#“Jean is the Phoenix and the Phoenix is Jean- now and forever. But they are like planets orbiting—

[seaweedstarshine]

—on the topic of psychotic Summers brothers, I only just caught up with six months of X-Men after stopping for six months the topic of Gabriel referring to the tags of my last X-Men post a month ago — but I was happy to see Scott's torture-induced psychosis didn't (definitively) turn out just to be that he'd calculated what others hadn't. Yes, the woman he'd accurately calculated would save him was Dr. Gregor, not Jean, but that doesn't change that he remained unsure if Jean was real (and thought she was alive) while the all-seeing Enigma knew on the contrary that Scott was delusional because Phoenix thus equally (an equivocation which casts further doubt of Scott's fiery visions ever being genuine, as Jean's dying mind had departed Scott well before Mother Righteous sacrificed Jean's dead fragmented self for Dominion, before Scott was tortured) Jean — were so utterly dead that Rachel and Hope had to cancel out death to reverse it. Yet Scott, hyper-vigilant traumatized autistic brain-damaged neurodivergent soldier that he is, seemingly accomplished all these strategic calculations while having a psychotic “break,” which is extremely in character for him—

[farsight-the-char]

"Now and Forever"

youve died a thousand times before who caaares just climb out of this grave again & again &agaian & agaian & again & again & aga

[rei-ismyname]

Scott and Ilyana

Do you ever think about what it would be like if Scott (and Jean) just ... kept and raised Ilyana? Obviously you can't just keep people's kids if you like them, but Cyclops and Magik have ended up so close with a very interesting dynamic that I can't help but ponder. Better Scott than Belasco.

Two future War Captains of Krakoa, future Phoenix Five. All three are future Phoenix people, now and forever.

[velvet4510]

The implications of Charles and Erik seeking out Logan in The Wolverine post-credits scene together are so huge that they really should be talked about more.

This is clearly a few months to a few years after The Last Stand, and it’s the very first time Logan is learning Charles is alive, and yet Erik is already well aware of it and they are approaching him as a team just as they did 50 years earlier at the bar. Erik even gives Logan the most certain and assuring head-nod when Logan looks at him for silent confirmation that Charles is really there.

So … how long has Erik known Charles is alive? Could he have been the first person besides Moira to find out? Is Logan now the first of the X-Men to find out? You’d think Hank or Ororo would’ve called him as soon as they heard. What have Charles and Erik been doing up till now?

It really touches the Cherik shipper in me - it’s not at all outside the realm of possibility that once they reunited after Erik had temporarily lost his powers, they just completely went off the grid for a while to steal some time together and help each other before the Sentinel thing became impossible to ignore.

If you think about it, at that point in time between The Last Stand and The Wolverine - however long it was - they both were at their absolute lowest, physically and mentally/emotionally. Charles was adjusting to an entirely new body as a result of getting almost killed by his surrogate daughter who he failed to save, and it’s quite possible that his powers may have needed an adjustment period as well; he also likely heard about Jean’s death in the news and thus had to deal with the losses of two of his most beloved students who were like family to him and were probably his vision of the future of the X-Men for a long time. Erik was adjusting to suddenly living without the powers that were so essential to his identity, as well as dealing with the guilt of unintentionally unleashing the Phoenix more than once, and once again accidentally causing Charles to get badly hurt. They both were facing massive loss and massive identity crises and massive PTSD - and seeing Charles alive again would not automatically erase Erik’s memory of watching him get blown to smithereens in front of him and thinking he’d lost him forever. And while Erik’s process of regaining his powers is obvious, it’s likely that Charles too needed some time to get his bearings in terms of his own mutation, as well as everything else he was going through.

So this was really a time where they needed each other, more than ever. They both were so deeply broken and lost that they were on the same page and in the same place for the first time, honestly ever. As someone who’d experienced permanent loss after permanent loss after permanent loss over the course of his life, there’s no doubt that Erik vowed not to let his unexpected second chance with Charles go to waste. It probably didn’t take long for them to rekindle what they - in that timeline - hadn’t truly shared since 1962. I imagine it was not dissimilar to Wanda and Vision’s first scene together in Avengers: Infinity War - hiding away in an isolated place, stealing some peace and quiet, and just letting themselves spend precious time together. And there may have been even more “rage and serenity” moments as they helped each other nurse their powers back to life.

Since it was offscreen, we can only imagine how many tears of grief, joy, relief, frustration, and love were shed during that period, before they found Logan.

[farsight-the-char]

Amy Reeder's cover for Jean Grey #2

Fire and Life Incarnate

Now and Forever.

...

"The Dark Phoenix has haunted Jean Grey since it emerged from Jamaica Bay. But what if the Phoenix had chosen…someone else?" it reads. "The love story of Cyclops and Jean Grey is one of the most beloved in Marvel Comics' history. Now witness a legendary creator break their hearts – and their minds. But this is no 'what if.' Jean Grey is not where she is meant to be…and neither is the rest of mutantkind. Stunning secrets will be revealed as Jean Grey lays the groundwork for her next shocking appearance in 'Fall of X'!"

[50calmadeuce]

Ch. 20: The Wedding (R)

Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction using characters from the Top Gun: Maverick world, trademarked by Paramount Pictures Corporation. I do not claim ownership of the characters and the world that I am borrowing.

The story and situation I am creating are a work of my imagination and I do not ascribe them to official story canon. This work is for entertainment only and is not a part of the storyline.

I am not profiting financially from the creation and publication of this story, but I do hope it gives you happy thoughts.

These stories are my own, so please do not take them and use them for yourself without my permission. If you see them somewhere else, please let me know. :)

The morning of the wedding was absolutely perfect. The sun beamed down, and only a few fluffy clouds dotted the sky. The temperature was expected to reach the upper 70s, with a light breeze that promised a comfortable day ahead—and no rain in sight.

Jake had spent the night in the bunkhouse, so the tradition of not seeing the bride the night before the wedding remained intact.

You sat in a chair, relaxed but focused, as the stylist worked on the final touches of your hair. Your makeup was already done, and everything was falling into place for the big day.

You had decided on a braid, delicate flowers woven throughout, which also served as a natural veil.

Phoenix opened the bedroom door and stepped inside.

“Y/N, you look beautiful!” she exclaimed, her voice filled with genuine admiration. “Wait until you see this.” She motioned toward the open door and called, “Come on in, buddy.”

Christian walked in, dressed in blue jeans, a white dress shirt, cowboy boots, and a black cowboy hat.

You smiled happily and picked him up.

“Yake say I cowboy.”

“Does he now?”

“Yup!”

You pressed a kiss to his cheek just as there was a knock on the door.

“Who is it?” Phoenix called.

“It’s me,” Jake replied. “Is Christian in there?”

“Yeah. Hold on.”

You gently set Christian down, and he ran toward the door Phoenix had cracked open, closing it behind him.

“Mommy pretty,” you heard Christian say from outside.

“Mommy’s pretty every day, little man,” Jake replied with a chuckle.

“No. Super pretty!” Christian insisted, his voice fading as they walked further down the hall.

“All finished,” the stylist announced.

“Thank you,” you replied, your gaze meeting Phoenix’s in the mirror. She gave a subtle nod, signaling for the stylist to exit the room.

“You okay?” she asked, her voice full of concern.

You hesitated for a moment before replying. “I’ve been thinking about Christian a lot lately,” you admitted quietly.

Phoenix's expression softened, and she took a step closer, her hand gently resting on your arm. "I can imagine. It's a lot to process, especially with everything going on." Her voice was gentle, understanding.

