WARNING: This article contains spoilers for Uncanny X-Men #3, by Matthew Rosenburg, Kelly Thompson, Ed Brisson, Yildray Cinar, Rachelle Rosenburg and VC’s Joe Caramagna, out now.

When the home, school and headquarters of the X-Men gets destroyed, you know things have gotten serious. That seems to be the trope with Marvel’s premier team of mutant heroes anyway, as over the years the X-Mansion in its various forms has been blown up, trampled, punched apart and obliterated so many times that you wonder how much they’ve spent on building contractors since the 1960s. Much like when the Watcher used to show up in a storyline (Rest in Cosmic Peace, Uatu), showing the X-Mansion getting decimated is a surefire way to raise the stakes.

The latest example just happened in Uncanny X-Men #3, which begins with a violent protest on the front lawn of the mansion, and ends with the arrival of the Horsemen of Peace. These strange, new figures don’t exactly live up to their name, however, seeing as the first thing they do is blow up the mansion in their effort to “end the X-Men.” That brings to mind perhaps the second reason the mutant school gets destroyed so often: as a symbol of change. This is a relaunch of Uncanny X-Men, so the mansion getting destroyed is a good way to symbolize a shift in the status quo for the teams, and allows new writers to shake things up in a way that feels organic to the story. As you look back through the multiple times this has happened over the years, you find that the same can be said for a lot of those occasions too.

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The first time the X-Men lost their home was in 1982, in Uncanny X-Men #154. The building had sustained damage before that, of course, but its was the first time the mansion was completely destroyed. Despite that, the event was perhaps not given the gravitas it deserved, but to writer Chris Claremont’s credit, it did take nearly 10 issues to begin rebuilding, which was a long time in 1982. In the issue, Corsair -- space-pirate father of Cyclops and Havok -- returns to Earth pursued by Sidrian hunters, his ship crashes into the mansion’s pond, explodes, and in the ensuing battle, the entire school is leveled.

The building is finally repaired in Issue 164, and thankfully would stand for another 79 issues, until 1989’s Uncanny X-Men #243, when the “Inferno” event was sweeping through the Marvel Universe. The mansion wasn’t being used by the X-Men at the time, but Mr. Sinister had set a trap for the team (and X-Factor) at their former school. As they all argued, the school around them suddenly exploded, and Mr. Sinister was free to pick at the wreckage. Despite the trope being potentially overused at that point, the moment was a legitimate surprise and was used to heighten the threat of Sinister and the importance of "Inferno."

NEXT PAGE: The X-Mansion Gets Destroyed ... Off-Panel?

Much as the destruction of the mansion can signify a great change in the comics, so can showing it rebuilt. That’s why, in 1991's X-Men #1 (aka the bestselling comic-book of all time), the mansion was new again, and it would be more than 10 years before we would see it destroyed. Well, perhaps “see” is the wrong word, because the next time the destruction occurs off-panel. Maybe it was a miscommunication, but in Grant Morrison and Phil Jimenez’s New X-Men #146 from 2003, it’s revealed that Magneto has been disguised as the mutant Xorn, but when the issue ends the Xavier Institute was very much intact. Throughout the “Planet X” storyline, we never actually see Magneto destroy the school, but New X-Men #155 depicts Scott and Emma looking out over the ruins of the Xavier Institute, firmly resolved to rebuild the dream together.

It wouldn’t be long before that dream (or the home they keep it in) would be reduced to rubble again, however. In 2005’s Astonishing X-Men #9, Joss Whedon and John Cassaday had barely begun their run when the Danger Room came to life and drove a Blackbird through the mansion. Seeing as it was only two years (in our time, which must be like six weeks in comics time, right?), Wolverine even jokes about how often this happens. “Next time, guys,” he says, “we should just rebuild this place out of LEGO.”

They don’t listen to him, though, because it’s only another three years before it happens yet again. This time, during the “Messiah Complex” storyline, the mutants were being guarded by Sentinel Squad O.N.E. due to their new status as an endangered species following M-Day in which Scarlet Witch whispered “No More Mutants,” and all but 198 individuals completely lost their mutant DNA). Suddenly, however, the Sentinel guards turned on the mutants and punched their way through the mansion, trying to kill them all.

Surprisingly enough, the X-Men take the hint, and not only leave the mansion a pile of rubble and regret, but they also move out of Westchester, New York, raising Magneto’s old Asteroid M orbital base from the bottom of San Francisco Bay and setting up shop there. They lived without a mansion for a few years, actually, coming to the conclusion that an old satellite would be a better and safer place to teach kids than the accident-prone mansion they’d only just managed to survive in up until then. Crazy. Wolverine couldn’t accept it, though, and following a "Schism" in the team, he left Utopia (the new name for Asteroid M) and rebuilt a school in Westchester, naming it the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning

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Despite being built on ground partially made up of the grandchild of Krakoa, the Island That Walks Like a Man, and despite surviving a trip to Limbo, and despite, you know, being a mansion that the X-Men live in, this is the version of the school that exists today, after if it was returned from Limbo and placed in Central Park. Well, existed, anyway. Thanks to Uncanny X-Men #3 and the inaccurately named Horsemen of Peace, the X-Mansion has been destroyed once again. This is another period of change for the mutants, however, so while it’s true that they’ll always need a place to live, teach and, inevitably, fight, when they will rebuild, where they’ll put it and in what form it will take are all questions that we’ll have to wait to find out. If history’s taught us anything, however, maybe they shouldn’t unpack right away.