The X-Axis – 24 June 2026
X-MEN #32. (Annotations here.) I know, I know, we’re into the next week now… but let’s run through these anyway. This is part 2 of “Anomaly”, which is basically the X-Men’s science team finding a comatose Schwarzchild and running into Department H. I’ve said before that this book is generally stronger on its shorter stories, but this time the pacing is working better for me. Purely on a plot level, not a huge amount has actually happened in these two issues beyond, well, finding Schwarzchild and running into Department H. But that’s left plenty of time for the book’s second-tier characters to breathe, and I’m actually pleased to see we’re getting the generic Department H guys rather than Alpha Flight characters who would demand more of our attention (and redirect the focus of the story). Tony Daniel does a rather nice take on Magneto getting a chance to be himself again briefly, and Schwarzchild’s intentionally blank mental plane avoids being visually dull thanks to some nice colouring work. I’m liking this arc so far.
WOLVERINE #22. (Annotations here.) In which the loss of Wolverine’s healing factor turns out to be to do with nanites that have stolen his powers and given them to Taskmaster. It’s rather weird to see nanites being presented as cutting edge stuff – they were a bit of a cliche twenty years ago – and the book can’t really seem to make up its mind whether Wolverine is on his last legs or whether he can still put up a fight against Taskmaster. And come to think of it, it’s a bit weird to treat the loss of Wolverine’s healing factor as life threatening stuff while referencing the fact that Cecilia Reyes has seen it before – which she has, in a story where it turned out to be pretty manageable, really. I don’t really mind if you want to ignore that story to sell the drama of this one, but don’t remind me about it while ignoring it! Still, I quite enjoyed this – the idea of a regular hospital which actually has the ability to treat mutants is quite interesting, and Logan’s reaction to the prospect of dying at least feels right. This run of Wolverine has been patchy, but this story feels fairly solid on the bits that really matter.
GENERATION X-23 #5. (Annotations here.) End of the first arc. I struggle to see it finding an audience in this market, but I’m enjoying this. Hopefully we’ll get some actual names for the characters in the next arc, because god knows I still can’t remember the numbers, but they’re distinctive enough in appearance and personality that it doesn’t actually matter as much as you’d think. And there’s a lot more going on in character terms than might first appear. X-Infinite is a genuinely interesting character with a mixture of self-absorption and sincere concern for his fellow Generated – I don’t think he’s lying when he claims to feel guilty for his role in their creation – but Laura’s apparent inability to grasp why he might feel that he had no choice in the matter is kind of fascinating. There’s still a lot of work to be done in fleshing out these characters outside Facility-23, but presumably that’s where we’re going next issue, and I”m looking forward to that a lot. I struggle to imagine this book finding an audience in the current market – if it makes it past issue #10 then I’ll be very pleasantly surprised – but it’s pretty good.
X-MEN: OUTBACK #1. By Steve Orlando, Stephen Segovia, Alex Sinclair & Joe Sabino. Another month, another flashback miniseries. I can’t help wondering who the audience is for these books – surely there can’t be that many current readers who are nostalgic for 30-40 year old continuity? If there are, that seems terribly unhealthy. With Psylocke: Ninja there was at least a case to be made that it was worth going back to look at a glossed-over part of Betsy’s life from a modern perspective, and face the problematic aspects of that back story more directly. Outback feels much more like “hey, remember this”? It’s mixed – Orlando has reasonable ideas about how the X-Men feel about having committed to hiding out in Australia and pretending to be dead, particularly those team members who were less on board with the idea. And Stephen Segovia handles those aspects fairly well. But I’m much less convinced about opening with a story where Sabretooth just finds them and has to get his mind wiped. Sure, you can have Sabretooth refuse to believe they’re dead and go looking for them – I don’t have a problem with him finding Logan in Madripoor, say – but having him succeed feels like it misses the point. The whole premise of this phase of the X-Men was that they had completely dropped off the radar and it can’t go wrong that quickly.
Roma’s spell should have made the X-Men undetectable, even Forge could not find them. But Sabertooth who is still more a marauder then a main solo antagonist at this time can, I assume his super senses have been upgraded so much that he can small his man crush Logan on the other side of the world.