You nodded, looking down for a moment, gathering your thoughts. "It’s just... there’s a part of me that feels guilty, you know? Moving on, getting married again." You took a deep breath, looking back at Phoenix. "But I also don’t want to live in the past forever."

Phoenix squeezed your arm reassuringly. "You’re allowed to love Christian and remember him. But you’re also allowed to open your heart again, Y/N. What you have with Jake—what you’re about to start—is a new chapter, not a betrayal."

You let out a shaky breath, her words offering you some comfort. "I just hope I’m doing the right thing."

Phoenix smiled warmly. "You’re doing what feels right for you. And that’s all anyone can ask for."

“I listened to a video he sent me when he was deployed years ago, a couple of days ago,” you confessed, your voice soft.

Phoenix’s expression softened as she listened, her eyes understanding. "That sounds like it was tough," she said gently.

You nodded, feeling the weight of the memory. "It was. Hearing his voice again… it just brought everything back. I still miss him. I always will." Your voice wavered slightly, and you quickly wiped away a stray tear.

Phoenix’s hand found yours, squeezing it reassuringly. "You don’t have to let go of him to move forward, Y/N. It’s not about forgetting. It’s about finding a way to live with both of those parts of your heart. Christian will always be a piece of you, but so will the love you’re building with Jake."

You took a deep breath, her words grounding you. "I know. I just… I want to make sure I’m being fair to both of them, you know?"

"I do," Phoenix replied. "And you're doing just that. You’re honoring the love you had and the one you're creating now." She gave you a small, encouraging smile. "Even though I still don't understand how you fell in love with the cockiest pilot I've ever met. You’ve got this."

You laughed softly. “If you’d ever seen Christian in uniform, you would’ve understood.”

“Come here,” Phoenix said, her voice gentle as she leaned in. The two of you embraced, the hug offering comfort without words.

An hour later, you stood with Phoenix on the back porch of the ranch, the sun beginning its descent in the sky.

“You ready to do this?” she asked, her voice calm but filled with excitement.

You glanced at her, taking a deep breath. “Yeah.”

Together, you started walking toward the side of the barn, where a vast pasture stretched out, with a small lake glistening in the distance. Your breath caught in your throat at the sight before you.

Sheila had truly outdone herself in just three days’ work. The setup was perfect. Off to the side of the western arch, you saw Jake and Javy standing tall in their Navy dress uniforms. When Jake spotted you, you swore you saw his eyes begin to water, but the look in them was pure happiness.

Mr. Whitaker had flown in to attend and to go over some paperwork, but other than him, the guests were mostly Jake’s neighbors—people who had known him since he was a boy.

Phoenix walked you down the aisle, her steps slow and deliberate, the weight of the moment settling in. When you reached the altar, you handed her your bouquet, your eyes locking with Jake’s as he gently took your hands into his.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we have gathered here today to unite these two in holy matrimony…” the pastor began, his voice steady and warm.

As the pastor continued, you barely heard his words over the pounding of your heart. Your eyes stayed locked on Jake’s, and you could see the emotion in his gaze. It wasn’t just love; it was something deeper, something that spoke of years of waiting for this moment.

Jake gave you a soft, reassuring squeeze of the hands, his thumb gently stroking the back of your fingers, grounding you. It felt like the whole world had faded away, leaving just the two of you in this moment. You smiled, feeling a weight lift from your shoulders, replaced by a sense of peace.

The pastor’s voice brought you back to the present. “Do you, Jake Seresin, take Y/N to be your lawfully wedded wife, to love and cherish her for as long as you both shall live?”

Jake’s voice was steady, his answer certain. “I do.”

The pastor turned to you. “And do you, Y/N, take Jake Seresin to be your lawfully wedded husband, to love and cherish him for as long as you both shall live?”

You looked up at Jake once more, your heart full. “I do,” you replied, your voice steady but full of emotion.

“By the power vested in me, I now pronounce you husband and wife,” the pastor said with a smile. “You may kiss the bride.”

Jake leaned down, his lips finding yours in a kiss that felt like the culmination of everything that had brought you both here. It was soft at first, then deepened as if to reaffirm every word spoken.

The applause of the guests was distant, a gentle backdrop to the moment that would forever change your lives. As you pulled away, Jake’s eyes sparkled with joy. “I love you,” he whispered, his words a promise.

“I love you too,” you replied, your heart full and sure.

Tags: @smoothdogsgirl @alwayshave-faith @devil-angel-winchester @khouse712 @illisea @hookslove1592 @tgmreader @juliemarauderfan @djs8891

[wellnoe]

What’s ur stance on Jean and the Phoenix being one in the same or not?

i really take a both are true approach to this question. jean and phoenix are the same, because jean embraces phoenix as a part of and as a version of herself and the 'now and forever' part of jean as phoenix means that we see jean being phoenix (without really being phoenix) as a child in some comics. some stories present the idea that phoenix first became aware of jean not in the shuttle crash but when annie died, when jean tried to save her, which alongside other stories which portray a young jean as phoenix makes it read as if jean is given the opportunity to become phoenix because jean is phoenix.

at the same time i think it is really important to how i see them and their relationship to think of this as a choice that they each make, to be each other and to be the same. jean chooses to become phoenix, to take on her actions as her own, and phoenix chooses to become jean, taking on her image and her actions so fully that she is indistinguishable from her. the level of identification we see between jean and phoenix is not something we see with other phoenix hosts, where phoenix is either completely subsumed or a completely separate entity being used. jean and phoenix, meanwhile, are one only through constant negotiation with each other, and they are not always on the same page in these negotiations! i think this is a way of reading them that allows for a lot of variety in their relationship across different comics and also acknowledges the ways in which jean's relationship with phoenix is different from other hosts' relationships with phoenix.

so my answer is that they are the same and they aren't all at the same time.

[jaidens]

pumpkin spice latte w/ extra whip and carmel w/ my baby rooster 😋😋 also completly disregard this plot if you want but seeing rooster after he’s been away yk at top gun for a while so r surprises him >:)))

And want you now, wanna need you forever In the heat of your electric touch, mm-mm

pairing [s] : bradley bradshaw x reader

warning [s] : mentions of : crying, making out, sex |

a/n [s] : my baby doll dal 🫶 requests are open!

It had been six continuous months without seeing your Bradley in real life. The scent of his cologne and musk had disappeared from your bed and his pillow, causing you to go after anything that has reminded you of him. Whenever you were invited to visit him in Top Gun after they were given a three-week break after a joyous win, you decided to immediately take it.

Deciding to not tell Bradley had killed you, as you watched him through the FaceTime call as he slept in a lonely house by himself. You told him your phone was getting repairs to cover up your five hour flight to where he was drafted, it worked surprisingly well. The flight was long, but your discount with it has given you First-Class seats with many helps from flight attendants to try and help your experiences.

When you landed in hot and humid, San Diego you were almost immediately dehydrated. You had called Penny and Maverick to pick you up from the airport, begging to keep everything a secret. Surprisingly, they kept it quiet and Pete told you he had told them he was taking Penny on a date tonight. The nerves were messing with your head as you mess with the hem of your (Bradley’s) Hawaiian shirt. It was a light and soft pink color, and you swore it looked better on him than it did you. Bradley would disagree, saying it was his favorite shirt you had worn.

“Hot as hell here, jeez.” You joke flapping a piece of paper against your face to try and cool yourself down. Even with the extreme cold air blasting on your face, sweat had still dripped from you. You couldn't tell if it was the nerves in your head about seeing Bradley, or the heat. If you had to assume it had probably been both electives. “I know. Bradley pretty much is shirtless half of the time. I’m tired of it.” Amy says next to you, tapping on her phone.

