we typically are not fond of just work for this character. We’re sure there will be another costume redesign at some point soon as it seems the X-Men receive new costumes for Christmas, but we’re sure it wouldn’t be long until he was wearing this once again.

Dishonorable Mention

Lightning Force: What could possibly be worse than a Nazi version of Nightcrawler? Well the costume Nazi Nightcrawler is wearing. Coming out of a universe where the Nazi’s one WWII, Nightcrawler decided to go for a more regal look. Is he a super villain? Is he a duke? We’re not quite sure, but either way it’s terrible. That sash is pretty sporty along with those slick sunglasses, together they invoke a feeling that we can’t quite pinpoint. Oh wait, that’s revolution. This is one instance where we wish Nightcrawler could just BAMF this suit away, preferably into a volcano or something just as horrible.