How Sabretooth found the X-Men in the Outback is even more ridiculous than that. He borrowed some of Sinister’s discarded projects that could track a target anywhere. Um…. sure.
When I heard Outback announced, I was hoping this would actually go into the uncovered time between the X-Men’s sacrifice and rebirth, and when they showed up to battle the Reavers and steal their home. I figure there was always an untold story about how they made the decisions to pursue that goal. There’s a very brief mention that Roma sent them to pursue the Reavers but…
I expect this continuity implant mini will be as impactful as any of the others, which is to say not at all.
I want to say the Russell Dauterman covers for Outback are nice, but even they feel a little phoned in. *shrug*
The narrator at the start of X-Men Outback is probably Mojo, since he talks about the X-Men’s supposed deaths leave “a big hole to fill in the programming schedule”.
The way that Sabretooth finds out Wolverine is alive is also ridiculous. He journeys to the cabin where Silver Fox and Logan lived. and finds a fresh hair. Let’s break down the ways that this is stupid.
First, Wolverine didn’t know where the cabin was at this point. He didn’t find out until Wolverine 65, when Nick Fury took him to the cabin. (This story takes place before Wolverine 1.) In fact, he wasn’t even sure that the cabin existed between Wolverine 49 and 64- he thought it might be a memory implant.
Okay, so let’s use the “Wolveirne’s healing factor causes amnesia excuse” fror why he forgot about the cabin. Let’s also assume that Gateway teleported him there and he didn’t tell anyone about it except Gateway. (Gateway wasn’t in contact with the X-Men between Wolverine 49 and 65.)
But the other problem is that this issue takes place before Uncanny X-Men 230. Uncanny X-Men 230 takes place very shortly after the X-Men arrived in the Outback. At one point Longshot hears voices and wonders if there are prisoners of the Reavers being held captive that the X-Men missed, So Uncanny 230 had to take place maybe 3-4 days after the X-Men defeated the Reavers at the most if any prisoners would still be conscious. So we’ve basically got to assume that Wolverine went to the cabin maybe two or three days after arriving in the Outback.
Later on, Storm says that Jessan Hoan suffered just for knowing the X-Men. But that’s not what happened. The X-Men arrived at the Reavers’ base after the Reavers started brainwashing her to turn her into a Reaver against her will. Longshot interrupted the brainwashing process but she was left half evil/ half good. If the X-Men hadn’t gotten involved she would have been turned completely evil. Maybe Jessan Hoan would have been saved if the X-Men got there earlier but that’s not the same as her suffering just for knowing the X-Men.
Later on, Longshot says that he’s lived rougher than the X-Men’s Outback headquarters. But the problem is that when Longshot was in the Outback he didn’t have any memories from before he met the X-Men. So all he should remember living in is the X-Men’s Mansion and Muir Island. In fact, Longshot left the X-Men to try to regain his memories. Then, in X-Men 5-6, Longshot, Dazzler and Lila Cheney are teleported to the Mojoverse and Longshot has his memories back. Presumably he regained them in the interim or perhaps being in the Mojoverse brought back his memories.
At the end of the story, Psylocke wipes Sabretooth’s memories and has Gateway teleport him away. This is odd because at the time Baby Cable was the Marauders’ prisoner and Lorna was possessed by Malice. So the X-Men were determined to find the Marauders. To be fair, Orlando does try to create a situation that justifies this. Sabretooth has excellent psychic defenses, so Betsy would have trouble reading his mind. Betsy has to get rid of Sabretooth quickly because she has no idea how long it will take for the Maruaders to notice he’s gone. Sabretooth’s powers make it extremely difficult for someone to follow him unnoticed, so it would be hard to follow him back to the Marauders’ headquarters. Maddie is conveniently absent, so she’s not there to do the “Where’s my son?” thing. But it still seems weird that the X-Men would just let him go. Especially since this takes place before X-Men 230 and in X-Men 240 the X-Men are using a search program to find the Marauders. it just seems odd that the X-Men would let Sabretooth go and then shortly afterward use a search program to try to find the Marauders.
