With his trench coat, playing cards and a charming smile, Remy LeBeau, better known as the mutant hero gambit has returned to the pop culture consciousness. Gambit is one of Marvel’s most cherished characters, making a television and film comeback with appearances in Disney Plus’ “X-Men ’97” and Marvel Studios’ “Deadpool and Wolverine.”
Gambit first appeared as a Cameo in the X-Men Annual in May 1990, and he later made a full appearance in Uncanny X-Men issue 266 in June.
Hailing from New Orleans, Gambit takes space in comics as one of a very small group of superheroes from Louisiana. He is also the only Cajun superhero. Gambit is known for his Cajun accent and his fluency in Cajun French.
Remy Etienne LeBeau was born in New Orleans, where he was abandoned because of his red eyes and adopted by the New Orleans Thieves Guild. They raised Gambit, and taught him how to steal, fight, and survive.
Storm was his introduction to the X-Men. Gambit met her after she was changed into a child version of herself without her memory. Gambit helped her and ended up meeting Professor Charles Xavier and the rest of the X-Men.
Nick Cutrer, a Comic book fan who works at Van’s Comics in Ridgeland, Mississippi, talked about what makes Gambit such an interesting character.
“He’s one of the most charming mutants to ever live. One of his powers is that he has almost a hypnotic charm, because he has the ability to affect kinetic energy, that includes the kinetic energy between people, and he kind of has a hypnosis charm about him,” Cutrer said. “He’s one of those flawed heroes where he has a past he’s trying to make up for by doing good deeds, and he’s always very much on a redemption arc. Even though he might stumble on the way, he continues to try to be that better version of himself.”
According to Cutrer, Gambit’s go-to story for new readers is a highly contested issue among fans. To him, however, Gambit’s best moments come from when he’s a part of a team.
“Every time they give him a solo story, they revert back to his old stories. They never explore what he could become. He’s one of those characters that everyone likes, but they like him where he is instead of where he could be,” Cutrer said.
“One of the things I’ve always enjoyed about comics is when they take a character that has been established for so long and they change them so slightly. Not when they change his power,” he said. “Don’t change him like that, change him as a person.”
Nikhil Clayton, a content creator, writer and a long-time fan of Gambit, talked about the essence of the character and his most recent iterations, mainly the relationship between Gambit and Rogue, a Mississippi-born mutant cursed with a power that prevents her from touching anyone, and why it’s so compelling.
“I think [the writers] do a wonderful job writing their relationship always. It’s set up to be a very classic romantic relationship, like in the old sense of the word, it’s like a romance novel almost. There is this guy that is so sex obsessed; he’s such a ladies’ man and he’s so lustful, and he has this woman that he can’t touch, and he can never be intimate with. And he still loves her, and it’s still a very fulfilling and great relationship for the both of them without the physical.”
Rouge and Gambit’s first romantic interaction happened in X-Men (1991) #4, but they didn’t have their first date eating Gumbo until X-Men (1991) #24. They’ve had a back-and-forth relationship for the past 30 years, until they got married in X-Men Gold (2017) #30.
In March 2024, “X-Men ’97” premiered. It stood as a follow-up to “X-Men: The Animated Series” which aired from 1992 to 1997. Cutrer especially loved Gambit’s representation in this show, as the ‘90s series was his first introduction to the character.
“Oh, he’s this guy that wears this trench coat, and he throws cards, and he’s from the south like I am. Which was so cool because there aren’t a lot of Southern superheroes. It’s like Rogue and Gambit, and that’s pretty much it.”
Cutrer pointed out that there are other Southern heroes, but “they don’t embody what it means to be from the south… He very much embodies that Southern attitude.”
Clayton said that when “X-Men ’97” was announced, he was cautious.
“I thought that it was a bit of a silly idea to revive the ‘90s series instead of just making a new X-men story… I expected it to be as silly and as Saturday-morning-cartoony as the original show was, and then I was absolutely blown out of the water by how good it actually turned out to be, and I think they wrote Gambit wonderfully.”
