- "Too late, assholes!"
- ―Shadowcat to Sentinels
Shadowcat (born Katherine Anne "Kitty" Pryde) is a young mutant with the ability to phase through objects and project a person's conscious back in time.
Biography
X-Men
She is a student at Xavier's School of Gifted Youngsters. Senator Kelly referenced her as "a girl from Illinois who can walk through walls" in Congress during his debate with Jean Grey.
She was first seen running through a wall out of a class with the Professor, much to a present Wolverine's shock. When Rogue becomes a student at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters and is sitting in a classroom with other students, with Storm as the teacher, Shadowcat and Jubilee are sitting near her.
X2: X-Men United
When Colonel William Stryker's forces attacked the X-Mansion, Kitty phased through walls and helped the others escape. Later on, Professor X used Kitty to retrieve files from Stryker's office which he presented to the President of the United States.
X-Men: The Last Stand
Kitty joined the X-Men as a full fledged member of the group, and is seen in the Danger Room with the rest of the X-Men. Enemy fire blasts buildings around them, and everything's in flames. The students are running through the chaos, and Storm flies, avoiding getting hit. Iceman and Shadowcat are running around the inferno, and a flaming piece of rubble flies at their direction. Bobby turns to it and freezes it, successfully dousing the flames and making it miss them by nothing more than a few inches. With a satisfied smile on his face, he turns to Kitty, not realizing that another boulder in about to hit them. At the last second, Kitty jumps to hug Bobby, phasing them both through the boulder. Rogue shows up just in time to see them breaking the hug, and her boyfriend looking quite pleased.
Later, Professor Xavier is teaching his ethics class about use and misuse of power – he states that "One can use power for the greater good, or for personal gain and destructive ends. This is a dilemma we all must ask themselves. Why? Because we're mutants." For psychics, he says, "This presents a particular problem: when is it acceptable to use our powers, and when do we cross that invisible line that turns us into tyrants over our fellow men?". Kitty remarks that Einstein said that ethics are an exclusive human concern without any superhuman authority behind it, and Xavier replies that Einstein wasn't a mutant – as far as they know. The kids all giggle and Xavier proceeds to show them a tape sent to him by Dr. Moira MacTaggert.
In the tape, Dr. MacTaggart stands by a man in a hospital bed. She says that the man was born with no higher-level brain functions: his organs and nerves system work, but he has no consciousness to speak of. Xavier turns the video off and asks his students an ethical question: what if they were to transfer the consciousness of one person, say, a father of four with terminal cancer, into the body of this man? How are they to decide what falls between the range of ethical behavior and what…? Suddenly, he stops mid-sentence. Outside the window, gigantic rain clouds are forming. A moment passes in silence, and then Xavier dismisses the class, saying they'll continue this tomorrow.
The next day, Outside on the front yard, Ororo Munroe is eulogizing Charles Xavier in a memorial service in front of all his students: "We live in an age of darkness," she says, "a world full of fear, hate and intolerance. But in every age, there are those who fight against it. Charles Xavier was born into a world divided, a world he tried to heal – a mission he never saw accomplished. It seems the destiny of great men to see their goals unfulfilled."
At Professor Xavier's funeral, in the crowd sit Marie D'Ancanto, Bobby Drake, Kitty Pryde, Piotr Rasputin, Hank McCoy and many other students and friends of Xavier's. Logan isn't sitting with them, as he is standing and listening from afar, a loner as always. Rogue looks at him, as Ororo continues her eulogy: "Charles was more than a leader, more than a teacher, he was a friend. When we were afraid he gave us strength, and when we were alone he gave us a family. He may be gone, but his teachings live on through us, his students". When tears fill Kitty's eyes as she listens to Storm's speech, Bobby, sitting next to her, puts his hand on hers to comfort her. Ororo finishes: "Wherever we may go, we must carry on his vision, and that's a vision of a world united." Logan walks away. All other people present stand up, and one walks to his memorial and puts a flower on it.
