Art by the Marvel vs. Capcom 2 Team
- Name: Elizabeth Braddock
- Code Names: Psylocke, Captain Britain
- First Appearance: Captain Britain #8 (1978)
- Powers: Telepathy, Telekinesis, the ability to teleport though shadows on occasion
- Teams Affiliation: STRIKE, RCX, X-Men, Exiles, X-Force
About
The X-Men have always been closely related to the adolescent experience and few things are more crucial to those years of self-discovery than understanding one’s self-identity. The teenage experience is all about discovering your role, your place in life, and no character in the X-Men canon accentuates that struggle than Betsy Braddock. Betsy has been an heiress, a pilot, a supermodel, a spy, a hero, a ninja, and a lover. She has bounced around trying to discover her sense of self for years and that conflict has made Psylocke one of the most engaging character to stay on Greymalkin Lane.
Portrayed by Olivia Munn in X-Men Apocalypse
Technically Portrayed by Meiling Melançon in X-Men The Last Stand
Betsy was the middle child of the prestigious Braddock family in Britain. Her older brother Jamie was a famous race car driver and her younger twin, Brian, was the hero known as Captain Britain. Betsy herself was a charter pilot, but often got wrapped up in her brother’s adventures as a hero. When her telepathic abilities first appeared she was recruited the S.T.R.I.K.E. a shady government organization that was like S.H.I.E.L.D. but with more tea and crumpets. As a cover for her covert operations, the UK government set her up with a modeling agency and made her a star. She performed admirably and when Brian was not willing to perform a service for the British government they turned to Betsy. They gave her the costume of Captain Britain from a different dimension and sent her on her way. But Betsy found herself over her head when she battled Slaymaster, the villain brutally beat Betsy and gouged out her eyes. She cried out psionically and Brian came to her rescue, killing the monster. Betsy decided to retire from her life of adventuring, and now blind, moved to the Swiss Alps.
Art by Alan Davis
In the Alps, the multi-dimensional TV mogul Mojo took notice of Betsy and decided to abduct and brainwash her to star in his new show “Wildways”. He also saw it fit to implant Betsy with cybernetic eyes that he could use as cameras. The X-Men, New Mutants, and Captain Britain came to her aid and she decided to recover at the Xavier Institute, just in time for the chaos of the Mutant Massacre. She stayed on the sidelines for most of the event until she came face to face with Sabretooth. She bravely stood against feral beast, leading him away from the infirmary. Betsy knew she was no match for Sabertooth but tried to bide her time until Wolverine could come and challenge his rival. The X-Men was impressed by her valor and invited her to join the team as she took the code name Psylocke.
Art by Alan Davis, Paul Neary, and Glynis Oliver
Psylocke worked as the team psychic while both Jean and the Professor were away for various reasons. She stood with the X-Men during the Fall of the Mutants and followed them to the Australian Outback. Most of the X-Men were significantly changed by the traveling though the Siege Perilous but none as much as Psylocke. When she came out the other side, Betsy had lost her memory and was found by The Hand and their leader Matsu’o Tsurayaba. Matsu’o was desperate for a way to resurrect his comatose lover, Kwannon, and saw Psylocke as the key to bringing Kwannon back. He worked with Mojo’s right hand lady Spiral to swap Betsy’s body with Kwannon’s but something went wrong. The two women had their memories and personalities melded together. Matsu’o still saw the value in the psychic melded with his ninja love and gave her as a gift to the Mandarin to be used as his assassin until she was found and recovered by Wolverine.
Art by Jim Lee, Josef Rubinstein, and Glynis Oliver
Betsy rejoined the X-Men but she wasn’t the same, she became more ruthless and this was none more apparent than her ability and willingness to generate a psychic knife, the focused totality of her telepathic powers. She also began a relationship with her teammate Archangel. They had both had their bodies manipulated and distorted, they both felt a darkness inside them, and they both wanted to fight against it. Eventually Kwannon, the ninja melded with Betsy’s original body, came to challenge Psylocke for singular control of their minds and bodies. The women came to an understanding and Kwannon even joined the X-Men for a time until he was infected with the Legacy Virus. Kwannon had her lover Matsu’o euthanize her and the lost part of Betsy’s soul was restored.
Art by Brandon Peterson, Dan Panosian, and Joe Rosas
The Professor made Sabertooth’s redemption a pet project of his, one that would have serious repercussions for Psylocke. Sabertooth escaped and wanted revenge on the frail that stopped him years ago. Psylocke tried to stop him but even her new physical skills weren’t enough to stop the rampaging Sabertooth. He gutted her like a fish and left her for dead. If not for Wolverine and Archangel acquiring the mystic elixir known as the Crimson Dawn, she would not have survived. But such mystic forces were not free. Betsy gained a large red tattoo over her left eye as well as the ability to teleport through shadows, more than that she was acting even darker than she had been. This descent into darkness was only thwarted by her defeat of Kuragari of the Crimson Dawn.
Art by Joe Madureira, Tim Townsend, and Steve Buccellato
She continued her work with the X-Men, even when it came at great personal cost. The Shadow King began a conquest of Africa and the X-Men journeyed to stop him. Though he was one of the strongest telepaths in the world, the Shadow King was unprepared for Psylocke with her new Crimson Dawn abilities and she was able to trap his life essence on the astral plane. To do this Betsy had to keep her telepathic abilities focused on preventing his escape. She had effectively lost her telepathy.
