Even though the X-Men aren't going to space in their first film, they've always had one foot on Earth and one in the stars. Since their beginning the X-books have had ties to the cosmos that went to the heart of the series and its themes of racial tolerance and paranoia.

Long before the beginning of the series, X-Men leader Scott Summers encountered extraterrestrials as a young boy, when soldiers of the alien Shi'ar attacked his family's plane. Scott's parents were kidnapped, and he and his younger brother Alex were left for dead.

Scott was left with a tragic souvenir of the experience -- an inability to control his mutation, the powerful optic blasts continually emanating from his eyes.

Back on Earth, Scott grew to become Cyclops, leader of the first group of the superhuman adventuring group the X-Men. It was during their debut that they faced their greatest foe, Magneto, a powerful mutant with the ability to control magnetism.

Soon the X-Men confronted Magneto on his orbital fortress, Asteroid M, a rock the magnetic megalomaniac had reshaped and parked in geosynchronous orbit using his powers. This base was eventually de-orbited by nuclear blasts and destroyed, but has been rebuilt several times.

During this period, the original team also battled a race of robotic mutantphobes called Sentinels, who were programmed to eradicate any genetic variants in humanity. Cyclops convinced the robots that the true source of all genetic variation was in fact the sun, which provides both energy for life and the radiation that causes genetic "drift." The Sentinels destroyed themselves in a vain attempt to neutralize the sun.

Shortly before the end of the original series, the X-Men were rallied by their teacher Professor Xavier to repel an invasion by the alien Z'nox. Combining their powers, the X-Men linked the minds of all the people of Earth to overwhelm the aliens' thoughts and drive them off.

But it was after the series was "rebooted" with different characters that the series took on a truly cosmic flavor.

A battle with rebuilt Sentinels in Earth orbit drove the X-Men to escape from a doomed space station in a damaged shuttle. The heat of reentry threatened to burn through the craft's shielding, requiring team member Jean Grey to stay on the flight deck to telekinetically reinforce the spacecraft.

During this trial, a powerful celestial being known as the Phoenix Force being traded places with Jean, and reworked itself into an exact duplicate (even to the point of believing it was in actuality Jean Grey), but with greatly elevated powers. Jean Grey herself was stowed away in a stasis box at the bottom of the ocean, while the Phoenix continued on in her place.

Before long, the alien Shi'ar reappeared to further disrupt the X-Men's lives. But this time it was a visit from the aliens' deposed empress, who approached Xavier for aid in overthrowing the regime of her corrupt brother. The X-Men traveled to the Shi'ar galaxy where they confronted the super-powered defenders of the throne, Scott was reunited with his long-lost father, and Professor Xavier and the reinstalled Empress Lilandra struck up a long-running romance.

But the Phoenix was to have its "humanity" sorely tested, eventually consuming a star -- and murdering an entire sentient species. Empress Lilandra, even though she was Xavier's lover and the X-Men's ally, had no choice but to hunt down and capture Phoenix and order its execution.

Recent issues have revisited some of the classic storylines, as the "X-Men: The Hidden Years" series deals with the aftermath of the Z'nox siege and a time-travel story in the flagship title had the team trying to protect the Skrull homeworld from destruction.

If the X-Men successfully mutate into a series of films -- as Marvel Entertainment, director Bryan Singer and distributor Fox hope -- perhaps some of these cosmic adventures will be retold on the big screen.

Either way, the cosmic tales of the X-Men remain among the most popular with the fans, who have come to expect some space opera in their mutant soap opera.