@The Other Michael- the most interesting untold story would be how Maddie felt between the beginning of her transformation into the Goblin Queen in X-Men 234 and her full transformation into the Goblin Queen in issue 238. Because she still tries to aid Jennifer Ransome in issue 235, and in issue 238 she claims not to remember what the Goblin Queen did in issue 237. So was she, for example, pilot Maddie, part of the time and the Goblin Queen the rest of the time? Was she slowly turning evil? Orlando is going to address this in issue 4 but I’m not sure that I trust him to do it.
@Thom H- The problem with Dauterman’s covers is that they don’t match the story inside. For example, in this issue, the cover has Betsy wearing her armor and Ali wearing her bare midriff costume but they’re not wearing those costumes in the actual story. Issue 4’s cover is a gooner cover with Maddie and Alex in their Goblin Queen and Goblin Prince outfits but the variant cover shows them fully dressed, like they should be, because issue 4 takes place between X-Men 234 and 235.
Bleeding Cool’s Bestseller List is out. None of the X-Books made the top 10. Being beaten by Captain America and Infernal Hulk is embarrassing.
By the way, Jamie Maddox and Glob Hermasn appeared in Infernal Hulk. The Eldest fed them to a magical tree and is using them to grow its army.
The problem I always have with these flashback minis is that, to my mind, there needs to be some valid justification for their existence: either the writer has an angle on a past storyline that we haven’t seen before, or there’s some merit in re-examining something we *have* seen before.
And I can’t think of a single one that’s successfully met either of those criteria. The Rogue: Savage Land one ended up being more about Ka-Zar and Zaladane than telling us anything new about Rogue; the Emma Frost one was just generic White Queen (it *might* have been interesting to explore her dynamic with Mystique as arguably the top two X-villainesses of that era, but Chu didn’t do much with that either); Psylocke: Ninja got *completely* lost in all that Hand nonsense that’s never been a good fit for the character; and Schultz’s Rogue mini was a complete waste of time.
There’s absolutely merit in revisiting the Outback era, especially the pre-Genosha part where things were kind of loose and faintly weird, but Orlando starting us off with yet another tiresome Sabretooth vs. Wolverine fight is a red flag. (Wouldn’t it have been so much more interesting if Creed had targeted Betsy instead, given her role in taking him down after the Morlock Massacre?)
Psylocke: Ninja would have been more interesting if it dealt with how Betsy felt about finding herself in a different body. It made an attempt but only the bare minimum.
I think there are some places you could fit in Flashback mini.
Havok – magistrate, Alex between going through the Siege and turning up leading the press gang in Extinction agenda.
Shadowcat – the Bullet, Kitty aimlessly drifting through space for 5 issues it well have as much impact as many of these books
Jean and Besty power swap – explaining what happened in the 6 month gap in 2000
Magneto Xorn, explain how Xorn took Magneto’s place or vice versa and what the other xorn was doing
Corsair – Starjammer a retelling of daddy summers capture and imprisonment and his failed attempt to save his wife
Vulcan Darwin the missing years. Just Darwin and Vulcan Drifting through space
@Diana- Schulz’s Rogue mini isn’t really a flashback mini. There were flashbacks IN it but most of the action took place in there present,
Psylocke: Ninja looked like it was going to be dealing with something that was barely addressed in continuity- Betsy’s guilt over causing Peter, .Ali and Alex to lose their memories without their consent- but that’s just resolved with an “I’ll apologize the next time I see them”.
I think that Creed finding out Betsy was alive somehow would have been even more contrived than the way he found out Wolverine was alive.
I am the audience for Outback. This is the team I first read and I feel it has been mostly ignored for decades. I love spending time in that era. Yes, it is purely nostalgia and it is going to be awkward trying to make it fit into that exact moment in time. It can’t do anything too permanent, but when books are cancelled and rebooted every six months nothing is permanent in the present continuity, why not do the same thing in the eras the aging readership has nostalgia for. That answers the ”why does this exist” question for me.
That doesn’t mean it’s above criticism and analysis though. I was immediately disheartened to see Sabretooth, Silver Fox, Wolverine’s birthday showing up, that’s just some Wolverine nonsense that should stay in his own book. They were explicitly hiding out because of the Marauders and other dangerous enemies. Having one of them show up the day after they move into their new hideout is ridiculous. Also, personal preference, at this point I want Sabretooth to be a Marauder team member, I don’t like him having main character energy here.
