10 Most Disturbing X-Men Villains

3. Phalanx

The fear of the unknown has been guiding science-fiction pretty much since the genre's inception, and when it comes to the X-Men, there's no foe that really exemplifies that fear more than the Phalanx.

Introduced in the nineties but only recently made truly scary in last year's House of X/Powers of X, the Phalanx are a cybernetic alien species developed and controlled through a sole artificial intelligence. They expand across the universe as they please, consuming all in an unending quest for knowledge.

In HOX/POX, the Phalanx come to Earth 1,000 years in the future, having been summoned by a being known as the 'librarian', a member of the post-human society that now rules the planet. The librarian wishes for his fellow synthetics to transcend their physical state, existing only as a part of the Phalanx hive mind beyond the confines of time and space.

HOX/POX was a phenomenal read, and it excelled particularly well when it came to its dystopian depictions of the future. The Phalanx and Homo-novissima (the name given to the synthetic beings who evolve past Homo-sapien and Homo-superior), represent a terrifying end for humanity's evolution - one I'm sure no one will be rushing to in a hurry.