In many ways, discussing the power levels of comic book characters has always been something of a futile endeavor for fans of the medium due to the inconsistencies that different writers, stories, and character preferences have imposed upon its characters. However, while it's fun to argue for hours on end over which character could defeat which other character, sometimes the answer is just plain as day.

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When a character has the power to destroy an entire planet for instance, it's hard to argue that pretty much anyone could take them down, and with all the recent information about X-Men: Dark Phoenix coming to light, what better time to take a closer look at the most powerful mutants the Marvel Universe has to offer? So let's get started! Here are 15 Overpowered Mutants That Could Easily Destroy The World.

15 STORM

Kicking off the list is Storm, whose raw power is one of the most overlooked in the entire X-Men roster, often overshadowed by the ever-expanding Summers/Grey family who seem to constantly rear their heads and demand the spotlight. While many would argue that Storm’s powers are limited to her location, Storm has demonstrated the ability in stories such as Rogue Storm to create worldwide tempests that put the entire planet in peril when she gets whipped up into a rage-filled frenzy.

Something else that’s frequently ignored regarding Storm’s powers is that she doesn’t simply summon tornados and lightning storms out of thin air, her power actually manifests itself as the ability to sense and manipulate energy at a sub-atomic level, essentially giving her control over the fabric of nature itself. Storm has even shown the potential to control electromagnetic energy too, which is one the four fundamental forces holding the Universe together.

Needless to say, Storm is a mutant whose power has not yet reached its full potential, and it’s frightening to consider the destructive capabilities she could subject the world to if she truly felt like it. Good thing she’s on our side.

14 MAGNETO

Another character with the ability to control electromagnetism, Magneto is one of the most imposing villains in all of comic books for a reason. His power over magnetism and metal give him an incredibly versatile skill set, allowing him to wreak havoc on as small or large a scale as he wishes. He can kill someone by manipulating the metallic salts in their body for instance, but could also tear up an entire bridge and toss it aside without breaking a sweat.

The extent of Magneto’s power appears to have almost no limits though, as the size or weight of an object doesn’t seem to be a limiting factor for him. He recently reversed the poles of the Earth in X-Men: Apocalypse to create widespread destruction for example, and that’s despite being the slightly nerfed silver-screen version of the character. At his best, Magneto could possibly even tear the iron core from the center of the planet, or even push Earth out of orbit, essentially dooming us all.

As if all of this wasn’t enough, Magneto has even managed to create pocket wormholes in the past, adding a whole new wrinkle to the potential of his abilities.

13 ICEMAN

Iceman is another hero whose powers have vastly increased over the course of the character’s history. Starting out as a young, snowball-throwing mutant, Iceman’s powers have come a long, long way since then.

Able to create ice on command by freezing moisture in the air, Iceman is far from just a glorified fridge-freezer. As well as being able to construct weapons, shields and pretty much whatever the occasion calls for out of ice, Iceman can also flash freeze anything in his path, and that’s still barely scratching the surface of this character’s capabilities. His ability to exist as pure ice basically renders him both immortal and omnipresent, allowing him to exist as thousands of snowflakes over a large surface area and reconstruct his form out of similar substances. Perhaps the most insane of all his powers however, is the ability to create semi-sentient ice creatures with powers similar to his own. This means Iceman can create an entire army of clones that could disperse across the planet freezing pretty much everything in their path. In short, he’s essentially the God of ice.

12 X-MAN

Created in the Age of Apocalypse timeline, Nate Grey (also known as X-Man) was created by Apocalypse to be the most powerful mutant in existence, so it stands to reason that he’s got some pretty intense abilities under his belt. As well as being a top-tier telekinetic, X-Man has incredibly powerful psychokinetic blasts, the ability to traverse the astral plane at his will, precognition, cross-dimensional travel and a whole host of other powers, too.

X-Man has pulled off some impressive feats throughout his career, even managing to use his telekinesis to bend the magnetic field of the Earth; an incredibly dangerous power when you consider that this field protects the planet from all kinds of nasty space radiation. In fact, X-Man is so dangerous that scientist Moira MacTaggert compared the potency of his psionic abilities to that of a Phoenix Force-powered Jean Grey.

11 MAGIK

Magik’s mutant power is the ability to teleport across time and space using an extra-dimensional plane known as the Limbo Dimension, which while cool, doesn’t exactly seem like the most incredible power on the surface. Magik’s interactions with the Limbo Dimension have significantly widened her pool of skills however, as she’s become an extremely capable wielder of magic as a result, even becoming the Sorceress Supreme of Limbo at one point. Being one of the most dangerous and unpredictable forces in the Marvel Universe, magic is a force that has the potential not only to destroy the world, but reality itself, and Magik has that kind of power right at her fingertips.

Magik’s constant hopping between dimensions combined with her magical ability poses a very real threat to the Marvel Universe, as she potentially has the power to release the demons of the Limbo Dimension on Earth, which given Magik’s tendency to tap into her dark side and turn just a little bit evil, is a very real possibility.