That night, Kitty Pryde is in her bed, crying. Bobby knocks on her door and enters, asking if she's okay. She says she's fine; it's just… Xavier came to her house; he was the one who convinced her to come there. Bobby tells her it was the same with him and says they're all feeling the same way, but she says he's wrong: he has Rogue, and she… She says she just misses home – the snow, and all that… Seeing her ice skates lying by the wall, Bobby gets an idea. He tells Kitty to get up and come with him, but she reminds him Storm told them to stay in their rooms. He tells her not to worry as they won't get caught – she can walk through walls, after all.
They sneak outside to the big fountain, and Iceman tells Shadowcat this place can be home too. He touches to water with his finger and, within seconds, the entire fountain freezes up like a frozen lake. She sits on the edge to put on her ice skates, and he uses his powers to create ice skates for himself. They smile at each other and go on the "lake," ice-skating. They hold hands and skate around the fountain faster, until they stop in a swirl. They end up holding each other to keep balance, and Kitty thanks Bobby for doing this.
After the President fails an attempt to stop Magneto, the X-Men plan to take this into their own hands and stop Magneto themselves. They meet up with Storm, Iceman, Shadowcat and Colossus, and Bobby reminds Logan that there are only six of them. Wolverine pauses and tells the young students that he won't lie to them – they're outnumbered, they lost Scott, they lost the professor – but if they don't fight now, everything these men stood for will die with them, and he's not gonna let that happen. Iceman nods in agreement, and Logan says they stand together, X-Men, all of them. Bobby looks at Kitty and Peter, and they both sign they're ready. He then turns back to Logan, and tells him they're in. Ready for the battle of their lives, the X-Men walk towards the Blackbird.
When the remaining members of the X-Men arrive at Alcatraz Island, the Blackbird lands on the roof. Lightning falls on the battle scene as Storm descends from the sky. Next, Beast jumps from the roof and lands like a true animal. Iceman and Shadowcat jump together, phasing into the ground to avoid getting squashed, and then phasing right back up. Colossus jumps down too, his metal form protecting him. Lastly, Wolverine jumps down the wall, using his claws to scratch the wall and slow down his fall. Storm lands too, and Wolverine yells to the humans to go back and lock the doors. He then orders the X-Men to stand together and hold a line. Instantly, the six mutants line up in front of the Brotherhood to form a strict line of defense, ready for the battle of their lives.
Up on the hill, Magneto tells Juggernaut to go inside and find Leech – and kill him. Juggernaut says he'll do it with pleasure, and runs towards the building, letting nothing stand in his way. Wolverine sees him run straight through the wall, and Beast realizes he's going for the boy. "Not if I get there first", Shadowcat replies and runs at the same direction, phasing through anything in her way.
Inside the building, Shadowcat runs after Juggernaut through the halls. She jumps at him from behind and phases him halfway into the floor, getting him stuck. She then phases herself back up, smiling, and runs away, continuing on her way to get to Leech. "Don't you know who I am?" Cain asks her as she phases through the next wall. "I'm the Juggernaut, bitch!" He then easily breaks the floor with his arms and jumps up, running after her, breaking the walls along the way. He chases her like that through many rooms until she manages to outsmart him: in one of the rooms, instead of phasing on she just hides. Juggernaut continues on, not realizing where Kitty disappeared to, and she just runs at another direction.
In another part of the building, Shadowcat finally phases into Leech's room. She looks around and finds Jimmy hiding behind his bed, frightened. She runs to him and tells him not to worry – she's there to help him. She helps him up, telling him she's gonna get him out of there. She holds his hand and starts running at one direction, but then she hears Juggernaut running through the walls not far away and decides to go through the other direction. When they get to the wall, though, she is horrified to find that she can't phase through it. Jimmy explains that her powers won't work with him.