You laugh as you think of Bradley, who is extremely typical to get naked when it's over 95 degrees outside. You decided to call Jessica, Hangman's long-term girlfriend who had also decided to surprise her big hunk of man on the same day as you. She told you how the pilots were meeting at The Hard Deck and how most of the Navy wives were doing the same. You agreed with her and told Penny and Maverick to take you there for him.

Suddenly it all started to hit you: You would see Bradley in under three minutes after months of missing, crying, and taking screenshots of him on the phone. Maverick pulls into the sandy deck of the bar and parks the car. He looks in the mirror and looks at you. “You ready, kid?” He asks and you nod, opening the door and following after the older woman who had already been walking in. The bar wasn't that crowded, only having pilots and other people that had gotten off of work earlier. It was five o'clock when you landed, so now it was six.

The bar is playing some eighties hits loudly, some rowdy people dancing around with drinks in their hands. You touch yourself up in your phone camera, take a big breath in, and start walking into the back corner of the bar where the pilots stayed. That's whenever you saw Bradley, whooping and hollering about winning the 8-ball game with Phoenix and Bob. Jake and Jessica are rubbing up against each other, kissing and hugging on every second, looking like high school couples in the hallways.

You walk up behind Bradley and when he bends over to hit a ball, you slam up behind and put your hands in the front pockets of his 1980s Levi's jeans. “Wanna teach me how to play?” You tease and Bradley jumps up and wraps you in his arms. His hand goes to the back of your neck and he practically jumps while practically screaming your name in pure and utter excitement at your presence.

“You didn't tell me you were coming!” He pulls away for a second to look at your face, before pulling you back in and wrapping harder around your body. The feeling envelopes you tightly and you feel the need to melt in his arms. “It's a surprise, dummy. Are you surprised?” You ask and now he's nodding quickly before he drops you down and kisses you harshly. His lips are running across you as he pulls you into a bench in the other corner.

“Am I surprised? Of course!” He says sassily at you and brings you back into a deep kiss, his hand messing with the hem of your Hawaiian shirt and the other against your neck as he holds you up in the kiss with him. He's warm and touchy throughout the sweet moment and he takes like a Cranberry Vodka. “Love you, so much.”

“Awh, I love you too honey.” Your hand runs through his fluffy hair that's been lightened from hours of sun, and you stare at this tan skin with freckles littering against his cheeks and nose. His fingers mess with the rips on your shorts and he kisses against your cheek. “God, I missed you so much.” Jessica waves at you and giggles as Jake kisses her away from attention. You laugh at his antics before Bradley pulls your chin and kisses you once more, and you stare into his deep green eyes.

“Thank you for visiting, so much.” Bradley speaks softly in your ear. “Always, and forever when I can.”

[garagepaperback]

trash tuesdays:

thanks to the widely-coveted @yiiiiiiiikes25 for newly minting this approach to the day. i'm happy to have re-discovered this scrap from two months ago, which didn't go anywhere because i was like 'this is just about the nervous game', but now it can be that and also be here.

-

The night's half-past past sloppy, careening towards shit-show.

Everyone's focused, so intense that it’s kind of dumb, an over-acted show of dedication, but Harry keeps catching Dean’s eye, and Blaise’s—even Malfoy’s once. Soon, without really ever actually committing, he's entirely in.

“How fast are you supposed to move?” Ginny asks.

“Whatever pace you like, I think," Blaise smiles, a very public, somehow private way, turning it toward Malfoy this time. Malfoy’s cheek tugs up like Blaise caught it on a hook. 

Harry’s palm skims up Blaise’s trousers, black denim so sleek it seems insulting to think of the fabric as the same genus as jeans, like a phoenix and a pigeon both being associated with a feather, while Malfoy slides his hand, smirk blooming, to the inside of Ron’s thigh, flexing two fingers out long, then curling back, like pressing a slow-rolling quotation mark into the leg.

Ron yelps, jumping up, and almost taking Dean out of the game as well with the force of it.

“Well,” Malfoy announces, shifting with a little shake of his head, already smug.

“You only win if you don’t say you're nervous," Harry reminds him.

Malfoy sniffs, “Fine.”

Across the thin plane of Malfoy's thigh, Blaise's fingers press a tight circle, striking it through with a line and just before Harry realizes he's likely writing a word there, letter by letter, Dean's hand scales Harry's leg with a heavy sort of heat. Harry slides him a ratifying glance. And still, Harry stays half-stuck in the fence of Blaise’s gaze.

Harry hasn't noticed before, maybe, or not this close, or not also while he's got a hand on Blaise's leg—which is so warm, summer trapped in the lean length. And he's got these steady brown eyes, half-lidded, fixed and laden on Harry even as Malfoy slinks his legs open a little wider so that Blaise can stride his fingers teasingly up along the inseam. The bored look on Malfoy's face does nothing to stop the blatant flush sullying his throat, mottling his stern jaw.

Even sloshed, Dean moves cordially. He makes it to just about the bottom hem on one of Harry’s pant legs, rucked just slightly under his jeans, and Blaise tilts his head just as Harry surpasses probably that exact threshold. Though, he doesn’t really seem like the sort to wear pants. 

“All right,” Blaise sighs thickly, and Harry pulls away. They smile at each other as Harry’s spine sinks back slowly into the stingy padding of the booth for only a moment.

Malfoy's hands stays unsettled and slack against his seat, looking off to the side pointedly bored, even though he hasn't really been able to keep himself from looking down that end of the table. He doesn't even glance up as Blaise presses against him, settling back in to drag more letters on Malfoy's trouser leg. A t, Harry catches, then maybe a cursive ch.

It’s an odd combination, all of it. Buzzed and comfortable in the uncomfortable booth, heat licking all along Harry’s chest and shoulders, a swamp of it in the belly. This is the molten middle of the otherwise pretty forgettable evening; nothing, and sensation stacked, Blaise’s gaze and Dean’s hand, wank-fodder for a few solid months, even if Harry has to surgically remove Ginny, Ron, and probably Pansy from the situation. And Malfoy.

Harry's scalp feels tight, a prickling up the neck that’s way-back and familiar, just the same.

“They're going to go on forever,” Ginny declares, leaning her cheek onto the probably un-plush pillow of Pansy’s skull. “Can’t we call it a draw?”

“Kind of cheating to play with someone you’re shagging,” Harry says, rushing the words out to soften the way he adjusts in his seat. It spreads Blaise’s grin. 

“You and Thomas are shagging?” Blaise tilts his head mock-wondering, and Harry snorts. His hand drapes elegantly against Malfoy’s pleated trousers, an easy centerpiece to twill table. Or, if Malfoy’s button fly is the center, an uninteresting epergne, Blaise’s grasp is placed neatly, a well-stacked plate. 

“Not yet,” Dean replies cheerfully, and squeezes Harry’s bicep with his other arm.

If he were smart, he would call it. If this were just about a game, or salvaging the Friday for parts, trying to make something out of the last few hours, he would. He’d laugh and hold Dean’s hand when Dean reclaimed it from Harry's jeans, squeeze the soft of his palm, wait for a lull in everyone’s fractured goodbyes later and maybe grab it up again, quickly, to ask if he wanted to come back to his. But Malfoy’s staring at him now, the practiced way he's never managed to get good at that’s so fake and full of himself and perfectly, awfully Malfoy. And when Malfoy doesn't look over determinedly at Pansy, or reproachfully at Harry, or a little ransacked with Blaise, his gaze skitters back over to the floating bounty, the collected hoard of pocket gold hovering at the far end of the booth. Hungry. The way Blaise is looking at Harry, the way Dean’s hand feels.

-

tagging anyone who sees this! lemme see your scraps/darlings/deleted things!