I liked the demon dogs, I think they are the kind of thing Claremont would have show up and I wouldn’t question it. I think they set up the interpersonal dynamics nicely. I’m curious what they’ll do with Maddie, I feel like that’s an easy character to try to cram too much new stuff into.
I have a low bar for this series but after one issue it’s mostly meeting it after one issue.
@Alastair: I’m sure some of those are tongue-in-cheek, but it does drive the point home that most, if not all, of these minis seem to specifically relate *only* to Claremont’s first run. It’s not as if we’re not far enough away from the early ’90s or even Utopia for that to be just as appealing, but no one seems to even be thinking in that direction.
My memories of the Outback period are such that I could welcome a continuity implant in that time period, but I doubt that I would be lucky enough to find one that fit my bill.
That was a bold time with an unusual status quo that opened the way for new stories, certainly. It just happens that I found it quite mishappen and often just plain uninsteresting as well.
If I knew for a fact that it would delve into the psychological toll of their newfound, unintentional isolation, now we would be cooking. Particularly if they put some focus into Madelyne, a character that was treated very badly both in and out of universe at that period, to the point that I can’t convince myself that Claremont knew why he brought her to the cast or what he hoped to accomplish.
If I am being brutally sincere about it, I have to assume that Claremont created Maddie specifically to explain Cyclops’ retirement. Nothing that I saw from his usage of the character after that plan was dropped was convincing. Every single plot involving her amounted to kicking the can ahead or lazy endings of otherwise unworkable plots in the lead up to Inferno.
Also, we have her being put on a bus (or rather a hospital) in #206 up to #215, with a still unexplained dead body turning up in X-Factor #13 in the meantime. It is not hard to see Claremont feeling a bit territorial about his character, but that does not make the published stories better.
Chris Claremont created Madelyne as a snub at Marvel editorial forcing him to kill Jean Grey. He wanted Scott and Jean to get married and live happily ever after, but Shooter took that away from him. He created Madelyne to be Jean reborn on a meta level, as a wink and a nudge to the readers (“You know who Madelyne really is.”), but in-universe she was a new character who just happened to look exactly like Jean snd it was all about coincidences. That way Claremont got to tell the story he wanted to tell with Scott; marrying his one, true love and retiring.
Of course, then Shooter decided to greenlight the return of Jean Grey with X-Factor, and Bob Layton decided that it was fine for Scott to drop his wife for his once-dead ex, and the rest is history. It ruined Claremont’s plans for Madelyne (or you could say that Marvel editors ruined Claremont’s intentions for Scott and Jean twice). That left a number of problems that Claremont had in figuring out where to go with Madelyne, until it finally lead to “Inferno”, as Madelyne had to be sacrificed for the sake of Scott’s character.
I figure the inspiration for all the nostalgia flashback minis is one of the best-received pieces of X-Men media in recent years being the ’90s nostalgia cartoon, whose next season is about to debut.
Anyway, the next continuity implant story ought to be the adventures of sassy baby Magneto after he’s de-aged by Mutant Alpha.
Did they ever explain how or by whom the other mutants (like the Blob) who were de-aged with Magneto were restored to their rightful ages? Were they also on Muir Island and aged up off-panel at the same time?
Paul forgot Moonstar #4. It was enjoyable, like the rest of the mini.
It was mentioned in passing at some point that when Erik the Red used his ray to reage Magneto, Blob, Lorelei, and Unus were kept in the next room, and the ray ended up working on those three as well.
I stopped reading the X-books after Inferno, which was a difficult decision. But I’d been buying them on autopilot since the Outback era started.
After the excitement of the Mutant Massacre, where so much happened, the Outback era seemed to drift along kind of aimlessly.
I couldn’t believe that these characters weren’t trying harder to get back to their normal lives. Wasn’t Kitty like a daughter to Storm? If they could hide literally anywhere, why the Australian desert?
And I just couldn’t deal with all the magic anymore. Or Mister Sinister, who seemed ridiculous.
I know every X-reader has an era they love, and I don’t want to poop on the Outback for anyone. It just wasn’t for me. Too far from the original concept, I guess.
