There really haven't been any team uniforms in the MCU. Over the course of the many Avengers films, each member has a distinctive style and outfit—but with an added patch. The Guardians of the Galaxy almost had some with their Ravagers style, but it didn't quite hit all the checkmarks.
That's what made Avengers: Endgame's Quantum suits so special. It was the first time that they all had a unified look.
The idea of a team suit is made most famous by the X-Men and their classic blue and yellow attire. However, when X-Men was first adapted to live-action all those years ago, the outfits were simply identical black tactical gear.
It was dull and unimaginative, not to mention the opposite of their comic roots. That adaptation, however, seems to have informed the most unlikely of projects: Marvel Studios' upcoming Eternals.
X-Men's Impact on the Eternals
In a conversation with Screen Rant, Marvel Studios producer Nate Moore talked about how the original X-Men costumes influenced how they designed the wardrobe for the Eternals family.
Moor mentioned that one of the challenges was "to not put them all in black X-Men uniforms:"
"When you have this many characters, one of the challenges is to not, no disrespect, to not put them all in black X-Men uniforms. To give them all personality, but to also make it feel like a whole. To make it feel like they came from the same place because, unlike the Avengers who all have their own mythologies and are brought together, these people all come from the same place."
Costume effects supervisor Ivo Coveney chimed in, saying that "there's a language" to all the detailing and pieces and that each costume "had to be individual characters."
Coveney continued, saying that their suits needed to "look like they were from the same place" but not "like [they] were making an X-Men suit:"
"When you look on the detailing and all of the pieces, there's a language. There's icons that are repeated throughout and that's what's tying them together, the language of the detailing on the pieces. Because production were very keen not to, we didn't make a uniform. They had to be individual characters, they had to be on their own. It wasn't like we were making an X-Men suit that everyone was having. But it was trying to make sure that we could, when you looked at them, they looked like they were from the same place. Born of the same universe, yeah."
The X-Men Already Made a Mark on the MCU
It's no secret that those uniforms in the original X-Men films weren't the most beloved. In fact, the team never got a good comic adaption of their suits—though, X-Men: Dark Pheonix certainly tried.
Marvel Studios has perfectly executed the visual language of all of the Eternals costumes while making each outfit unique, yet connected to the rest. The golden detailing and ancient glyphs help tie them all together, while everyone gets to enjoy their own color palette and uniform structure.
While they didn't have that much of an impact when they were first revealed at San Diego Comic-Con in 2019, the images of the Eternals' uniforms now are absolutely stunning. The deep, rich colors, with simple but intricate detailing throughout truly draws the eye and makes for a memorable visual language.
It won't be long before fans can finally see Eternals for themselves, as the film will be hitting theaters on November 5, 2021.