[bamfdaddio]

X-Factor Abridged: 1986

X-Factor Investigations: for when you need a soapy covert-ops team of mutants that isn’t officially affiliated to the school. Perhaps the most fluid title in the X-Pantheon, they are nevertheless part of the X-Men’s long, tangled history. Want to unravel this tapestry? Then read the Abridged X-Men!

(X-Factor 1 - 7) - by Bob Layton, Louise Simonson and Jackson Guice, Keith Pollard, Joe Rubinstein, Mark Silvestri, Terry Shoemaker

X-Factor is what happens when somebody reads the sixties X-Men and thought: we need more of that! But soapier! Somebody really read Roy Thomas�� run and thought: this is the quality we should strive for. They keep trying to distract me from the mediocre plot with gratuitously naked Angel –  that keeps kind of working. 

One enjoyable thing is the weirdly queer undertones that were put into this first run. And I’m not just saying that because Warren is shirtless nearly every issue and Candy kicks us off with a thinly veiled gangbang joke within the first five pages of [X-Factor 1]

Roll Call

Cyclops - Scott Summers. Uncontrollable eye beams. Recently left the X-Men to raise his baby boy Nathan with his wife Madelyne Pryor in Alaska. Hold onto your butts, because we’re about to enter some heavy character derailment with this guy.

Jean Grey, officially Marvel Girl. Telepath, telekinetic, love of Scott’s life - before she died! It was a whole thing. I wonder how she joins the cast of this book…

Beast - Hank McCoy. Fuzzy, blue and acrobatic genius, back to his thesaurus swallowing ways. (Seriously, he instructs a villain to “orally extract embryonic fluid from a hen’s egg”. Not annoying at all.) Previously of the Defenders, currently looking for a job at a university.

Iceman - Bobby Drake. Subzero jokester. Previously of the Defenders, currently an accountant. My god, y’all are some boring dudes.

Angel - Warren Worthington III. Millionaire playboy with wings. Previously of the Defenders. Has the most boring superpower and personality, and yet still has the dubious honour of being the guy in this title I’d most like to fuck. This confession fills me with a deep yet vanilla shame. 

Madelyne Pryor, Scott’s wife, mother of his child. Also about to get derailed.

Candy Southern, Warren’s girlfriend. Likes swimming, shopping and getting railed, apparently.

Angel, who’s considering himself a washed-up superhero, is renovating his playboy mansion with his girlfriend, Candy Southern, when Reed Richards calls. Jean Grey - you know, who went Dark Phoenix and sacrificed herself on the dark side of moon - is somehow alive! Gasp! Shirtlessly, Warren boards his private plane and books it to New York City. (He is just such a relatable down-to-earth character.)

Angel briefly considers not calling Cyclops, because with Scott happily married in Alaska, Warren can finally make a move on Jean. I’d get mad that Warren disregards Candy Southern so casually, but ‘millionaire playboy’ has been part of his biography since forever. Scott, meanwhile, has married a harridan (allegedly):

I love how that baby just disappears in between panel 2 and 3. (X-Factor 1)

Getting upset that Cyclops is being a deadbeat dad? Good for her! Then minimizing the plight of the minority he belongs to and getting jealous of his dead wife? Nay, Maddie, nay. But hey, if we don’t make Mrs. Summers-Pryor a shrew ASAP, it doesn’t make sense for Scott to reconnect with Jean, so let’s throw in some shouting and yelling! And then, when Warren calls and Scott has to leave, she can throw in an ultimatum that if he leaves now, he doesn’t have to come back!

As sands through the hourglass, so are the mutants of our lives. 

Scott, of course, responds to Warren’s distress call, flies to New York and finds…

She looks pretty good for a dead bitch. (X-Factor 1)

So how is Jean alive? Well, the Avengers found a pod on the bottom of the Hudson Bay, from which Reed Richards extracted this Jean! Apparently, the cosmic entity of the Phoenix did not possess the actual Jean, but created a perfect copy of her and possessed that. That copy went and did the whole Phoenix Saga, while Jean lay dormant in the bay for the entire time.

Well, fuck that with a rake.

Imagine you’re Chris Claremont. You crafted the Phoenix Saga, but were told that Jean could not survive, because she genocided a planet of broccoli people. You rewrote your ending, so that Jean sacrificed itself. That turned out to be a blessing in disguise, because it made the Phoenix Sage ever more poignant. And then editorial decided to piss all over that because they really really wanted the original five X-Men back and so they undid that beautiful ending by saying: “It was a clone all along” and, oh yeah, they also went ahead and assassinated the character of Cyclops. I can only imagine how steamed he was.

Why didn’t they just substitute Scott and Jean with Havok and Polaris? That way, Scott could have retired in Alaska with Maddy and Jean could have stayed dead. Ugh. UGH.

Oh, and somehow, Jean’s nap in the Hudson Bay got rid of her telepathic powers and she’s just  a full-on telekinetic now. Did I say ugh? Because UGH.

Anyway, Jean steps over her own miraculous resurrection right quick, points at the tv and newspaper and is all: “Look at this anti-mutant sentiment! Everybody hates us! We gotta do something! And we can’t return to the X-Men, because Magneto took over the school!” (So… you’re not even going to try and call your best friend, Ororo? Or was that relationship wiped out with your retcon-resurrection?) Warren agrees, something has to be done and then…

Time skip

We see that Beast is being rejected from his tenth interview at a university for being an obvious blue and furry mutant. (Sad!) Warren then recruits him for some new initiative and then gives Bobby a call:

Hilariously, it takes Iceman three mere weeks of being an accountant to say: fuck that (X-Factor 1)

Warren also picks up Cyclops, who has a beard of sorrow. He hasn’t talked to Jean or Madelyne in the past three weeks and apparently, that’s just how he rolls now. Whatever. Warren and Jean pitch their idea: X-Factor! They will pose as a group of mercenaries who hunt down mutants for a fee, while secretly helping these mutants in trouble! Warren will bankroll X-Factor, while Candy Southern will take care of his other business. They also introduce Cameron Hodge, Warren’s old college roommate who’s going to handle their PR. Everyone is on board, except Cyclops, who is still deeply embedded in paralysing angst. He hems and haws, not because this is a terrible idea rife with mistaken identities, but because he just doesn’t know what to do about his wife!

Fucking hell.

But then, their first job! In San Diego, a sailor, Rusty, is taken for a night on the town by his Captain, and then this happens:

So is Emma the Captain’s… girlfriend? Are they into threesomes? Is he her pimp? This relationship is weirdly unclear. (X-Factor 1)

I’m not a big fan of Rusty. Layton looked at the varied group of New Mutants that Claremont created and said: “I’ll have none of that. I’ll create a milquetoast dude with generic fire powers and call it a day.” The most interesting thing is that Rusty’s powers got triggered because he got sexually assaulted by a woman, but no writer will ever acknowledge that. Instead, it’s presented as Virgin Angst. 

Anyway, the captain, who’s a huge mutant-hater, calls X-Factor. They show up, snatch up a Rusty who’s freaking out and serve the captain a whopping bill for their services, which is a hilarious detail. The group is all: we could not have done this without Cyclops and his leadership skills and Scott is all: that sounds about right.

But what about Madelyne? Well…

I wonder what Carrie Bradshaw would have to say if you told her that your husband dumped you through a commercial that he made with the previous love of his life. (X-Factor 1)

I will mock this title a lot, but there are some things I like:

I like the pivot to X-Factor Investigations, giving this title a different spin than a regular X-Men title. I just wish they didn’t also pretend to be mutant-hunters.

