'Dark Phoenix' After Credits, Ending and Spoilers: How The 'X-Men' Series Ends, So You Don't Have to Watch It

Not including the upcoming New Mutants spinoff, Dark Phoenix is the last entry in the long-running X-Men movie series which began all the way back in 2000. Over seven main X-Men entries and five spinoffs, the series has had a few highlights (X2, Logan), and many disappointments. If reviews and box office projections are any indication, Dark Phoenix brings it all to a close with a sputter. Still, you don't have to actually watch Dark Phoenix to be invested in how 20th Century Fox, recently purchased by Disney, wraps up its marquee superhero franchise. Dark Phoenix spoilers ahead for those who need to know, but can't bring themselves to watch.

Dark Phoenix After Credits

This one's easy: there isn't one. Dark Phoenix has no after credits or post-pre-credits or any other secret awaiting those who sit patiently hoping for a treat. It just ends, like a... movie.

Dark Phoenix Ending

While Dark Phoenix may not have an after credits scene, it does bring the X-Men movie series to a definitive close. At the beginning of Dark Phoenix, set in 1992, the X-Men are ascendant, until Jean Grey (Sophie Turner) is overcome by the eternal cosmic power of the Phoenix Force during an outer space rescue mission. An already dangerous situation becomes a lot more dangerous when Jean discovers that Professor X walled off childhood memories of her neglectful father, rather than treat her. Now the destructive and powerful Phoenix, Jean Grey, overcome by childhood traumas, kills Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence). This is all early in Dark Phoenix.

Jean Grey is pursued by both the X-Men and the mysterious Vuk (Jessica Chastain), who turns out to be an alien D'Bari, whose people were killed by the Phoenix Force. Vuk hopes to draw the Phoenix Force from Jean Grey, take it for herself, then use it to remake the Earth into her new homeworld.

In the end, Jean Grey fully bonds with the Phoenix force, then unleashes its full destructive capacity against Vuk, seemingly killing her in the process. Professor X (James McAvoy), ashamed at how he failed his most promising pupil, retires and renames the Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters after Jean.

The very end of the movie includes a voiceover from Jean, now Phoenix, as she watches over Professor X from above. After 19 years, that's how the X-Men series ends. Presumably, Marvel Studios will reboot the series in the coming years. X-Men: Dark Phoenix is in theaters now.