Emplate may not be the most famous X-Men villain, but what he lacks in notoriety he more than makes up for in terror.
Another nightmare from the nineties, Emplate served as a key antagonist of Generation X and is disturbing solely for the fact he has mouth hands. Like, he literally has mouths where his palms should be, and, as anyone who's ever read Sandman will tell you, characters who have mouths where other body parts should be (i.e., the Corinthian) are horrifying.
Emplate adds an even more frightening twist on the old 'mouths-where-they-shouldn't-be' trope though, because he uses them to feed on the bone marrow of other mutants in order to stay maintain his physical existence. If he doesn't, he'll disappear into a realm where he gets tortured forever, so you can understand his desperation to chow down on mutant marrow when the chance arises.
Still though... mouth-palms? That's gotta be up there with what, the top five worst mutations ever?
WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well.
In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.