Despite the throwback to the sixties, Marvel Girl has more agency and has a better use of her telekinesis. She’s one of the hard hitters now, as it should be.

There’s a throughline of anti-mutant sentiment, which pops up at every junction. It makes sense, considering that X-Factor is a lot more centered in NYC than the regular X-Men are.

The, eh, ridiculous amount of shirtless men. 

I wasn’t kidding: Warren is shirtless at least once an issue and, apparently, he has emotional heart-to-hearts with Scott wearing nothing but underwear and robes. It’s a wonder Scott can piece together a coherent sentence. (X-Factor 2)

What I really dislike is the obvious reverting to earlier times. The author revives the Scott/Warren/Jean triangle, even though that was done and dusted in the sixties. Jean is just a telekinetic, Beast is no longer blue and fuzzy… Actually, that last bit doesn’t randomly happen: there’s some plot involved. Beast runs into another throwback to the past, his old stuffy librarian girlfriend called Vera, except…

Sufferin’ Sappho! Vera also runs a store for left wing music and South American literature. Apparently, we’re not meant to read through the lines and suss out that she might be a lesbian.  (X-Factor 2)

Beast is kidnapped from Vera’s by a bio-chemist named Carl, who has a mutant son named Arthur. (Artie! Bless! <3) Artie is a mute who can read and telepathically project his thoughts into images. He’s also disturbingly pink and bald, in an ugly cute kind of way. Carl, his father, uses Artie to spy on Beast’s thoughts, who’s fixing Carl’s equations as a thought experiment. With Beast’s help, Carl can fix his envelope-pushing treatment. What’s that treatment? Well, Carl can reverse mutations! Or he thinks he can. And before unleashing that treatment on his son, he needs a guinea pig.

Yeah, that’s exactly how Beast loses his blues. But first, we have to open the issue on yet another… suggestive picture:

It’s not just me, right? You’re all seeing this? (X-Factor 3)

Beast usually doesn’t do it for me, but this picture is… Er. I know that the X-Men have a reputation for being horny, but it’s usually not as explicit and male-oriented as this.

ANYWAY. 

X-Factor find a totally bandaged Beast in the basement of the compound where Carl is hiding. So, yes, there’s this trope in soap operas where somebody is completely wrapped up in bandages after a horrific accident, all to have a big reveal later when those bandages are removed and… gasp! The person underneath is completely changed! (Usually, because they hired a new actor.) This trope was so corny they spoofed it on Ugly Betty, and this comic just plays it completely straight.

Ugh.

ANYWAY

The bandages come off and Beast is all hairless. Good golly Miss Molly! Look like he just lost his most recent mutation!

Carl the crazy bio-chemist was apparently not supposed to be having a secret lab in the basement of an anti-mutant hate group, so when X-Factor comes a-knockin’, the guards of the compound start shooting. Carl sort-of tragically gets shot and implores X-Factor to take care of his boy, Artie, before he expires. 

So yes, that’s the second stray X-Factor takes in. Make that three, if we count Artie’s kitty, Muffin.

I’ve known Artie and Muffin for only three panels, but if anything happens to them, I’ll kill every other character in this book. (X-Factor 3)

Damn, little orphan Artie gets a real art upgrade in the nineties. There, he’s just a cute pink chibi kid, but now he’s a patchy-haired, liver-spotted Roswell E.T. without the charming green skin. I guess being uggo he engenders more sympathy. Not that leaving a kid with X-Factor is a stellar idea: Scott can barely take care of his own.

Yeah, you being a deadbeat dad is directly caused by the uncontrollable eyebeams you have, even though you’ve got ruby glasses to contain them. Fuck off, terribly written Scott. (X-Factor 2)

What follows are some clunky stories where a so-called Alliance of Evil try and pull various nefarious things for their shady master. They’re honestly a bunch of losers and the only name you need to remember is Frenzy. She’s cool. She almost pulls off kidnapping Rusty – but, like, why would you ever kidnap that dude? He’s about as exciting as wonderbread. Especially interesting considering that their master is none other than… Apocalypse!

Yo, Apocalypse, you used to hire these bozos? Man, you were really strapped for lackeys in between Horsemen, weren’t you?

Top to bottom, that’s discount!Ant-Man, discount!Multiple Man, discount!Boom Boom and… well  Frenzy. She gets a pass. (X-Factor 5)

Oh, and this is the last of the porn-y panels, I swear, but like: come on, there is no heterosexual explanation for this:

Ironic, how the only canonically gay one is wearing the most. (X-Factor 5)

Warren! That’s your work out… well, outfit is too strong a word. Work out briefs? Jesus Christ. 

If I gave this writer any credit, I’d say that the focus on Warren’s perfectly chiseled body might be serving as a contrast as to what happens with Warren later, after the Mutant Massacre. But alas, after the one-panel introduction of Apocalypse, Bob Layton fucks off from this title and gives the reins over to Louise Simonson. (I think she’s the first female writer for our merry mutants who is here to stay, so yay! Sadly, all the pin-ups of Warren stop.) I wonder what made Marvel pull Layton off this book mid-story. Maybe the sales were disappointing? Maybe emulating the run that got this shit cancelled in the sixties didn’t turn out to be such a hot money-maker after all? I guess we’ll never know.

Simonson gets saddled with an unfortunate plotline where a mutant named Michael uses heroine to block his uncontrollable powers. (His powers is that he can jumpcharge mutants nearby, making them tap into their untapped potential.) Everyone keeps calling him a junkie, even the heroes - like, Cyclops? Maybe a little sympathy for this dude? No? Anyway, Apocalypse is obviously interested in anyone that unlock anyone’s full genetic potential, and uses the guy’s girlfriend as leverage.

I’m not a huge fan of Simonson - while she’s leagues better than Bob Layton, characters still tend to make decisions for DRAMA instead of common sense - but she does bang out a few amazing plots and she’s created or molded a few great characters. Her characterization of Apocalypse is immediately spot on: 

Like Magneto, Apocalypse is a natural born drama queen. It helps to imagine all his hammy speeches in the voice he got in X-Men: the Animated Series. (X-Factor 6)

She also immediately clocks Warren’s greatest superpower: his wealth and his white privilege. Like, X-Factor accidentally destroys a residential home and Warren’s all:

Where did he keep that wad of cash? Should I be jealous of it? (X-Factor 6)

My god. This title has me simping for Warren. It truly is a barren wasteland if this is the character I'm most into.

In other tragic news, both Michael and his girlfriend perish while the Alliance and Apocalypse battle X-Factor. Sad. 

Because X-Factor arrived at the scene as mutant hunters and then changed into quick drag into mutant heroes, the Alliance suspects they are related. When reporters come to televise this whole mess – Michael’s house was destroyed – the anti-mutant X-Factor are linked to the pro-mutant ‘X-Terminators’ and the X-Factor compound immediately becomes the staging ground for a protest between pro- and anti-mutant people. 

Oh hey, it’s Trish Tilby reporting for duty! She’s like the X-Men’s Gale Weathers.

Anyway, Scott still can’t spit it out, even though he inadvertently calls Jean Maddie. Fuck, he really is his daughter’s father, isn’t he? And just when he finally has the backbone to confess he is married, Jean figures it out all on her own! She’s big mad. (Well, at least that makes sense. I’d also be mad if I was trapped in a clichéd soap opera plot.)

We end this plodding run on a B-plot that involves unhoused mutants living in a radioactive dump which is somehow also near New York. I know the Big Apple was bad in the eighties and I’ve also seen radioactive goop in Halloween: Freddy Takes Manhattan, so maybe this was just a thing back then so let’s not worry about it!

