I AM The X-Men - Cyclops Appreciation 2023

[xiyon]

Fraction, Ellis and Gillen were great for Cyclops. Bendis was also good. And then he died by the Terrigen Mist and never came back.

Bendis was the start of the decline for me while Whedon was where my interest started. Or, I guess, KYost, as it was the Academy X kids that brought me back to X-Men comics.

Still, in hindsight, Bendis actually wrote Cyke well in contrast to everything that came after, even up to the present :x

I blame editorial especially JDW.

[whitecrown]

A bit saddened to see no writers before the 21st century mentioned so I'll chip in to include Chris Claremont and Louise Simonson.

But Alan Davis' version is also very underrated especially considering he got the gist of the character, which I certainly can't say for just about every writer since.

[xiyon]

A bit saddened to see no writers before the 21st century mentioned so I'll chip in to include Chris Claremont and Louise Simonson.

But Alan Davis' version is also very underrated especially considering he got the gist of the character, which I certainly can't say for just about every writer since.

Pre-Y2K, I was in my single digits age-wise. Primarily consumed the animated series as I didn't have the cash to buy comics at the time. I was a massive Wolverine fan, with a strong dislike for Cyke for "standing in the way of Logan getting Jean". For what few comics my grubby little hands could get, I couldn't for the life of me understand why people even liked Cyke.

In my defense, I was a stupid kid! lulz

Honestly, didn't think I'd be such a Cyke fan years later...

If there is one thing post-Schism did to me, it was actually turn me into a Wolvie detractor (and borderline hater during the AvX, Bendis era, and beyond).

[Gray Lensman]

Pre-Y2K, I was in my single digits age-wise. Primarily consumed the animated series as I didn't have the cash to buy comics at the time. I was a massive Wolverine fan, with a strong dislike for Cyke for "standing in the way of Logan getting Jean". For what few comics my grubby little hands could get, I couldn't for the life of me understand why people even liked Cyke.

In my defense, I was a stupid kid! lulz

Honestly, didn't think I'd be such a Cyke fan years later...

If there is one thing post-Schism did to me, it was actually turn me into a Wolvie detractor (and borderline hater during the AvX, Bendis era, and beyond).

One thing a lot of Cyke's haters never seem to understand. If they turn him into the punching bag/punchline they dream of him being, the entire X-Men series becomes untenable. Logan's rivalry with Scott? If you can't get your OTP away from a total loser after decades, then by default you are also a loser. And a bigger one at that. Did you willingly follow this loser? Then you are a loser too. Did you put this loser in charge? You are also a loser. Did this loser ever defeat you, or even give you a hard time? Then you are yet another loser. Were you willingly married to him, get back together after being apart? Yep, you're a loser too.

Scott has been a lynchpin character for too long for degrading him to work without also doing the same to the entire franchise, like a bunch of dominoes of suck.

[R+R]

I started with X-Men Evolution and then the films. Cyclops seemed to just be "Jean's boyfriend" to me before reading the books. I never understood the audience's reception of the Cyke vs Wolverine rivalry. Logan just picked on Scott for no reason and Scott doesn't do anything really hateful in the movies or cartoons. I saw people commenting on the internet about their reasons for hating Cyke, so when I read the books, I discovered that most of the reasons were lies and distorted context.

[AJpyro]

So is that embarrassing annual out yet?

[Amacent]

So is that embarrassing annual out yet?

Ha! I thought it was an okay issue but it definitely had issues with dialogue and the art was rough. Here's a summary if anyone is interested:

spoilers:

Cyke and Capt. Marvel are transported to a fishing village in Iceland and are slowly being corrupted by chaos magic which is causing their tempers to rise. Cyke tries to plan how he and Carol will survive if they're stuck there for awhile but Carol becomes distrustful of him. They accuse one another and Cyke gets thrown around by Carol for a bit all while trying to pull their punches. They spot a magic fish that they believe is their ticket out of there. They both fight some more with Carol having the upper hand after being powered up by a blast by Cyke. He decides to let go of the control he has over his powers and let's loose. Carol thinks that she's won as she's even more powered up by that blast but there's a catch. If she tries anything there's a chance that she can destroy not only the village but Iceland too. He's betting that she's strong enough to remain in control and not do that. He goes after the fish and ends up with the other winning heroes (Storm, Wolverine, etc.)

end of spoilers

[whitecrown]

Pre-Y2K, I was in my single digits age-wise. Primarily consumed the animated series as I didn't have the cash to buy comics at the time. I was a massive Wolverine fan, with a strong dislike for Cyke for "standing in the way of Logan getting Jean". For what few comics my grubby little hands could get, I couldn't for the life of me understand why people even liked Cyke.

In my defense, I was a stupid kid! lulz

Honestly, didn't think I'd be such a Cyke fan years later...

If there is one thing post-Schism did to me, it was actually turn me into a Wolvie detractor (and borderline hater during the AvX, Bendis era, and beyond).

I'm the exact opposite. I was not a fan of Wolverine when I first got into the X-Men. I felt he was overexposed, exceedingly violent, and relied on the shtick of his claws to be interesting plus his hidden past which really wasn't all that gripping once it wasn't hidden any longer. I didn't care for the rule breakers or rebel characters. Scott was much more up my alley as the "boy scout." It was around Schism when I flipped on the two characters. Suddenly, I saw Logan had the morality and decency that Scott had long lost as he devolved into Mutant Hitler.