I like Orlando, and he seems to be addressing some of my concerns, so I’m interested to see what else the book has in store. I doubt it will accomplish anything substantial or satisfying, though.
The Outback era is probably my second favourite period of X-Men, after the Romita Jr. period. I thought Claremont could have done better with the execution, but I greatly enjoyed the stories. I felt the X-Men never achieved those heights again until Morrison, although I did also enjoy the remainder of Claremont’s tenure.
It seemed like the Mutant Registration Act should have played a larger role in the X-Men’s decision. To escape the American government growing more draconian, they would take their own deaths (well, kind of “faked”) and hide out in an isolated location to continue their fight against enemies like the Marauders (later the Reavers).
Still, plenty of fun stories until after “Inferno”. I wish Claremont would have kept the Outback status quo going for a bit longer, but seeing that Claremont’s time on Uncanny was quickly ticking down by the end of that era, it was probably for the best to move onwards (even if I didn’t enjoy what followed as much as the Outback and “Inferno”).
Having written all that, I really have no desire to revisit that time. I own the back-issues if I want to relive the nostalgic feeling for a time when my own life was quickly changing just as much as the comics (I was in middle school during that time, and a lot changes in a child’s life between 7th and 8th grade).
@Chris V- Claremont has claimed that Maddie wasn’t supposed to be Jean- it was just a coincidence. Of course, if an editor DID order Jean resurrected the simplest way to do it without damaging Scott’s character would be to reveal Maddie was Jean. All the fans thought that if Jean was brought back, Maddie would turn out to be Jean. Of course, what Byrne didn’t realize is that sometimes the reason the fans expect something to be done a certain way is because any other solution is just too messy.
@Luis Dantas- after Jean was brought back, Clatemont apparently intended for Maddie to become a human badass normal that was part of the X-Men. There’s a drawing floating around online by Silvestri showing Maddie with guns and a costume.
I know Claremont’s SAID it was supposed to be a complete coincidence that Madelyne looked exactly like Jean and was in a plane crash the same day as Jean’s death, but it’s crazy to believe he actually meant it at the time. Even if he never intended to follow up on it himself, the entire setup was flagrantly inviting another writer to tie Madelyne to Jean sooner or later.
It probably would’ve made more sense and hurt the characters less for X-Factor’s opening arc to have Madelyne somehow turn out to be an amnesiac/reborn Jean, with some loophole to absolve her of the broccoli genocide.
@Diana – Like the rest of the line, I am sure that X-Editor Tom Brevoort has an excellent reason for- no, I can’t finish that. Not even in jest.
Part of the reason for the Outback was to allow the X-men to proactively strike against their enemies, anti-mutant forces, and all around bad guys without endangering their loved ones. That covers the Reavers, the Brood, and the Marauders before it met the fate of 99% of the “proactive heroes” and reverted to reactive heroing. The genre is really reactive, it’s no knock against reverting to type.
With that in mind, striking at some Shaw Industries Sentinel factory, dealing with Hellfire Club operations, those are the sorts of things that a continuity implant could do. Maybe throw in a few nods to the future, like maybe inspiring the MLF (say they gathered and were ineffective before Stryfe took over) or that Shinobi Shaw was responsible for leaking the location of the Sentinel factory (in general, not specifically to the X-men), and I think something entertaining could be done.
If feeling ambitious and wanting to make a statement, it could be a dissection of why proactive superheroing doesn’t work, along the lines of the Squadron Supreme 12 issue maxiseries.
Another idea for a continuity implant series would be an expanded and full version of the one panel mention of the Shadow King taking control of the Hellfire Club from Magneto, but that probably wouldn’t be as entertaining as 5 issues of Kitty-in-the-bullet.
@Michael: That image is captioned “Molly Dodd meets Indiana Jones” (which is presumably the one from “The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd” a late 1980s sitcom about a divorced woman that I’d never heard of). There’s also someone on Reddit claiming it’s not Silvestri’s art, but actually theirs.
I never really thought about it that way, but it would have been much easier to retcon Maddie as Jean with her mind stolen, than all that business about a pod on in a hole at the bottom of the sea. I guess Layton et al also wanted to get rid of the baby?
