Summary

• The identities of Nightcrawler's parents have changed mutliple times throughout the years.
• While Mystique has always been one of his possible parents, other characters like Nightmare and Azazel have been potential fathers for Nightcrawler.
• Mystique and Destiny have been revealed as Nightcrawler's parents, as originally intended, finally giving Nightcrawler a concrete origin.

As of now, the origin story of Kurt Wagner, better known as the mutant hero Nightcrawler, is no mystery. However, that wasn't the case for the first few decades of the character's existence. While the questions surrounding Kurt Wagner's beginnings were never quite as prominent as the famously mysterious origins of the likes of Wolverine or his time with the Weapon X Program, they were still a concern for dedicated fans of the character, not to mention Nightcrawler himself.

Of course, it is common knowledge at this point that Raven Darkholme, better known as Mystique, is the most prominent maternal figure in Nightcrawler's life, but before that relationship was confirmed there were several familiar Marvel characters were legitimate contenders for the role of his parents. Thankfully, the vast majority of these potential parents had their claims to Nightcrawler's lineage shot down almost as quickly as they emerged, leaving the real story to be unveiled as more interesting than anything even immortal entities had to offer.

Updated on May 21, 2024 by John Dodge: Comic book timelines and the interpersonal relationships between the characters who inhabit them are almost constantly changing. As such, this article has been updated to reflect the latest information pertinent to its subject.

One of Marvel's Most Terrifying Fear Lords was Nearly Nightcrawler's Father

Early in his seminal run as the lead writer and plotter across numerous X-Men titles, Chris Claremont wanted to reveal the malevolent Fear Lord and ruler of the Dream Dimension, Nightmare, was Nightcrawler's father. However, Nightmare was primarily a Doctor Strange villain, and Roger Stern, who was then writing for the Sorcerer Supreme, didn't like Claremont's idea nearly as much as the X-Scribe.

In Back Issue #29, "Nightcrawler's Two Dads and the Owl That Could Have Been," Stern recalled when the idea was first pitched to him. "I replied with something like, 'No, he's not. I'm not going to let you appropriate one of my character's major villains,'" he said. "As I recall, Len Wein crossed the room and shook my hand. And not too long after that, I did become the X-Men editor and was able to make sure that didn't happen for long enough that Chris eventually changed his mind."

Mystique's Relationship with Nightcrawler was Implied from the Very Beginning

The mutant villain turned unwitting antihero known as Mystique was originally teased as Nightcrawler's mother when they first met in Uncanny X-Men #142, by Claremont and John Byrne. When Nightcrawler sees Mystique's blue form, he remarks how alike they are. Mystique responds by calling the mutant hero by his name, which startles Kurt and prompts him to ask who she is. Mystique replies, "Ask your mother, Margali Szardos. Who would know better than she?" Later, Mystique confides in Destiny that she wasn't able to harm Nightcrawler, once again hinting at a deeper connection between the two.

In Claremont and John Romita Jr.'s Uncanny X-Men #177, Amanda Sefton, Kurt's step-sister, says Margali found Kurt next to the body of his deceased father. A few years after that 1984 story, Marvel Age Preview announced that Excalibur creators Claremont and Alan Davis would work on a biographical graphic novel about Kurt Wagner that would include details about his birth and his connection to Mystique. While that project never materialized, several other hints to Mystique's involvement in Kurt's parentage are given over the years, but none were concrete until 1994's X-Men Unlimited #4, by Scott Lobdell and Richard Bennett, which saw Mystique explicitly tell Kurt that she was his mother, and revealed the circumstances of his birth.

Mystique tells Kurt that she was the pampered widow of a German bureaucrat. When the townspeople found out she was a mutant and that her son bared a striking resemblance to a demon, they chased her with pitchforks. "I was too weak to stand and fight," she says. "I realized I had a choice. I could die with my unwanted child in my arms...or I could save myself at the expense of my newborn son." With that in mind, she threw him down a raging waterfall to save herself. At that point, Mystique took the form of a local farmer and told the townspeople that she killed "the woman" and her child.