10 PROTEUS

Son of scientist Moira MacTaggert, Kevin MacTaggert - later known as Proteus - is one of the most profoundly powerful mutants to exist in the mainstream Marvel Universe. With an overwhelming hunger for energy, Proteus is able to possess others, burning out their energy and killing them in the process.

Proteus also has the power to warp reality at his will, essentially allowing him to create and transmute any set of conditions he can imagine, within reason. Reversing gravity and creating earthquakes, as well as other destructive applications of this power, are par for the course with Proteus – but this is only a small taste of the mutant’s true potential. His ability to transmute organic matter at his will is almost limitless, theoretically allowing him to artificially create the conditions that would cause a nuclear explosion – or perhaps even worse.

9 HOPE SUMMERS

Another one of the Summers/Grey family, it’s no surprise that Hope Summers is an extremely important (and powerful) mutant in the X-Men continuity. Hope’s mutant ability is similar to Rogue’s, allowing her to mimic the powers of other mutants and superpowered beings, essentially giving her the ability to do anything her fellow teammates can do, some of whom are powerful enough to have already appeared on this list.

Raised by a time-hopping Cable, Hope’s childhood sees her evading capture from a group of “prophets” of sorts, who indicate that her future self could become a harbinger of destruction for humanity, while others – namely the X-Men – think the exact opposite. Although the extent of Hope’s ability has not been fully realized yet, her status as the Jesus (or Antichrist, depending on who you ask) of mutantkind indicates that Hope’s future self will display an incredible amount of power, though whether that power will be used to save or destroy humanity remains to be seen.

Perhaps the ultimate proof of Hope’s growing strength however is her connection to the Phoenix Force, which only tends to seek out the most powerful beings in the Marvel Universe – though this never seems to end well for its host or the people surrounding them.

8 QUENTIN QUIRE

Also known as Kid Omega, Quentin Quire is an on-again off-again member of the X-Men and general angsty teen with a rebellious streak. Not quite the best temperament for someone with such a dangerous set of gifts. Another highly skilled telepath, Quentin Quire also has telekinetic and psionic powers, and can even create shotguns, rifles, explosives and other weapons from the psychic energy he produces.

What truly separates Quentin from the dozens of other telepaths in the Marvel Universe though, is the fact that he can process ten million individual thoughts per second – meaning he can think at a rate faster than the speed of light. Coupled with his ability to create fully realized psychic worlds run by AI, Quentin could use his ever-increasing power to entrap the entire planet in a simulation, leaving the real world to deteriorate around them. It’s also worth mentioning that if you die in these simulations, you also die in reality, leaving whoever is unfortunate enough to be trapped in one of these AI worlds completely at the mercy of Quentin.

Oh, and he’s also been shown to be another potential host for the Phoenix Force, so there’s that.

7 MISTER M

One of the more obscure mutants in X-Men canon, it’s strange that Mister M never got more of a spotlight given his tremendous, almost God-like set of powers. What powers are those exactly? Well, pretty much all of them.

Mister M can manipulate energy to create fire blasts, lightning bolts and other similar things, and has a near endless list of other skills too, including telekinesis, psionic manipulation, super strength, enhancement or depletion of other mutant’s superpowers, intangibility, technopathy, healing, reality warping and sub-atomic manipulation. While you could take your pick of methods in which Mister M could destroy the world, one of the most unique ways he could achieve this is his ability to create and even evolve lesser life forms. Just imagine Mister M creating a whole new race of Brood-like creatures and over time, nurturing them to eventually take over the planet. Sure, it’s not as instantaneous as other world-ending powers on this list, but it’s still a worrying thought.

Luckily for everyone Mister M tends to keep to himself, and appears to have a cool demeanor and a relatively good heart, otherwise the X-Men could be dealing with one of the most dangerous mutants to ever exist.

6 APOCALYPSE

Aptly named, Apocalypse has long reigned as one of the X-Men’s greatest foes due to his myriad of top-tier mutant abilities and hunger for world domination. Further imbued with power through Celestial technology, Apocalypse’s powers include telepathy and telekinesis (does every superhuman have these powers?), super strength, immortality, invulnerability and energy manipulation.

One of Apocalypse’s most frequently used abilities though is molecular manipulation, allowing him to build or dismantle anything he desires at a molecular level, enabling him to vaporize pretty much anything in his path. In fact, the only reason Apocalypse hasn’t destroyed the world yet is because he’d rather rule it as a cruel God than destroy it outright. He actually manages to achieve this in the Age of Apocalypse timeline too, ruling the planet with an iron first, destroying all of those he considers too weak to survive (which naturally means all humans and a large number of mutants).

While Apocalypse hasn’t destroyed the Earth just yet however, he could easily live up to his namesake in the future in a whole host of nasty ways, but it’s more than likely he’d simply dismantle the planet at a molecular level.

