Many classic characters are showing up in Marvel’s Wolverine, and now we’ve gotten our first look at Nathanael Essex, aka Mister Sinister, thanks to one of the lucky fans who got to try the game out recently. Insomniac’s next Marvel game is finally launching on September 15, and will take players on a darker, more violent journey that will bring mutants to the Marvel’s Spider-Man universe at long last.
Aside from Wolverine himself, players will get acquainted with iconic X-Men figures like Jean Grey, Mystique, Sabretooth, and Omega Red, as well as anti-mutant enemies like Bolivar Trask, Lady Deathstrike, and the Sentinels. There are bound to be plenty more Easter Eggs and guest appearances in Marvel’s Wolverine, and now fans can see yet another nefarious villain in Logan’s orbit…
Troy Baker Plays Nathanael Essex In Marvel’s Wolverine
BlueThunderReal was one of the many influencers who got to play through some of Marvel’s Wolverine ahead of its September 15 launch, and has shared several clips of the game’s brutal combat and dark plotline on Twitter. One of these clips sees Logan rescuing a man identified as Nathanael Essex, better known to X-Men fans as the villainous Mister Sinister.
As his name would imply, Mister Sinister has been a major antagonistic force for the X-Men since his introduction in The Uncanny X-Men #221 back in September 1987. Born in 19th-century London, Nathanael Essex devoted his life to bringing about the next stage in human evolution by any means necessary, and saw mutantkind as the ideal guinea pigs for his twisted experiments. These same experiments granted him nightmarish powers (such as shapeshifting and an extended lifespan), and he has since been a, well, sinister thorn in the side of the X-Men and the world as a whole.
Sinister’s reign of terror has naturally spread into the realms of cartoons (like the first season of X-Men ’97) and video games (with some prime examples being X2: Wolverine’s Revenge and X-Men Legends 2: Rise of Apocalypse). For Marvel’s Wolverine, veteran voice actor Troy Baker is lending both his voice and physical likeness to Nathanael Essex, who seems strangely human and vulnerable in the brief clip BlueThunderReal shared.
This might mean that Essex first appears as a supposed ally to Logan (only to reveal his true nature later on), or Insomniac is giving us a different take on Mister Sinister’s origin in Marvel’s Wolverine that could see him take on his iconic nickname towards the end. According to a tie-in prequel comic released before last month’s San Diego Comic-Con, Essex is the leader of Team X, the squad that Logan, Sabretooth, and Mystique are part of at the start of the game.
This could offer a clue about Marvel’s Wolverine and its darker storyline, with Logan and company being unwitting pawns in whatever evil scheme Mister Sinister is cooking up from the shadows. The answers will come when Marvel’s Wolverine is released on PlayStation 5 this September, but the plot is certainly thickening on the mutant side of Insomniac’s ever-growing Marvel gaming universe.
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