Here’s the drawing for those interested:
https://www.reddit.com/r/xmen/comments/pcwxkn/concept_art_for_madelyne_pryor_as_a_member_of_the/
That helmet is extremely goofy. Both of them.
As for this week:
X-Men – good. Glad the backbenchers got something to do at last. Nice to see Beast stretch his legs. Even if I’m not sure I buy that he asserted his authority and had his leadership moment so easily. That didn’t quite read as Hank to me. (If Magneto brought the team under control and then asked Hank for a solution, that would have been more in line with the traditional character dynamics… then again, I guess Magneto is in a slump in this run).
Wolverine – nice to see Cecilia Reyes, even if I doubt she’ll have a role other than as an exposition delivery device. Nice to see Taskmaster, too, hope he manages to get out of this story without getting maimed/killed.
Other than that – yeah, Logan’s state is widely inconsistent from scene to scene and I’m not terribly interested in the whole thing. Still – this run had worse arcs.
Generation X-23 – I was shocked when… that one… tried to kill X-Infinite, but then I realised – why am I shocked? I know nothing about that one.
Still, it’s not bad. Laura had worse ongoings. Won’t be surprised if it gets cancelled at #10, but there is potential here if it got more issues.
X-Men: Outback – mediocre and unnecessary. The Outback era has room for additional stories, so I’m still interested in this mini, but this wasn’t an auspicious beginning.
Moonstar: The Forgotten X-Book – decent, but very clearly the penultimate issue. It can’t rush to the finale, but it’s done with the second act already, so we’re kinda twiddling our thumbs here.
@Si- The pod was Kurt Busiek’s idea from when he was a fan. It was because Shooter refused to allow Jean to return unless she was absolved of the murder of the D’Bari. He told it to Roger Stern, who told it to John Byrne.
Now, why they didn’t just say that Maddie was a Jean who escaped from the pod powerless and amnesiac, who knows? Possibly, as you said, Layton didn’t want Jean to be a mother.
As one of the absolute dozens of Molly Dodd fans, I can confirm she was both divorced and had a similar hairstyle to that sketch for a season. Don’t even get me started on her on-again, off-again thing with Moss, though…
@yhrze: Too many people forget that in that first Madelyne storyline, Mastermind is explicitly manipulating everyone’s perceptions to increase her resemblance to Jean. It stands to reason *that* was Claremont’s original take – that she looks like Jean, but it’s more Scott and the others who are projecting onto her because of their lingering grief. Had it not been for X-Factor, that probably would’ve been the end of it.
Not exactly true. There’s the scene where Scott shows Madelyne his locket with the picture of Jean, and Madelyne’s reaction is, “It’s me. She looks just like me.”, which would be weird for Madelyne, herself, to project those feelings upon a photo of Jean. Claremont did intend for them to look like twins. He spoke in an interview once about how he believes that every human has doppelgängers, and by sheer fate, Scott happened to meet one of the doppelgängers of Jean Grey. The problem was that Paul Smith was the artist, and he had his own interpretation of Madelyne that didn’t look very much like Jean, outside of them both being red-heads (even the hairstyles were very different). Mastermind’s tricks were to add to the paranoia around this woman who looked “exactly like” Jean, to make the X-Men believe that the Phoenix had returned.
So anyway…maybe people were humouring Scott. “Uh, yeah. Sure. She looks just like Jean. Uh-huh. Scott isn’t having a breakdown, no way.”
Alternately, maybe Scott can’t tell different red-heads apart. “Peter Parker is dating…Jean? Impossible. She’s supposed to be dead, yet she’s taken to calling herself Mary Jane.”
@Chris V- But it wasn’t just Scott. Lilandra tried to kill Maddie because she thought she was Jean.
OTOH, Colossus was confused when Lilandra tried to kill Maddie, so clearly he didn’t think Maddie was Jean.
(The hairstyles were supposed to be different though.)
Chris: Well, remember that Scott is viewing everything through red tinted glasses.
Michael: It’s possible that to Lilandra one alien human looks pretty much the same as another.
@Diana Too many people forget that in that first Madelyne storyline, Mastermind is explicitly manipulating everyone’s perceptions to increase her resemblance to Jean.