Spoilers for Episode 5 of X-Men ’97
In episode five, during the genocide of Genosha, the safe haven for thousands of Mutants, Gambit gives up his life, saving hundreds and ending the massacre.
Clayton said, “It’s one of my favorite Gambit moments ever. There’s a wonderful little nod they give in it as well, a lot of the show seems to be in conversation with the comics, they go out of their way to let certain characters get redemption for things they’ve done in the comics,”
Clayton thinks Gambit has some universal appeal, due mostly in part to the character’s cool factor.
“I think the real selling point is that he’s the king of thieves, the cool thief guy, and he is charming and awesome, and his power is really cool… Here’s the charming Cajun Rogue that does whatever he wants, steals things, a very Robin Hood-esque,” Clayton said. “And on the deeper level, he is this really damaged and interesting character that covers for himself in this way by presenting himself as what he knows everyone is going to love.”
Clayton also thinks Gambit’s inherent connection to the Cajun South is a unique trait that gives the character an extra wow factor.
“I do think it is very neat that he is a Cajun superhero. It’s not a background you see very often. What I would tell people about it, in school and stuff, about why he’s my favorite, there would be a point where I’d say, ’He’s a Cajun superhero.’ Which is like, not a thing,” he said. “You get a lot of New York superheroes, there is one Appalachian superhero, and there is one Cajun one across both DC and Marvel.”
Gambit’s character is largely defined by performance, and Clayton thinks a Gambit story is only worth its weight in ink if the writers remember that the character’s suave coolness is only a mask.
“He’s a very angsty boy underneath,” Clayton said. “Sometimes people just like that persona he puts on, so that’s all he is, but ‘X-Men 97,’ does a great job at not just seeing him as a Rogue.”
One of Gambit’s more recognizable traits is his womanizing, as he’s frequently portrayed as a sort of playboy.
Clayton argued that this too, however, was only a performance.
“He doesn’t truly womanize that often, it’s just a thing he pretends to do. He has been in a pretty monogamous relationship for a lot of his publication history. So I think that’s the most important aspect of him, is his dual-sided nature there.”
In 2022, the character received a solo comic run with one of his creators, Chris Claremont, at the helm.
“I thought it was fantastic,” Clayton said. “I love Gambit solo stuff because they always dive more into the side of the character I really like, which is the thief part.”
The Claremont series was set when Gambit first met Storm, and before he met the X-Men.
“It was good to see a lone-wolf and cub-style adventure between these two, and their relationship was so cute, and I think it helps cement them being the good friends they are later.”
The comics also gave the backstory to Gambit’s iconic outfit, his trench coat and strange body suit.
“I talked to Claremont about that actually, we were at Comic-Con, and he was talking about how he put him in this outfit originally and never really thought about what it could be and so later he addressed that it was from aliens. Which was a weird pick, but also it’s for comic books,” Clayton said. “So, before the events of X-Men, Remy got an alien costume because why not?”
Gambit also made a return to the big screen in “Deadpool and Wolverine” after 15 years of being gone after “X-Men Origins: Wolverine.”
Being such a prominent figure in the Gambit community is a double-edged sword, to Clayton, as three days before the movie came out, he was receiving waves of messages from people spoiling the character’s inclusion in the movie.
Outside of spoilers, Clayton enjoyed the movie and Channing Tatum’s portrayal of the character.
“In a more X-Men film, I hope they treat the culture he’s from with a little more respect,” Clayton said about the response from Cajun Gambit fans hoping that making fun of the accent doesn’t become a trend.
Moving forward, Clayton has a few hopes for the character.
“I think ‘X-Men ’97’ was a perfect little show of how to use him. I don’t think he needs a solo movie. I’d go see it, but I don’t know how popular it would be with everyone. But he is a wonderful character in an ensemble like the X-Men,” Clayton said. “As long as you treat him with some actual seriousness, I think he’s a fantastic character, and I think it’s easy to throw him in a box of that jokester type, but if you ever give him any depth like ‘X-Men ’97’ did, I think it works perfectly.”
