The MCU has taken its sweet time introducing the X-Men. While it still hasn’t shown us the entire team, “The Marvels'” post-credits scene does offer some pretty solid hints that they’re finally on their way. First, we see Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) waking up in what appears to be an alternate universe after closing the tear in space-time, greeted by her mother Maria (Lashana Lynch) who now looks like the superhero Binary and has no idea who Monica is. Then, in walks the Kelsey Grammer version of Beast, charming as ever but stealthily redesigned to resemble his “X-Men: The Animated Series” look. As stingers go, it’s small and quiet — but since it’s the first X-Men appearance in the MCU that virtually promises a follow-up, it might just become one of the most pivotal moments of the mega-franchise’s history. 

This isn’t the first confirmed mutant sighting in the MCU. Ms. Marvel (Iman Vellani) is a mutant hybrid, and Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) rocks his iconic yellow sci-fi wheelchair as part of the alternate-universe Illuminati team that gets wrecked by the Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” Still, Beast is the first member of the classic X-Men field team to enter the fray, and his design aesthetic and the fact that Grammer is playing him implies that the MCU intends to lean pretty heavily on the “X-Men ’97” aesthetic and actors from the original trilogy. 

With Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine fitting right in that same combination of design aesthetics and casting decisions in “Deadpool 3,” it’ll be interesting to see whether the likes of Famke Janssen, James Marsden, Halle Berry, and Ian McKellen are secretly being fitted for comics-accurate costumes, as well.