They hear Juggernaut is getting closer, and Kitty doesn't know what to do. She then gets an idea and tells Jimmy to stay close. Juggernaut breaks through the wall across from them and tells Shadowcat he's the wrong guy to play hide-and-seek with. She ticks him off, calling him a dickhead, and he charges towards them. Just in the last second before he hits them, Kitty pushes Jimmy and herself to the floor, and Cain just bangs himself against the wall, his powers dampened by Leech. From the force of the hit, Juggernaut drops to the floor, and the kids are free to run out through the holes he created on his way there. She managed to succeed and get people to safety when Jean Grey tried to destroy the world under the influence of the Phoenix Force.
The next day on the mansion's front lawn, Ororo and Kitty stand in front of the two graves of Scott Summers and Jean Grey, lying next to Xavier's grave – three great losses that the X-Men are left to mourn.
X-Men: Days of Future Past: Rogue Cut
As the Sentinels are dispatched to find and kills mutants living underground, they adapt to any situation and change their form. Iceman, Sunspot, Blink and Warpath fight the Sentinels while Kitty and Bishop run off into a closet somewhere. Bishop lays down and Kitty starts massaging his temples, sending his consciousness back in time. As the Sentinels kill the rest of the team and break through the closet, everything fades away, revealing that the past has been changed.
As Bishop prevents mutants about oncoming Sentinel attack, they leave Moscow and hide in a monastery in China. Charles Xavier, Magneto, Wolverine, and Storm arrive to meet them. Professor X plans to get back to 1973 to stop Mystique from killing Bolivar Trask, which triggered the Sentinel Program. But Kitty, however, says that she could only send someone back about a month without them getting serious brain damage, and warns that sending a person's consciousness back more than fifty years could damage their brain. Wolverine, however, says that, since he can heal his wounds fast, he can go back. Kitty, Magneto, Professor X and Iceman goes to a chamber behind the Great Wall of China and Kitty sends Wolverine back to 1973. Everyone agrees (in the Rogue Cut Professor's decision causes discussion between mutants but they agree in the end).
While in 1973, Wolverine comes across and recognizes a young William Stryker, and this causes him to get some kind of seizure. He has traumatic flashbacks from his Weapon X days, which causes him to violently shake in future, and he stabs Kitty with his claws, enticing Magneto to bind Wolverine with his powers, and telling Iceman to restrain Wolverine. The effects wear off after a few minutes, and Kitty keeps Wolverine at bay again. She loses lots of blood but continues keeping Wolverine.
Realizing that Kitty won't be able to keep Wolverine long enough as he seriously wounded her, Bobby offers to release Rogue from the X-Mansion. Magneto and Iceman manage to save her but they are attacked by Sentinels on their way back. Bobby sacrifices himself letting Erik and Rogue escape. When Professor X, Magneto, and Rogue return to sanctuary, Kitty wonders what happened to Bobby, and Rogue sadly tells her "I'm sorry Kitty". Kitty, realizing what Rogue means, gets very distressed to find out that Bobby died. Rogue then absorbs Kitty's abilities, and succeeds in switching places with her in keeping Wolverine in past.
Soon Sentinels find mutants and attack the sanctuary. Most of them were destroyed by the explosion of the X-Jet caused by Magneto and Storm's powers. But some Sentinels survive and begins to kill all the mutants protecting the sanctuary. During the Sentinel's attack, Kitty takes Magneto, who was punctured by a stray piece of Sentinel shrapnel, through sanctuary's wall after he had reinforced the entrance into the monastery with pieces of the X-Jet. Eventually, the Sentinel's break into the monastery and prepares to kill the rest of the remaining X-Men. As they fire on the remaining mutants, Rogue breaks the connection, erasing the original timeline as Mystique refuses to kill Trask in past.
X-Men: Days of Future Past: 2023
Kitty is seen at the X-Mansion, giving a presentation to her classroom while Colossus stands by her side.
