Uncanny X-Men - Chris Claremont VII.

X-Men v1 #129-134.

Chris Claremont's run on (Uncanny) X-Men is regarded by many as the best the X-Men have ever been, and accordingly, the Dark Phoenix Saga is regarded as the absolute apex of his work. Mutant X and Days of Future Past are two other storylines cited as standouts. There is some talk of decline in his later years which I don't think is unfounded. At the end of the day, he's only as good as his collaborators. John Byrne is freely credited as co-plotter, and the exact extent of their relative contributions isn't exactly clear. At least in the case of this story though, you should mentally substitute “Claremont and Byrne” in most cases where I type “Claremont.”

The Dark Phoenix Saga's ending is the one X-Men scene everyone remembers, and the whole thing has more iconic moments than you can shake a stick at. Being such a focal point, it's also been hit hard by certain retcons, but not to the extent that it's been ruined. And keep this in mind: as I've tried to emphasize, Claremont excels in long-format stories, with plenty of foreshadowing of the future and referencing of the past. As such, even a compact ten-issue arc like this is reliant on the greater context surrounding it. It's 'only' the payoff of something Claremont and Cockrum started over three years earlier.

The Saga ran from X-Men #129 to #138; it's composed of three relatively distinct parts, two of which I'm covering today. Along the way, it introduced three prominent X-Men (though it took one of them quite a while to get there) and one of the book's most notorious villainous organizations. On a less positive note, what it started here with the Phoenix eventually evolved into one of the franchise's most troublesome continuity problems. And of course, it had THE X-Men death scene, which didn't last long as such and became THE infamous retcon.

First of all, let's talk a little about the art. At this point, it's been twenty issues, almost exactly two years, since John Byrne took over as penciler. Terry Austin has been his inker continuously over that time – with the sole exceptions of issues #109, and #118 (where Ric Villamonte took over). You don't exactly have to squint to see how the art has matured over this period. The later issues seem much more crisper, especially in regards to the lineart. See the comparison I've included. Glynis Wein's coloring certainly didn't hurt either. Perhaps I'm imagining things, but the color palette in the Dark Phoenix Saga seems darker and moodier than before, which certainly plays well into the tragedy and duress that the story depicts. All these talents combined made for a spectacular art team, and one of the most visually accomplished books on the stands at the time.

Issue #129 brings with it some interesting new developments. For one, Sean chooses to stay behind on Muir Island with Moira, in part because his powers still haven't returned from the Moses Magnum incident. This is it for Banshee and the X-Men, at least for the moment. I feel his exit was a little undignified, but on the other hand, I wish I'd see this sort of thing more often in superhero comics – sending unwanted characters off with a happy ending instead of giving them a trip to the guillotine. Even more importantly, Professor Xavier is back from space. After the happy reunion though, things get problematic when he wants to micromanage the team in Cyclops's stead. He doesn't like the individualistic style the All-New, All-Different X-Men have, and even accuses Scott of poor leadership. It makes sense for him to be so out of touch with the new team, since he's spent hardly any time for them, but I do think aspects of this conflict are a bit contrived. After all, Xavier hasn't exactly been shy about trusting Scott with the reins of the X-Men in the past.

Things between Scott and Jean are going great though. You might recall Scott not showing much of a reaction to Jean's seeming death in issue #114. Well, it turns out that was nothing! He was just closing himself off emotionally. This (apparent) flip-flop on his attitude was handled rather gracefully, with repression effectively being turned into a factor in his characterization, but it does feel a little unneeded. There's a less elegant bit of character development counterbalancing this, however. At some point along the way, off-panel, Kurt has apparently decided to be true to himself and not use the holographic image inducer any more. Hey, whatever happened to “show, don't tell”? This should have been a meaningful step instead of just a random throw-away comment. (Claremont's dense plotting just doesn't leave the time and space needed for such things.) Even worse, Professor Xavier was apparently angry with Nightcrawler for making that choice. This is so incongruous to his later characterization and ideals that it honestly baffles the mind. At the end of the day, Xavier would always encourage a mutant to feel secure in their existence like this.

We also see Jason Wyngarde report to his masters, the Hellfire Club, and meet one of their higher ups, Emma Frost, with the title of 'White Queen'. The Hellfire Club is based on the historical Hellfire Club, a secret society active in England in the 19th century. Their plan seems to involve turning Jean Grey over to the Dark Side. Crucially, we find out that Warhawk broke into Xavier's Mansion in #110 on the Hellfire Club's orders – and he managed to bug the Danger Room, which means that the X-Men have been under surveillance for quite a while.

Regarding the actual plot though, Xavier informs the team that Cerebro has picked up two new mutant signals, one in Chicago and the other in New York. He splits up the team and sends them to meet the 'neo-mutants' (I really hate that term), presumably to invite them to join the X-Men. This isn't actually explained very well. This fairly random incident also raises a few questions. Why did Cerebro pick up these mutant signals now? One of them is only developing her powers, the other has apparently had them for a while. Does this mean there have been absolutely no new mutant appearances in years? And if there have been, why does Professor Xavier feel that these particular new mutants have to be found right away?