OK, I’m REALLY glad to finally hear I’m not the only person who thought this! I know it’s somewhat contradicted by the reactions of other characters and Madelyne herself, but… I think the reality is, Madelyne definitely was supposed to bear a VERY strong resemblance to Jean. That’s not something that never happens in real life. The scene of Maddie acknowledging this when she sees a picture of Jean can be taken as hyperbole due to her discomfort over her new boyfriend apparently having *such* a specific type. Or maybe she’s equally being influenced by Mastermind.
As for Lilandra? One of her defining character traits is being an asshole who rushes to judgment. Being familiar with the legend of the Phoenix and its propensity for rebirth, she saw Scott in the company of a very familiar-looking redhead and immediately feared the worst.
After Mastermind’s deception is revealed, I don’t think it was quite meant to be taken that Madelyne was IDENTICAL to Jean. Not to the point that Scott would be suspicious (and bold) enough to flat out ask her if she was the Phoenix resurrected. Nor for the other characters to be freaking out because they think they’re literally looking at Jean. This wouldn’t necessarily be apparent in the art because a.) Paul Smith was already drawing Madelyne with a different hair style from Jean, abd b.) There’s a change in artists the very issue Mastermind is defeated.
That said, I think Claremont WAS trying to have it both ways.
Despite all his assurances, in-story and otherwise, that Madelyne was her own person: it should indeed be taken with a wink and a nudge to the reader. Madelyne was his way of giving Scott and Jean their fairytale ending after it was denied to him previously. “Sure Jim, I know I can’t bring Jean back. Of course Madelyne is a totally different character. We’re just having some fun here. Cross my heart.”
The Mastermind story gave Claremont the plausible deniability to sell that after Madelyne’s initial introduction.
In conclusion: I believe the intent was for Madelyne to look a lot like Jean, without actually passing for her twin/clone, but also… she’s totally Jean (on a metatextual level).
I love the idea that Cyclops is so obsessed that he thinks every redhead is Jean.
Mary Jane? Jean.
Red Sonja? Jean.
Jackpot? Jean.
Arcade? Jean.
@Chris V Of course, then Shooter decided to greenlight the return of Jean Grey with X-Factor, and Bob Layton decided that it was fine for Scott to drop his wife for his once-dead ex, and the rest is history. It ruined Claremont’s plans for Madelyne (or you could say that Marvel editors ruined Claremont’s intentions for Scott and Jean twice).
Yup. And just like Madelyne’s creation was Claremont thumbing his nose at editorial for derailing his original story, his addition of Madelyne to the cast of X-Men was his way of driving home just how thoroughly they had ruined Scott’s character by fucking him over a second time. If Madelyne just appears in that one, terrible first issue of X-Factor and disappears, she’s effectively out of sight, out of mind (exempting the 2-3 panels per issue where Cyclops dithers over whether to call her, then gets distracted by a new mission to persecute one of his people). But if Madelyne is still a complex, functional character? Written sympathetically by her creator, taken in and treated like family more so than her own husband, and by his former teammates at that? A team deliberately positioned to be philosophically opposed to X-Factor? It serves as a constant reminder of what an idiot and a deadbeat Scott had been turned into. And hence, how stupid it was to immediately and carelessly unwind Claremont’s “ending” for the character.
Far and away, this is best exemplified through Madelyne’s “dream” sequence, signifying her demonic corruption. She finds herself besieged by Scott and Jean, who callously mock her as they take her apart bit-by-bit. They rebuild Jean from her features, reducing Maddie to “a nothing person in a nowhere place.” It’s terrifying, heartbreaking, and gorgeous, perhaps the finest moment of writer/artist synergy between Claremont and Silvestri. It’s also a brutal, scathing commentary on the whole sad state of affairs.
Claremont tended to be a good soldier when it came to executing editorial edicts that came his way, however distasteful. But when he had serious misgivings, boy was he ever sure to let you know about it – in ways that added dimensionality to his plots and characters.
@Cyke88- Rachel does mistake Maddie’s voice for Jean’s in Uncanny X-Men 185. But Rachel was expecting Scott to be with Jean, it’s Scott who answers the phone and Maddie only says “What’s up, hon?” Under those circumstances, it’s likely Rachel couldn’t hear Maddie clearly.