Anyway, Rusty meets a Morlock! A pretty Morlock, so we know she’ll be important. Sort of. Rusty and Skids don’t make it out of the nineties. (They don’t die, they’re just… narratively forgotten. A fate worse than death.) 

It’s hard to be a more boring character than Rusty, but Skids gives him a run for his money. (X-Factor 7)

Well, at least Skids has great outfits, but soon even that position will be usurped by Boom-Boom. Them’s the slip-slidey breaks, Skids.

Skids comes just in time to introduce the Morlocks to this title, because, well, we’ve got a big event coming up. During that event is actually when this title starts to gets some of its sea legs: it’ll spread its wings! So to speak. Poor Warren. Anyway, check back for the Mutant Massacre. (The first one.)

Best new character: Frenzy!

Most audacious retcon: It’s the worst! Not the whole Phoenix-cloned-Jean-and-took-her-place debacle. The fact that we never see Artie’s cat Muffin again!

What to read: Please don’t.

[dailyjeangrey]

“I am fire and life incarnate! Now and forever — I am Phoenix” — Uncanny X-Men #101

Jean Grey/Phoenix + Aesthetic

[afro-hispwriter]

Maximoff?(2)

Peter Maximoff x reader(main)

Wanda Maximoff x reader(past)

Warnings- y/n has dark humor, the Avengers, Thanos and the blip, Phoenix Force!reader but she doesn't know that yet;), Vision slander, semi-slow burn

Italics- past

Bold- telepathy 

Part 2 of “Maximoff?” 

a/n-the part 2 nobody asked for

-

"Hi, I'm Y/n L/n, your favorite telepathic superhero or not. I mean, I should be because I am helping clean up the mess Thanos made while the Avengers go in their depressive little hole and think about their failure." You press your lips together and shake your head. "We should really start hating them more, they really don't fix the cities they destroy. And guess who has to clean it up? Me, people from Stark Industries, and volunteers." You point behind you.

"Haha, aren't you an avenger?" The interviewer asks awkwardly.

"No I'm not an avenger, they just want me as a weapon. To do what they can't." You crossed your arms and shrugged. "You know I offered to destroy the soul stone but my ex-girlfriend decided that her red airhead boyfriend that came out of a refrigerator was more important." 

"You sound a little hurt at talking about Wanda and Vision, did it hurt when she left you and does it hurt that she's probably gone forever?" You cocked your head to the side.

"Not anymore, it's been 2 years since the whole Sokovia accords thing, and I am definitely over her. And she always talked about her dead family, guess now she gets to see them. As does everyone who disappeared." You laughed awkwardly before face-palming. "Sorry, Sorry."

Swoosh

The chatter behind you became distorted before slowing down to a complete stop. You looked around confused and everyone was moving very slowly. You looked back at the interviewer and the cameraman and their eyelids were still in the process of a blink. 

"I didn't do this." You say and press your lips together. But out of the corner of your eye, you saw someone walking around normally. He had silver hair, wore a Nirvana t-shirt, jean jacket, and some tight jeans(that made his ass look great). He turned around and you locked eyes making him stop, suddenly a goofy smile appeared on him before his eyes widened in shock at the realization that you were looking at him.

Who are you? You ask him through your mind and he looks at you confused, still trying to grasp whatever was happening. Before he could open his mouth you sent him flying back, stopping whatever he was doing. Everyone started moving again and you made your way to the man. 

"Everyone take a break." You say and the people around you stopped moving completely. I stopped in front of him and placed my hands on my hips. "Who are you?" 

"You're a mutant?" He asks you to curve an eyebrow. People have called you a monster, criminal, a weirdo. But never a mutant. You rolled your eyes. 

"Excuse me?" You passed and searched his head. "Peter Maximoff wait- Peter Maximoff? Maximoff!?"

“Maxi- I never told you my name." He says and he sits up. You didn't answer at first, but your heart started racing. 

"Wanda all those people dying wasn't your fault."  You tell her as you passed your fingers through her hair.

"They certainly think so." She says as she watched the news. You shook your head and grabbed the remote and shut it off. 

"You were protecting cap, that's all that matters." She just shrugged and started to bite her nails. Suddenly Vison fazed through the wall and you and Wanda untangled from each other.

"Vis we talked about this," Wanda says with a sympathetic look on her face. Your eyes widen and you scoff. 

"Talked about this, so he's done it before. Creep." You sneered and Vison stammered. "Get out." You had said through your teeth, Vison winced and pressed his thumb and index finger into his head. The stone in his forehead felt like it was throbbing. 

"Just came to say Mr. Stark is here with a guest." He says and instantly walks out, out the door this time. 

"Why do you hate him so much?" Wanda asked you.

"He's bad news Wanda, that stone in his head is bad news. I can feel something bad will happen." 

"Doesn't mean you get to control him. You promised you wouldn't control or get in the heads of us or me." She grabbed your hand and entwined your fingers. You sighed and nodded.

"I know I just, I feel like whatever is inside of me is starting to break free, and I can't control it." 

"I know the feeling." She says and kissed your cheek.

A small smile came to your face at the memory. 

"Have you seriously not caught on that I can read your mind and control others?" You answer him and gestured to the people around. He opened his mouth to say something but just fumbled with the words and just shrugged. "Who do you work for? Thanos?" He looks at you in confusion.

"T-Thanos who is that? I mean I've heard the name because my friend Wade calls this other dude, Cable, Thanos but no I don't know who Thanos is. Sorry, I'm rambling." He says and stands up. You nodded and turned away from him. He was telling the truth, but you needed to know more. So you flicked your hand everyone started moving again and started walking away.

"Follow me Maximoff, you have some explaining to do." You say and Peter doesn't hesitate to follow. 

- 

"You have a Lamborgini?" He questions as you walk up to the black shiny car. 

"I have a rich friend. Get in." You say and unlock it. Peter pops the door open and the door lifts up. The face he gave was as if the most amazing thing just happened. Once you both were sitting in the car and the doors closed and you started driving you started asking Peter more questions. 

"So you're from another Earth?" 

"I guess, but I didn't know there were other earths."

"Felt that, but I've learned were not alone." You say with a slight gloom in your voice. 

"You sound like you've seen it first hand?"

"I have, and part of that is the reason why everything looks destroyed." 

"By Thanos?"

"Yeah, with a snap of his fingers, half the population disappeared and you can guess how that went. People disappearing while driving, flying planes." 

"Where were you while Thanos was doing all this." You let out a chuckle

"On vacation. It wasn't until everyone around me was disappearing that I knew something was wrong. Now I'm out here going around and helping rebuild, because I know damn well the Avengers won't do it themselves, they're too busy dwelling on their loss to help the ones still here."

"I'm sorry the Avengers?" Peter asks in pure confusion.

"Earth's mightiest heroes?" 

"Oh, so like the X-men. At least that's what we are called where I am from."

"Nice." You say and you fall into an awkward silence. Peter's eyes ran around the entire car. It was so nice and clean. 

"So where are we going?" 

"Headquarters."

-

The way Peters's eyes lit up and his jaw slacked at seeing the building was adorable. He looked like a kid on Christmas. 

“Here we are.” You say and park the car in your designated spot that had your last name. The doors opened and you stepped out. Peter again looked in awe and she stumbled out of the car. You were walking pretty fast and were almost at the building before Peter noticed. He zipped to you and almost knocked you over. 

“Sorry babe, almost knocked you over there.” He says and patted your shoulder lightly. You whipped your head around and glared at him.

“Babe? I'm not you babe.” You say and Peter frowns.

“Sorry, I say that a lot.” You let out a hmph and opened the door. He followed you to the elevator and stepped inside. “How rich is your friend?”