5 LEGION

David Haller, often referred to as Legion, is the son of X-Men co-founder Professor X, and also happens to be the focus of the recent superhero TV show Legion. An incredibly volatile mutant, Legion has dissociative identity disorder, giving him several distinct identities that are each able to use a different power. While the stability and potency of David’s powers tend to fluctuate due to circumstance, at the height of his power David is shown to have dozens upon dozens of different personas to occupy.

As a result, Legion has far too many powers to list here, but some of the highlights include hypnosis, pyrokinesis (as well as the obligatory telepathy and telekinesis), transmutation, reality warping, control over gravity, the ability to open wormholes and time manipulation. The last two of these powers alone are capable enough of destroying Earth; in fact, Legion once managed to use his powers to erase the existence of the Elder Gods, resulting in the Universe reverting back to a state in which the Elder Gods had yet to appear on Earth.

There are limits to Legion’s powers, as he’s only able to use the abilities of the persona he’s currently embodying, but the instability of David’s mind and the sheer scope of some of his powers are enough to make him a very viable threat to the planet.

4 VULCAN

The younger brother of fellow mutants Cyclops and Havok, Vulcan’s mutant ability is similar to that of his siblings, as he can absorb and project various different forms of energy; although his power is much more potent than that of his brothers.

In fact, Vulcan is one of only a small handful of mutants to be considered “beyond Omega-level,” with his energy manipulation abilities posing an extremely large threat to the X-Men. Not only is Vulcan powerful enough to emit nuclear-level blasts, solidify energy into constructs and create force fields, he even been shown to siphon the powers of characters such as Marvel Girl in the past, enabling him to use them for himself.

Given that Vulcan has the raw power to toss the other X-Men round like ragdolls, it wouldn’t exactly be hard for him to siphon the abilities of even the most powerful of the X-Men, gaining their powers and using them against the planet they call home.

3 MATTHEW MALLOY

Still a mysterious character in the X-Men Universe, Matthew Malloy is said to have been the strongest power source that Cerebro ever registered, which is a huge feat considering the other mutants already on this list.

Still a relatively unknown quantity, Matthew’s powers are seemingly similar to others on this list, energy generation, matter manipulation, reality warping and space-time manipulation, but the level of Matthew’s power seems to be a cut above the rest of the mutants on Earth, and he’s made even more dangerous by the fact that he has little to no control over his powers.

Matthew Malloy is such a colossal threat to the planet that even Professor X had to break his code of morals by using his telepathic powers to suppress his abilities, effectively lobotomizing him. While this seems harsh, Matthew ultimately ended up causing many problems for the X-Men, his presence resulting in the deaths of Emma Frost, Cyclops, Magik as well as many others, forcing Tempus to go back in time and ensure he was never born in the first place. But who knows? With Matthew Malloy’s control over space-time, who’s to say he’s not still floating around out there somewhere…

2 FRANKLIN RICHARDS

Franklin Richards is ridiculously overpowered.

The son of Fantastic Four members Sue Storm and Reed Richards, Franklin Richards is basically a God in the body of a child. With vast psionic powers, molecular manipulation and astral projection under his belt, Franklin’s greatest power is the ability to make pretty much every single one of his desires come to fruition through his incredibly powerful reality warping powers. I know, reality warping has appeared several times on this list already, but Franklin is on a whole other level compared to any other mutant with similar abilities, as he’s able to use this power on a cosmic scale. The Celestials have even claimed his power is on par with - if not greater - than their own, with Franklin having managed to will entire new universes into existence on occasion.

It’s also worth noting that Franklin is still a child, which is particularly worrying considering he’s not entirely emotionally developed yet – let’s just hope he doesn’t have a rebellious teen phase in which he summons a singularity to swallow the Earth whole.

1 JEAN GREY

Jean Grey is one of the most beloved yet feared mutants in the world, and she’s definitely earned that reputation. The quintessential telepath, Jean’s unsurpassed telepathic and telekinetic abilities soon drew the attention of the Phoenix Force - perhaps the most destructive primal force in the entire Marvel Universe - which attached itself to Jean, giving her God-like powers and a temper to match.

Making the powers of some other mutants on this list look downright trivial, the Phoenix Force can dismantle anything at a molecular level, and can absorb and project energy on a near limitless scale, easily able to consume the energy of an entire sun. Not only this, the Phoenix Force can manipulate cosmic energies, allowing it to create and destroy parts of the Universe as it pleases, and can even drain the potential energy of unborn beings, basically denying their future existence by stealing their life force and using it as a weapon.

During the famed Dark Phoenix Saga, a Phoenix-imbued Jean goes as far as consuming a star, resulting in the demise of billions of innocent people, so there’s definitely no question that Jean could destroy Earth in the blink of an eye.

Did we miss any of your favorite overpowered mutants? Let us know in the comments below!