Death of the X-Men
In 2028, Charles Xavier developed Alzheimer's and suffered a massive seizure that injured 600 people, and killed 7 mutants, including several members of the X-Men. It is unknown if Kitty was among those who were either killed or injured.Powers, Abilities & Weaknesses
- Intangibility - Shadowcat possesses the ability to pass through any matter, known as "phasing", by passing her atoms through the spaces between the atoms of the object of which she is moving through. In this way, she and the object can temporarily merge without interacting, and each is unharmed during the process, making her, all intents and purposes, intangible. Hence, when attacked, she can shift into a "phasing" state to allow oncoming danger to pass through her harmlessly. She passes through objects at the same rate of speed at which she is moving. She is also able to allow all targets she made physical contact with beforehand, living or otherwise, intangible, allowing the targets to safely phase along with her.
- Chronoskimming - Sometime after mastering her powers, Shadowcat developed the ability to separate her consciousness from her body and send it back/forward in time into a direct ancestor/descendant or even her younger self. Alternatively, she can use this ability on another person. Any changes in time will not take effect until the connection is severed, to which the target's consciousness will return to the same point of time the travel first took place. Only the target will remember the original events of time while also having no personal memory of the altered timeline.
- Gravity Phasing - Shadowcat is able to phase against gravity. She demonstrates this when she and Iceman descend into the ground via phasing and ascend back out. When confronting Juggernaut, she leaves him stuck with half his body stuck in the floor while she phases out upwards.
Relationships
Friends
- Professor X - Former Mentor, Teammate and Friend
- Wolverine - Former Mentor, Teammate, and Friend
- Storm † - Former Mentor, Teammate, and Friend
- Jean Grey † - Former Mentor, Teammate, and Friend
- Cyclops † - Former Mentor, Teammate, and Friend
- Beast † - Former Mentor, Teammate, and Friend
- Magneto - Former Enemy turned Teammate and Friend
- Colossus † - Teammate, Former Classmate, and Friend
- Iceman † - Teammate, Former Classmate, and Love Interest
- Rogue - Teammate, Former Classmate, and Friend
- Warpath † - Teammate and Friend
- Blink † - Teammate and Friend
- Sunspot † - Teammate and Friend
- Bishop † - Teammate and Friend
- Angel † - Former Teammate
- Jubilee - Former Classmate and Friend
- Artie Maddicks - Former Classmate
- Jones - Former Classmate
- Leech - Rescuee and Ally
Enemies
- William Stryker † - Enemy
- Pyro † - Classmate turned Enemy
- Omegas - Enemies
- Sentinels - Enemies
Friends
Trivia
- In the first and second X-Men movies, she is a minor character portrayed by different actresses. However, in the third movie, she is incorporated as a main character and is portrayed by Ellen Page, who once again is a different actress for Shadowcat. X-Men: Days of Future Past will be the first time in which Kitty will be portrayed by the same actress in two movies.
- The three actresses that portrayed Kitty in the X-Men Trilogy are all from Canada.
- While she possesses the ability to send people back in time, she never actually remembers the original timeline she sent them from. She tells Wolverine this herself, explaining that only he will remember the changes he makes when he finishes changing the past.
- Shadowcat's powers saved Bishop's Free Mutants group an untold number of times by projecting Bishop several days into the past to allow the Free Mutants to escape the Sentinel attacks. However, her teammates presumably die protecting her during these attacks.
- Shadowcat proved vital in saving the world in Days of Future Past, as her powers were used to facilitate Wolverine's time travel.
- Given her and Iceman's closeness in the original timeline by the time of Days of Future Past, they may have been in a romantic relationship. However, if this was so, it was one of the things changed by Wolverine, since the new timeline shows Iceman and Rogue together.
- Her time-phasing abilities are similar to Rina Patel, aka, Timeslip. A new warrior mutant.
- In the novelization of The Last Stand, it is revealed that she and Colossus were previously dating, but they broke up with Peter still having feelings for Kitty, a reference to their mainstream counterparts' past romance.
- Her alias, Shadowcat, from the comics, is never used in the film series.
- Her first appearance in the comics was during the Dark Phoenix saga, which ironically would be adapted for part of the plot of X-Men: The Last Stand.
External links
Kitty Pryde on the Marvel Wiki
Kitty Pryde on Wikipedia
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