X-Men Origins: Nightcrawler by Marc Bernadin and Adam Freeman tells a different story, suggesting the information that Mystique and her mutant-hating son, Graydon Creed, gave Nightcrawler was unreliable. In this iteration, Margali tells Kurt the story of his birth, saying one thing while the image shows another. While she lies about Kurt's mother being a beautiful, brave and wise woman, the panels show Mystique gently placing Kurt in a nearby river to save him instead of violently throwing him into raging rapids, as she did in X-Men Unlimited #4.

Nightcrawler was Nearly the Last of Marvel's Elfburgs

In Claremont and June Brigman's Uncanny X-Men #204, Nightcrawler rescued from Arcade a woman named Judith Rassendyll, who learned she was the last of the Elfburgs and heir to the throne of Ruritania. This idea was expanded upon further in the solicit description for Marvel Age #36, which explained that the then upcoming tale would see "Nightcrawler deals with his fears about the Beyonder, a love-life that's falling apart, and the truth about himself and his origin."

In Comics Focus #1, Claremont elaborated on that abandoned story, saying, "We started to do his origin and the story died on us. We set up, we started it rolling, tried to hammer it into something of value, and it died... So, we rewrote the ending of the story and instead did one with Rachel Summers, Wolverine and the Hellfire Club, which led up to the 'Mutant Massacre', which turned out to be a much more powerful and effective storyline."

As seen in the pages of Uncanny X-Men #206, Nightcrawler chooses not to go with Judith to Ruritania. The unfinished arc raised a lot of questions for many readers, such as the identity of who hired Arcade to kill Judith. As "How Would You Fix..?" notes, it was likely someone who didn't want her to take the throne of the European nation.

Mystique and Azazel's Original Relationship was Nearly an X-Disaster

In 2003, one of the most infamous Uncanny X-Men stories, "The Draco," by Chuck Austen, Phillip Tan and Sean Phillips, added another wrinkle to Nightcrawler's history. That new origin revealed that Mystique was married to a wealthy German man, Baron Christian Wagner, but the couple was unable to have children. Raven engaged in various affairs, but her most notable entanglement was with Azazel. This devilish villain was introduced as a member of an ancient demonic race of mutants known as the Neyaphem, who were mostly banished to another dimension by a race of angelic mutants.

During their affair, Raven became pregnant with Azazel's child, and she soon gave birth to a boy who had had black hair, yellow eyes, blue skin and a forked tail. To make matters worse, as she gave birth, Mystique reverted to her naturally azure form. That caused the locals to revolt, naming both Mystique and Kurt demons and attempting to kill them. Mystique then dropped Kurt off a cliff into a riverbank as she made her escape, cursing Azazel as she did so.

The Truth About Mystique and Destiny's Relationship Reveals Nightcrawler's Real Mother - And Father

As of the release of 2023's X-Men Blue: Origins #1 (by Si Spurrier, Wilton Santos, Oren Junior, Marcus To, and Ceci De La Crus), fans finally have a concrete origin story for Nightcrawler, as well as absolute confirmation that the mutant seer known as Destiny is his mother, while Mystique is and has always been his father. Thanks to Mystique's shapeshifting abilities running all the way through to her very genetics, this wasn't any great feat in terms of effort, though it wasn't a secret that either she or Destiny could keep for very long. Upon being discovered, Mystique and Destiny were forced to abandon the infant Kurt in the hopes of saving him from the onslaught of enraged townspeople who were hunting them.

For the most part, Mystique being half of Kurt's parentage was always understood to some degree, but the other part of Claremont's original equation wasn't. He wanted Mystique to be Kurt's father while Irene Adler (Destiny) was his mother. Concerns with Marvel and the Comics Code were often cited as reasons why that origin never became canon. Scott Lobdell, who wrote X-Men Unlimited #4, explained his reasoning for abandoning Claremont's idea in 1995: "It was always Chris' plan that Mystique and Irene Adler (Destiny) were lovers, and that Mystique at one point had transformed into a man and impregnated Destiny and she gave birth to Nightcrawler. So Mystique and Destiny were actually Nightcrawler's father and mother."