One of the biggest draws for fans in Avengers: Doomsday is the return of veteran actors from Fox's X-Men, such as Patrick Stewart's Charles Xavier, Rebecca Romijn's Mystique, and Ian McKellen's Magneto. Considering it's their last hurrah as the characters, Marvel Studios will be going all out in their send-off, including showing off their powers in ways that have never been seen before in live-action.
Adaptations of superhero comic books typically water down the powers of most characters simply because they'd be too overpowered for the story. Another reason for the absence of certain aspects of their powers was simply the difficulty in visualizing them for audiences.
No, Magneto isn't stepping on Storm's toes with the lightning show in this new promotional artwork for Avengers: Doomsday found by HEXFacility, as this is no doubt a display of his electromagnetic powers. In the comics, Magneto isn't limited to merely magnetism, but the entire electromagnetic spectrum. An aspect of his powers that Magneto has commonly used in the comics, cartoons, and video games.
For example, Magneto used this power quite liberally in X-Men '97, even telling one member of the Friends of Humanity, "Electricity and magnetism are intimately acquainted." He used this aspect of his powers to disrupt electronics, such as the inhibitor collars, but most useful was its ability to create impenetrable force shields.
Something he commonly used, including in Season 1, Episode 2, "Mutant Liberation Begins," when he brought the UN into the upper atmosphere to make a point, with his electromagnetic shield woven at the subatomic level to form a completely sealed barrier. It's just a shame that this visual of Magneto's powers has never truly made it into live-action.
The closest that any of the movies ever came to depicting his electromagnetic powers this way was in X-Men: Apocalypse, when the titular villain deliberately powered up Magneto. With his newfound power, Magneto formed a protective bubble around himself that not even Evan Peter's Quicksilver super speed could penetrate.
However, instead of being surrounded by electricity, it seemed to be more like microscopic shards of metal encircling him as a barrier, with not a single spark of lightning in sight.
With these purple sparks in this new promotional artwork for Doomsday, Magneto will likely have a chance to show off the full spectrum of his powers in this penultimate conclusion of the Multiverse Saga and beyond.
What Other Powers of Magneto's Could the Mutant Saga Show?
Half of Magneto's powers in the comics are outright nonsense, such as astral projection, turning invisible, and, most ridiculously, blocking telepathy without his helmet, but other powers of his haven't been adapted yet that would perfectly align with his mastery over the electromagnetic spectrum.
The most obvious would be Magneto's ability to release an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) to disable machinery, a simple extension of his powers that could be easily visualized. It's also one he's commonly employed in other media, including X-Men '97, where he sent out a global EMP in retaliation against humanity, something directly adapted from X-Men (1991) #25.
Another aspect of his powers, which could, admittedly, become overpowered if used improperly, is his limited control over the small amount of iron in the bloodstream. One application of such control could be as harmless as slowing the blood flow to someone's brain to render them unconscious, or something much worse, as shown in Mythos: X-Men (2006) #1, when he removed all the iron from someone's blood to give them an agonizing death.
Considering the vastness of powers in the MCU compared to the X-Men in the Fox movies, giving Magneto a bit of a boost won't do the universe any harm, especially since Jean Grey's already gotten a considerable one by the end of Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