Art by German Garcia, Art Thibert, and Liquid!
Jean Grey, having lost her telepathy when she was resurrected, sympathized with her longtime rival and tried to help her cope with the loss. In their training the women somehow switched power sets, Jean got the telepathy and Betsy the telekinesis. Psylocke followed Storm on her mission to recover the Destiny Diaries and that mission brought her face to face with the man called Vargus. In his battle with the X-Men, he defeated Rogue and Beast but Psylocke stood firm to protect her friends. However, the ninja was not strong enough to stand against her mighty foe and Vargus ran his sword though her.
Art by Salvador Larroca, and Liquid!
This death didn’t last long as her older brother Jamie, a powerful reality warper in his own right, resurrected his dear sister to assist him in battle against the Foursaken. She continued her work with the X-Men until she was shunted into the Exile’s Crystal Palace where she assisted the reality warpers for a time. Madelyn Pryor, pulled Psylocke’s spirit into her original body and tried to brainwash Psylocke into serving her. Betsy was too strong willed however and fought against the Red Queen, destroying her original body and essential restoring Psylocke to her 90’s power set and look.
Art by Greg Land, Jay Leisten, and Justin Ponsor
When Wolverine decided to reform X-Force in secret, Betsy was one of the first mutants he recruited alongside Archangel, who had rekindled a romantic relationship with Betsy. She was tried to help Warren control his dark nature, the seed of Apocalypse that was inside of him, but she couldn’t fully heal him. At the same time, she exhibited very strong sexual tension with her teammate Fantomex (who is a whole other story you can read about here). After the murder of the child clone of Apocalypse, Warren’s condition became unmanageable and he accepted his role as the heir to Apocalypse. X-Force tried to save him but Betsy saw that he was truly lost and shoved her katana through his chest, however she did not deliver a killing blow and instead decided to stay by his side and try to save her lover.
Art by Jerome Opena, and Dean White
Archangel was as ruthless as Apocalypse and turned to Betsy. Using a Celestial Death Seed he turned Psylocke into his new Horseman of Death and she assisted Warren in his conquest of the world. The Age of Apocalypse Jean Grey, alongside X-Force, charged at Apocalypse and was able to cleanse Betsy’s mind of the influence of Death. Betsy used her telepathy to enter Archangel’s mind, she showed him visions of a future together, giving up on being heroes and killers, having children, growing old by each other’s side. It was a perfect, beautiful life. She thrusted the Celestial Life See into her lover destroying Archangel and turning Warren into a blank slate with no memories or wickedness inside him.
Art by Jerome Opena, and Dean White
As she grieved her brother Brian and the Captain Britain Corp discovered what X-Force had done and put Fantomex on trial. He brought his sister to Otherworld to watch the trial and chastise her for her killer nature. She escaped with Fantomex and tried to return to her reality but got caught up in the ongoing war on Otherworld. A multidimensional being known as The Goat laid siege to Otherworld and threatened to destroy all of reality. Psylocke found out that The Goat was a potential future of her brother Jamie and was forced to make a horrific choice. Using her telepathy, she took control of Brian’s body and had him break Jamie’s neck in the present. Brian was disturbed that his sister would force him to do such a thing but understood that sometimes there is no right choice, just one that saves more lives than others.
Art by Greg Tocchini and Dean White
After quitting X-Force she began a relationship with Fantomex, even continuing after he was split into three clones (again read the Fantomex article for more) thinking it would be her happy ending, but happiness was not to be. She tried being an X-Man again but it didn’t scratch the itch she needed. She felt compelled to violence, a need to kill and joined Cable’s new incarnation of X-Force. She is currently working with Magneto and his proactive band of Uncanny X-Men to help the mutant population with the threat of M-Pox.
Art by Greg Land, Jay Leisten, and Noland Woodard
Must Read
Psylocke has a long and rich history filled with character development. Some of it has been questionable and some has been fabulous. Luckily Psylocke was the lead character of the single best X-Men story in the last ten years, Rick Remender’s Uncanny X-Force. This story made Betsy face all of demons inside her and finally gave her resolution to her ongoing questions of self-image. This is a book that will kick you in the gut, make you cry, and make you question why superheroes even exist. And you will keep coming back to read it time and time again. I can’t say anything about this run that hasn’t already been said, go to Amazon or Marvel Unlimited and read this thing.
Art by Daniel Acuna
Ranking
Psylocke is a long time, A-list, X-Men character and for good reason. She is engaging and dangerous. She is constantly conflicted between her high class upbringing and her dirty life. She also has a design and power set that is visually engaging and always fun to see in action. She is very similar to Magik at the top of the list, but I think Psylocke’s story keeps her less engaging than our demon queen. Colossus is a much heavier weight of history to him and I don’t think I can rank Betsy above him. She comes close but can’t overcome some of her issues like the race bending. For all those reasons, Psylocke ranks as the new number 3 in the Xavier Files.
Psylocke was requested by /u/jocab_w on reddit and Spencer from the Patreon. Thanks for the request guys! If you want to cut to the front of the line like Spencer, we just started a Patreon if you want to support it and get a line cutting reward for just a $1 pledge. Our first goal is only $15 and it gets rid of those ads and makes the hosting for Xavier Files entirely reader supported.
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Zachary Jenkins runs ComicsXF and is a co-host on the podcast “Battle of the Atom.” Shocking everyone, he has a full and vibrant life outside of all this.