Yeah, a lot of this becomes even more difficult to suss out when you’re not only dealing with a new character meant to bear an uncanny resemblance to an old, dead character – but stopping short of being her outright doppelganger – when everyone around her is ALSO reacting under the confirmation bias of desperately wanting her to be their friend/lover/parent returned from the dead.
There is, of course, every possibility that I’m completely wrong and Claremont created Maddie to be Jean’s double in every way. But I don’t know, that almost feels like being too cute to the point of not even trying. Seriously, EVERYONE is going to accept it’s just a coincidence that this random woman looks like Jean, talks like Jean, walks like Jean, smells like Jean, and just happens to cross paths with Scott? In their line of work, Madelyne being a resurrected Phoenix/Jean is actually the more plausible explanation and something they would have encountered before. Mastermind’s meddling at least gives Claremont somewhat of a dodge, in-story (again, plausible deniability).
The more I think about it, the more I’m coming around on the idea of Mastermind engineering the entire relationship, right down to Scott’s first meeting with Madelyne, as the better idea. Wyngarde finds a woman who looks enough like Jean to raise eyebrows, uses his powers to amplify that resemblance, arranges the meet-cute, then whips everyone into a frenzy over the ensuing relationship and drops the bomb that he used their paranoia to destroy them from within. Yet in his defeat, he actually proves to be the instrument in Scott’s happily ever after (whereas his previous meddling paved the way to Scott’s greatest trauma).
It would have made for a nice inversion of the Dark Phoenix Saga, with the outcome ultimately being the same (i.e. Scott leaving the X-Men), but for completely opposing reasons. I feel like all that’s missing is a thought balloon or something right after Scott resuscitates Maddie, to the effect of: “With Mastermind’s deception lifted, I see it now. Madelyne isn’t Jean. But she is the woman I love.” He declares as much anyway when he later visits Jean’s grave. Even if Maddie wasn’t going to be drawn any differently (look, John Byrne had trouble disambiguating his female characters who weren’t meant to be lookalikes), it does enough to put the annoying question to rest going forward.
Yeah, but that’s ignoring the ret-con that this was all Sinister’s plot, not Mastermind. Unless you are outlining an alternate scenario where the Scott and Madelyne relationship wasn’t ruined.
@Cyke88- in the Marvel and DC universes, superheroes seem to run into people who coincidentally each other almost as often as they run into people who are resurrected from the dead. Just in the Marvel Universe. Rick Jones and Jock Monroe both resemble Bucky Barnes, Alicia Masters is close enough to Sue Richards that she’s impersonated her on at least two occasions and there’s the Daredevil story with Gladiator and Ladykiller.
@Chris V, yes I am (somewhat arrogantly) outlining a hypothetical 2nd draft of Scott and Madelyne’s relationship that would have avoided Sinister and Inferno. (And I love Inferno! In spite of it being a prominent example of Claremont in good soldier mode.)
Although, I have to imagine any scenario where Jean then separately returns would inevitably spell doom for their marriage. Then the question simply turns to Madelyne’s new fate. Murdered by The Right, probably. Or turned into a Reaver? Possessed by the Shadow King? Killed by Sinister anyway (because he still wants Scott and Jean together)? We’ve got some possibilities, and vanishingly few of them allowing for her continued existence, sadly.
@Cyke68- As we’ve discussed before, the problem is that Marvel seems to have had an unofficial “no divorces” policy after the Pyms split up until Crystal divorced Pietro. If it hadn’t existed. Scott and Maddie could have divorced and co-parented Nathan.
Admittedly, divorce doesn’t always save a character- Jean Loring divorced Ray Palmer and she still wound up being depicted as a homicidal madwoman years later. But that’s probably because she cheated on Ray with a guy named Paul. If they had split up under more sympathetic circumstances, identity Crisis could have been avoided. (On a side note, why is the unwanted third party in a relationship usually called Paul? There’s Paul Rabin, of course. And back when Matt and Natasha were dating, a cop named Paul seemed to be Matt’s rival for Natasha’s affections.)
@Thom H: Not just the style, but the hair color as well.
@Cyke68: In Uncanny #75, Mastermind says his plan was to use whoever Scott’s girlfriend was, and Madelyne’s resemblance to Jean was a was a fortuitous coincidence.