“Pretty rich.” You smile at him and his nose twitches. The elevator dinged on your floor and you stepped out. “Hungry? Thirsty?” 

“I can always eat.” 

“What do you want?” You ask and you turn the corner into a kitchen. 

“Got any Twinkies?” You didn’t respond just opened the pantry and looked around. Frowning at the sight of no Twinkies but settled on a box of brownies. “No Twinkies but I have brownies.” 

“Oh, those are cool too.” He says but you can tell he was a little sad and probably needed something that made him happy after everything he has gone through. 

“Okay.” You closed your eyes and smiled, then opened the box. In your hand was a wrapped-up brownie. Peter reached out for it but before his eyes, it started to change. It was so familiar to him, as he watched the brownie distort and then become a Twinkie. It suddenly clicked.

“My friend Jean used to be able to do that.” He says and he frowns. You knew when to respect people’s privacy, so you wouldn’t pry on your own. Peter noticed your silence and cleared his throat. “Is it safe to eat?”

“Yeah.” You say and hand it to him. He opened the plastic wrapping and grabbed it. “I guess we should find out how to get you back, your people are probably worried.” 

“Yeah probably. But I'm not rushing.” He says and smiles up at you, a slight twinkle in his chocolate eyes. You looked down away from his gaze and felt yourself warm up. 

“My friend, Bruce-.” You were cut off by Natasha walking in the kitchen. She stopped at seeing you weren’t alone but chose to ignore it and ask you about it later since her news was urgent. “Nat? Everything okay?” 

“We got a hit on Thanos.” 

-

[spongebobafettywap]

I can't begin to describe how badly Mystique and Destiny got woobified during the past 5 years, Maz. It was straight out of fanfiction in the levels of cringe because the writers and characters were as close to babying these two grown-ass women at every turn as it gets (this is the worst trope anyone can pull when writing flawed/evil LGBT characters seriously).

I guess an example speaks louder than any essay analysing the intricacies of this character bias : They had Hope Summers, the teenager who was nearly killed as a baby by Mystique under the orders of Destiny's diaries to save Rogue while risking dooming mutants post-M day, give a PEP TALK to Destiny during her "my wife is gone" filler phase of the plot, saying stuff about how strong Destiny was and all kinds of other adjectives she couldn't possibly know about this woman she barely had any canonical interactions with.

The writers used Hope, a character as unrelated to any of this family feud as Xavier was before Spurrier's origins retcon, as a cheerleader for the reveal of Nightcrawler's new parents : She was backing up Destiny the second she heard this new thing about actually being Nightcrawler's mother this whole time and straight up said she was so happy for him, even though Hope was in the front row seats to see how little fucks Destiny has given about Kurt not only since she met him, as the dude literally died to save her in 616 and nothing was done to prevent that avoidable death, but also since she became a member of the same mutant government Destiny, Mystique and Nightcrawler were a part of. She was in the front row seats to see Mystique publicly belittling and insulting him for any of his opinions and ideas while Destiny didn't stop Mystique, ignored his ass while he suffered from his horn illness then went totally MIA and was useless and passive for anything that wasn't about Mystique including her now new son's fate.

Tell me the character (Destiny and Mystique) is the writer's pet without telling me it was the writer's pet

Yes it's pretty well established that this retcon is pretty fanficcy, doing the usual tropes of making the story and other characters bend to make the couple look better and have it revolve around them. Honestly with how similar these stories end up being to the point where it's a stereotype of fanfics why do people even bother being fans of different couples? It seems it's less the characters they're drawn to rather it's just like an outfit for their ideal romantic characters to dress up as.

I also feel like you came to the wrong person when looking for sympathy for Hope Summers. To me she's always just been a plot device and for a long time I resented her because of that and the fact that Nightcrawler was sacrificed for her sake and then she basically doesn't even care about him dying and mind you he was actually dead for a few years which is forever in comic book time lol. She was also the reason why they decided to make Bishop an evil guy willing to kill a child for a while because well we can't make Cable a villain let's just villainise one of our few recurring Black X-Men! That's surely not gonna bite us in the ass when we have to start talking about how diverse our books are!

Had Bishop been her adoptive father and wanting to protect her against a deranged and evil Cable would have been far more unique and interesting because now it was someone who isn't a Summers trying to protect the Phoenix imbued person and the Summers is trying to be the force that actively wants to destroy that person.

So yeah Hope and Destiny are both these leech characters to me who absorb all the good aspects of other characters and have to have everyone else be written ooc to make them look good or compelling and I do not have any time for characters like that. Hope especially because she's just a regurgitated form of Rachel Summers but made to look like Jean but connected to Cable who himself is also a regurgitated version of Rachel's story only this time being a Rob Liefeld version of Terminator.

The only decent future Summers relatives to me were Rachel Summers and Nate Grey, Rachel had that storyline first and Nate Grey felt like an improved and unique version of the concept of Cable.

I don't want to sound too harsh because maybe she is being written ooc but to me it's hard to say if she is because I never got a hint of a personality from her and this type of writing seems par for the course.

[rei-ismyname]

oddly enough, the krakoa era is making me come around on Scott Jean. My X-men reading has been a little all over the place lately, I think what initially bothered me with claremont’s scott and jean was that the phoenix was so much more interesting to me then what Jean and Scott had going on in the early days.

I like when writers give them a rapport, i’ve been trying to read original X-factor as well and among a few things, the fact that they don’t have much on screen chemistry drags things down. Now, I’m aware that I might be too early in all of this to call things, I haven’t read all 16 years of claremont and I certainly haven’t finished X-factor. I still need to finish 90s X-men.

What made Scott and Emma entertaining to me, was that they bounced off one another. I did truly enjoy what they had going on in astonishing, for example. It felt like a more mature, realized relationship. Maybe it’s because it has less baggage then “we’ve been together and occasionally not since the 60s,” that’s just my guess for my own enjoyment.

Sorry if this was a tangent, I mean to ask your opinions on either pairing? What do you have more fun reading?

Hello there! Turns out I have an awful lot of thoughts, and I had to edit judiciously otherwise I'd keep yammering forever.

Nice! Same here, kinda. I'd been out of comics for a decade or more until House of X pulled me back in. I didn't have the strongest feelings about them either way except for thinking the movies did a crappy job of capturing them separately or together. I was taken aback at first by the domesticity they'd established, but it didn't take long for me to appreciate it as a framework for storytelling and character study (and as something precious to threaten.)

I hear that and agree! For all that the Phoenix has been beaten to death as a plot device, it did so much for both characters 'growing up' for lack of a better term. I've come to view every element of comics through the lens of adaptation - not exclusively - but the O5 are adaptations of Superman and the other superheroes that predated them - and each iteration of the X-Men are adapted from what came before it. It's not a bad thing (mostly) but different hands at different times with different mandates adapt the concept into something else, using classic iterations in as many ways as possible. I feel that the Phoenix conceptually pushed the adaptation somewhere quite bold - and grew up.

I've probably read most of it, but there's just so much - plus I acquired a disability that fried my memory ~10 years ago so I'm always re-reading to enjoy it (kinda for the first time) and to rebuild those memory pathways. TLDR same, bestie. Let's touch base in 6 months, hey? 😀

I really enjoy both couples and don't have a preference as long as it's written well without going back to the misogyny well or just killing Jean because they don't know what to do with her. The Phoenix is both Jean's original sin and the start of her canonisation, while being incredibly powerful. Annoyingly, Marvel overdid it but couldn't keep Jean alive for so long.

