Rogue X-Men: Who She Is and Who Plays Her

Rogue is the codename of Marie, a teenage mutant played by Anna Paquin, whose skin contact drains the powers and life force of whoever she touches. The films credit her as Rogue in X-Men (2000), X2 and X-Men: Days of Future Past, and as Marie / Rogue in X-Men: The Last Stand. She is one of the central X-Men characters, even if her screen time is shared with a large ensemble.

What is Rogue's power in X-Men? She absorbs, and the cost lands on the other person. In the opening act of X-Men (2000), directed by Bryan Singer, a kiss puts her boyfriend into a coma, and that is the reason she runs away from home. The power is a danger to everyone near her, so it works a little like a live wire in a house: people know where it is and nobody can lean on it.

What is Rogue's backstory? The films keep it lean. She is a runaway who meets the drifter Logan in Canada, and the pair are attacked by Sabretooth before two X-Men take them to Xavier's school for gifted mutants. Her story on screen begins with that kiss and her flight from home.

Is Rogue good or bad in X-Men? She is a hero. She becomes a student at the school, and the villains of the saga treat her as a target or a tool rather than an ally.

Who plays Rogue? Anna Paquin plays her in all four films. She is billed seventh in X-Men (2000), twelfth in X2 (2003), sixth in X-Men: The Last Stand (2006, directed by Brett Ratner) and ninth in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014). Singer directed the 2000, 2003 and 2014 films. The full ensemble is on the X-Men cast page, and the X-Men movies in order guide shows where each of her films sits.

Rogue's most important relationship on screen is with Logan, and it begins in the first act of X-Men (2000). He is the drifter she meets in Canada, the man who tries to bring her home from the train station, and the one who gives up some of his healing power to save her. In X2 he is again the person who gets her out of the raid on the school. Hugh Jackman plays Logan, and you can follow his own arc on the Wolverine X-Men page.

Mystique, played by Rebecca Romijn in the first three Rogue films, is an enemy in her story. Is Rogue the daughter of Mystique? The movies do not present them that way: in X-Men (2000), Mystique disguises herself as Bobby to trick Rogue into leaving the school. More about her sits on the Mystique X-Men page.

Magneto, played by Ian McKellen, sees her as a power source, and the Magneto page covers why that plan fails. Cyclops and Storm, who rescue her and Logan, become her allies, and Storm is the one who leads the school at the end of The Last Stand. Xavier, played by Patrick Stewart, heads the school that takes her in, and the Professor X page covers his role.

Among her peers, Bobby Drake (Iceman, played by Shawn Ashmore in X2) and John Allerdyce (Pyro, played by Aaron Stanford) travel with her and Wolverine out of the raid. What about Gambit? He appears in the films as Remy LeBeau, played by Taylor Kitsch, in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, where he takes Logan to Stryker's island facility.

In my opinion, the train station scene in X-Men (2000) is the best thing Rogue gets to do. She has been tricked into leaving by Mystique's Bobby, Logan finds her and tries to bring her home, and Magneto steps in before she can decide. It works because the danger arrives at the moment she is most alone. It could be argued that it also sets the pattern for her whole arc, where somebody else keeps deciding what her power is for.

Second is the Statue of Liberty finish, where Logan gives her some of his healing power. Her gift is to take, and this is the one beat where she is on the receiving end. Perhaps that is why it lands harder than the machine itself.

Third is the Boston stop in X2. When police turn on the group at Iceman's family home, the mutant conflict arrives at a family's doorstep, and the students look like kids caught in a news story. Rogue is one of them, and the film says everything it needs to about her without a line of backstory.

Last, and quietest, is her decision in The Last Stand to stay on as a student. After a film about a cure and a battle on Alcatraz, a teenager choosing to remain at the school is a small beat, but it answers the question her first scene asked, which was whether she could belong anywhere. For where her films sit in the wider story, the X-Men timeline puts them in order.