Colossus, Wolverine and Storm head to Chicago to meet Kitty Pryde, a teenager developing troublesome intangibility powers, while Cyclops, Nightcrawler and Phoenix go to New York to seek out Alison Blaire, the Dazzler, a disco singer who can transform sound into light. Considering the X-Mansion is located in New York State, I was actually stumped at first as to why Ororo and folks reach Chicago in the daytime, while Scott's group get to their New York destination late in the evening. I can be rather absent-minded sometimes, since the answer lies in the Rolls Royce Scott and the others step out of. The team only has one jet.

The two branches of the storyline are closely linked.

In Chicago, the spunky, thirteen year-old Kitty Pryde is approached under false pretenses by Emma Frost, trying to recruit her for her own private school (which will become very important in subsequent years). As she leaves, the X-Men arrive to make their own sales pitch. They explain to Kitty about her mutant powers and about who they are, and Kitty makes fast friends with Ororo.

At this point, they come under attack by mysterious soldiers equipped with power armor specifically customized for Storm's, Wolverine's and Colossus's individual powers. Although they manage to defeat the goons, the White Queen then easily disables them afterward and carts them off to her secret base. Kitty manages to stay hidden and tag along (intangibility lends itself well to stealth), then make contact with the imprisoned Storm. She manages to call Nightcrawler and explain the situation, and then goes on the run.

Meanwhile, Scott and the others find Alison performing at an extremely seedy bar. I'm not kidding, it's presented as pretty much the worst place in the world. I have a really hard time buying that this is where Dazzler is stretching her creative wings and trying to make it big. One can't really discuss Dazzler, by the way, without saying a few words in eulogy about her music of choice. It's really the ultimate tragedy if you think about it – a disco star character introduced in the year 1980. Considering this little misfortune, she's managed to maintain relevance surprisingly well over the years, and she certainly has her fans.

Incidentally, Wyngarde appears at the club and continues to mind-rape Jean with illusions. He even entices Jean to kiss him, and Scott's reaction to that is unintentionally hilarious. “I've never seen her act like that – it was as if she wasn't Jean at all, only someone who looked like her. Eh?! The announcer-!” Yes, easily distracted puzzlement is his only response to his girlfriend randomly making out with another man. The Hellfire Club attacks the group here as well, and is defeated. Dazzler teams up with the X-Men to get to the bottom of the situation.

In issue #131, Scott's group tracks down and rescues Kitty from goons chasing her. (She is initially more than a little frightened of Nightcrawler's demonic appearance.) Jean telepathically finds out who's been after them from the mind of one of the defeated soldiers. From there on, the team heads on to a Hellfire Club hideout in Chicago to find the rest of the team. Specifically, the most of them make a covert attack while Kitty slips in and rescues Peter and Logan (Ororo is busy with an extremely suggestive interrogation by the White Queen). Here already Kitty makes comments setting up the possibility of a romance between her and Peter.

Jean takes care of Emma Frost personally. The Phoenix utterly dominates their fight, leading to Emma blasting her with a focused psi-bolt that somehow causes the roof to explode, seemingly killing her. Jean and Ororo both get away unscathed, which brings us to our denouement. Dazzler elects not to join the X-Men, saying she prefers life as a singer. In all honesty, Dazzler's role in this mini-arc is rather redundant. She doesn't do much, she doesn't say much and we don't really find out anything about her. She was introduced either for the explicit purpose of joining the X-Men much later, or to show that there are mutants in the world aside from heroes and villains. Kitty, on the other hand, ends up joining Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters – but only after Jean mindwipes her angry parents about her mysterious disappearance. This is supposed to be a disturbing sign of things being amiss with her, and thus Professor X's liberal manipulation of the minds of others in early issues has retroactively become problematic.

On the whole, this story is only the prelude to the prelude of the main action of the Dark Phoenix Saga, and pretty much the weakest of the three parts, though it's still a fairly gripping tale by its own right. While the whole arc flows fairly well overall, I think there are some individual scenes in these specific issues that are awkwardly paced. Jean kissing Wyngarde and Dazzler appearing is one example. Actually, also taking into account the beginning of the next issue, I almost feel as if this story could have used a breather issue to properly space out the action and give some “super-duper happy fun-time” context for the looming tragedy. Of the characters introduced, Alison is a total dud (for now), Kitty is fertile new ground, and Emma is a fairly striking villainess, not least because of her outfit. She had a fairly standard super-villain death, e.g. there's no sign of a corpse, so I guess the implication might have been that she actually survived. However, she might just as well have been just disposed of in an off-handed manner. I really can't tell if she was intended to return later on as she did.

UNDER CONSTRUCTION