Scott/Emma are fascinating to me for so many reasons. They're a power couple that inadvertently recreate many of the same dynamics Scott and Jean did, due to the telepathy and being thrust into leadership (by Jean no less.) They support and challenge each other, they practice radical honesty and make each other better, they have to navigate the reputations they have (fair and not) while trying to keep an endangered species afloat during a period of constant war. Seriously, the 'lost decade' is just endless trauma and genocidal threats. They went through hell together, even when many abandoned or opposed them.

They're both strong individuals who know who they are and what they want, but they're quite different people even in their similarities. They almost shouldn't work, but they do. If you told me they'd be a long term couple when Emma was first introduced I wouldn't have believed it. No way. Like Emma's radical character arc and face turn, they grow together while having all the doubts.

They're both heirs to 'The Dream' in very different ways that mesh well ideologically. Xavier and Magneto both had unrealistic visions of what was best for mutant rights activism, Xavier in his liberal naivete and Magneto losing himself in the war. Emma is a better teacher than Xavier and can operate well in human institutions, but she doesn't trust them blindly in part because she's been at ground floor of genocide. They've both lost students, but only one of them thinks about it a lot and informs her decision making.

She's got the pragmatism and proactiveness of Magneto without slipping into the megalomania (usually.) A diamond fist with the interpersonal skills and resources to build a coalition. She's overlooked as a leader I think, but ideologically she strikes me as the next generation of mutant activism who learnt from the mistakes of old men and actually listens to the kids.

Scott has been a disciple of Xavier since he was a kid, but when The Dream didn't fit reality he ditched it and made plans. He had Xavier and Mags as advisors, and formed a synthesis of their dialectic approaches. Together they embraced not just personal growth, but a revolution in X-Men operations. I enjoyed reading almost all of their time together but especially Utopia era when they were at their power couple peak blazing a new path for survival.

Scott and Jean have known each other since their early teens, but for all that they were high school sweethearts they spent decades apart. They have their own lives and achievements separate from each other, but the love is always there and they bring out the best in one another. They went through hell too, but Jean wasn't around for the darkest times. This drastically affects their worldview, and the God/Mortal dichotomy is a fascinating extension of that and power dynamic. Importantly, they accept each other as they are and there's so much love and understanding present.

That's the core of them for me - no matter what they're always ride or die, yet secure enough to be individuals with different lives and agendas. Their normal is hectic to anyone else but they make it work. Importantly, they've both grown a lot, as much as comics will allow at least. They've been through shit and learnt from it, including situations that would melt most people's brains. There's a lot of forgiveness and understanding too, as long as there's forward movement. Right now is an interesting example - Jean needs to be in space so they make it work. I hope they're allowed to.

Krakoa was peak in general for me, and definitely for Scott and Jean. Wholesome family time with a backdrop of superheroics and polyamory? Hell yeah. Both have good relationships with Emma and Logan, with the boring love triangles and rivalry in the past (yes they were all fucking, I don't care what Tom Brevoort says.) Krakoa meant something different for each of them - safety with one foot in the human world for Scott and progressivism for Jean (a bit reductive but you get me) - which led their growth in different directions. That core partnership was there underneath it all, and they got through everything, even death.

[nthflower]

That issue where Emma and Scott just explain how awful people they are and their darkest deepest secrets to each other is so good.

Emma is like "I pushed jean to dark phoenix, I betrayed my students, I did awful things to Laura to make her leave, I failed wither, I joined Norman's cabal, I killed my own sister using death of my students as a excuse because actually I saw in her myself because I am an evil evil person who uses children for my own gains and ego."

And Scott is like " I formed a secret assassination squad behind everyone's back for doing dirty work but it backfired so badly it hurt X-Men more than it helped, I caused lots of meaningless violence in the name of greater good but it was all lies, I think of terrible horrible things using the worst pains we faced as weapons to my enemies, three of our kids kidnapped and i tell nobody because just keeping things secret and just send them to another mission, I am the worst of worst person now just to keep the name of X-Men clean."

And both of them later are like " NOOO you are so wrong you did this for children/mutantkind I am the real evil one noooo" and kissed. Wonderful. Then they were also like "avengers X-Men they can all hate us if they learn but we have each other and we love each other who cares it's us Vs the world. I will trust and love you forever and ever evil or good."

They learned nothing now and just made each other feel good about some real awful shit they actually did and I love them. Being toxic together and loving each other no matter what. With zero secrets. They love each other so much they can accept every behaviour the other one did. And tell everything without any fear to each other. Unfortunately everything includes lots of murder and child abuse.

[keepsmagnetoaway]

X-Men 129 (January 1980)

Chris Claremont/John Byrne

It's late September in this one-comic-a-day project and the dawn of the 1980s in the actual publication timescale of these comics: it's the moment we've all been waiting for. It is, finally, the Dark Phoenix Saga.

It's good to be back. I'm going to try and resist the temptation to rehash in great detail the plot of all these issues, but this is what so much of the last few years of Claremont has been leading too: a ten-issue run of unparalleled high stakes that changed the X-Men forever and is usually regarded as their finest story ever. We'll see at the end if that's true, I guess. One great thing happens right at the beginning, though: Banshee fucking leaves.

I'm being a bit harsh, but I just never liked Banshee. All the begorrah-bejesus stuff is exhausting, his leprechaun castle backstory is insane, his powers are baffling, and his role in the team was...what? "Older sensible guy"? That's never going to be a particularly interesting position. So, farewell Sean, and hello again to Xavier, who has finally returned from space bullshit and appeared right in a panel with some clashing patterns that are giving me a migraine.

Meanwhile we get our first real look at our antagonists, though they've been lurking around for a while (including in some retroactively inserted stories), and one of them - Jason Wyngarde - has now appeared a couple of times to psychically send Jean back to a Regency romance novel. But now we finally properly see the Hellfire Club.

"Regency-themed sexual deviant Illuminati named for the actual Regency deviants' club and heavily inspired by that one Avengers episode" is a totally fucking bizarre idea for a villainous group, but it works. It's unlike anything we've really seen before for the X-Men and it instantly brings a kind of spooky, literal cloak-and-dagger quality that feels very exciting and mature, even when it's all basically silly. That's not all for introductions this issue, though, as Claremont has another piece to put on the board (this is a very Hellfire Club-inflected metapor, sorry) as this storyline kicks off.

It's Kitty Pryde! She's here! Well, she's in Chicago, as you can see, but still. It's remarkable to realise that, although the revival had been going for five years at this point, Claremont had not yet introduced an actual new character to the team, playing in the sandbox of the existing characters and the ones he created for the initial Giant-Size relaunch. Kitty - though of course we don't know it yet - is here to change that with her instantly recognisable and distinctive features (loosely based, apparently, on Sigourney Weaver) and with her various key differences from existing team members: most notable, she's only thirteen (and also, Jewish - note the necklace). Kitty, as you can see, is being courted by Emma - but the X-Men are also onto her, and she likes them a lot better.

God, I love this panel (uh, slightly insane comment from Kitty about skin colour aside): the layout, the use of colour in the background, the facial expressions. Note Peter and Logan back there: Logan's reading a porn magazine and Peter's eyes are popping over his shoulders. And on the next page, he gets called on it, before things kick off.

Right, anyway, Kitty. I'm well aware that there are Strong Feelings about her and various things that have happened to her since, but this is a banger of an introduction and I adore her. The audacity of droping her in like this and then having the three actual X-Men get owned is brilliant, and this is how the issue ends.

There we go! It feels like whole vistas have suddenly opened up: the Hellfire stuff is suddenly so adult and intriguing, but then we also have plucky teenage Kitty showing up for what seems like a Saturday morning cartoon. It shouldn't all work but it does. And we haven't even gotten to any Jean stuff yet!