10 Best Superhero Movie Theme Songs

Michael Kamen's score for the first X-Men film was good, but it didn't quite have enough of a heroic edge to it; it felt more like the score to a sci-fi film rather than a superhero movie. For X2, John Ottman came on board and crafted an entirely new score and theme that proved to be a much better fit for the franchise.

Though still perhaps not as iconic as the theme song to the 90s cartoon series, the theme to X2 brings a similar but more cinematic sense of energy. It perfectly matches up with the whirlwind opening credits that begin Bryan Singer's entries to the franchise, pumping you up for the movie as it begins.

Sadly, the theme didn't seem to stick at first. John Powell came on board for The Last Stand and provided a solid but ultimately unmemorable new theme, and who even remembers any of the music from X-Men Origins: Wolverine? Henry Jackman's score for First Class was pretty good, but in the end it's a score perfect for only that movie specifically; it wouldn't have worked too well with an X-Men film set in the present day.

Thankfully, when Bryan Singer came back to the franchise with Days of Future Past, so did John Ottman. The theme was restored and revamped for the 2014 film and its 2016 sequel Apocalypse, but the original version from X2 is still the first and the best interpretation of this theme.