I've never understood this mentality that some fans seem to have that because Wolverine is the "cool" one or the "popular" one, that this somehow makes Cyclops lesser. The general public has always gone for the more dynamic or "cool" characters like Han Solo and Iron Man. Yet, Luke Skywalker and Captain America are really not that far behind in popularity. They may not be as flashy but they're more or less equally as iconic. Cyclops would not have the fanbase he had if he had really been a dud from 1963 onward. Wolverine gets more credit only because he's the face of the franchise and Marvel's second most popular character after Spider-Man. Some fans seem to take this personally as though it means Cyclops is unloved and a loser because he can't compare to Wolverine's popularity, but that's true for just about every Marvel character save for Spider-Man. You can't compare him to a behemoth like that and even then, he's not that far off so I don't get the interest in making Cyclops become something he isn't so he can pull Wolverine off his pedestal and take his spot as the "cool" one. If someone wants to make him into Wolverine to get him to be readily accepted and liked, then why not just like Wolverine in the first place rather than try and make Cyclops into him?

[whitecrown]

I started with X-Men Evolution and then the films. Cyclops seemed to just be "Jean's boyfriend" to me before reading the books. I never understood the audience's reception of the Cyke vs Wolverine rivalry. Logan just picked on Scott for no reason and Scott doesn't do anything really hateful in the movies or cartoons. I saw people commenting on the internet about their reasons for hating Cyke, so when I read the books, I discovered that most of the reasons were lies and distorted context.

Evolution is still my favorite iteration of him. The movies didn't give him much to work with but that's not a complaint exclusive to Cyclops. In fact, in comparison to Storm, I think Cyclops was still rather better off. When he's around he's more or less authentically portrayed and his casting was accurate. Nor does he every do anything in the movies that would justify anyone hating him or thinking he's a prick. In fact I remember more complaints that Wolverine came across as unlikable for stealing someone else's girl and constantly taunting Cyclops. Apparently Famke Janssen was opposed to the Wolverine/Jean kiss in X2 as she felt it made all parties seem unsympathetic.

What hurt Cyclops the most was the lack of screentime and his death and exclusion in X3 was because his actor abandoned the series for Superman Returns, where he more or less played the exact same role as a third wheel. If I'm correct, Bryan Singer's original draft for X3 had Cyclops in the central role but only after Singer and Marsden jumped ship and Marsden only agreed to essentially play a cameo, that it was decided to rework Wolverine into the central figure. I'm hoping Deadpool 3 will give him some redemption and there are rumors that Cyclops, Jean, and Storm will join Wolverine (and Deadpool) in the MCU for Secret Wars.

In Evolution there is no rivalry between Cyclops and Wolverine. Wolverine even slightly plays a mentor figure to him. The only time the two have a fight is in the beginning of Season 3 when Xavier is missing and the two disagree on how to lead the X-Men and Wolverine ends up leaving so Cyclops comes across as the sympathetic party. It was the 90s show that more or less was responsible for jump-starting their rivalry since it had been dead in the comics for decades by then. Even then, I think who audiences favored tended to be based on which character resonated more with them so for every Wolverine fan, there was a Cyclops fan as well.

[Kal-El Summers]

A bit saddened to see no writers before the 21st century mentioned so I'll chip in to include Chris Claremont and Louise Simonson.

In all honesty, I don't have Claremont on my list because of his acting like a petulant child when Jean was brought back/Scott joining X-Factor and transferring that anger onto Scott. Plus, even as a kid, I always found the Maddie stuff super-creepy instead of some sort of wholesome send-off.

Suddenly, I saw Logan had the morality and decency that Scott had long lost as he devolved into Mutant Hitler.

Are you trying to troll with this?

[AJpyro]

About the annual

spoilers:

The fact that Cyke letting lose looks a lot like His out of Control use in The Bendis run. Does that mean he got it under control sometimes ago? But does it also mean his Eyebrows have become stronger?

end of spoilers

[Gray Lensman]

In all honesty, I don't have Claremont on my list because of his acting like a petulant child when Jean was brought back/Scott joining X-Factor and transferring that anger onto Scott. Plus, even as a kid, I always found the Maddie stuff super-creepy instead of some sort of wholesome send-off.

What's funny is that on re-reads the only person who thinks that getting with someone who looks just like his dead lover is actually Scott. Everyone else is saying do it.

[whitecrown]

In all honesty, I don't have Claremont on my list because of his acting like a petulant child when Jean was brought back/Scott joining X-Factor and transferring that anger onto Scott. Plus, even as a kid, I always found the Maddie stuff super-creepy instead of some sort of wholesome send-off.


Are you trying to troll with this?

I'm not a fan of Maddie either. Claremont was too attached to her emotionally as a character and couldn't seem to realize that for all his readers, there was no connection. Everyone just saw her as a Jean substitute and most of them were probably still waiting for the payoff that she was Jean reincarnated. It's ridiculous to see Scott visit Jean's grave before his wedding where he talks about how he's moved on and in love with another person who happens to look, talk, and smell exactly like Jean and was the sole survivor of a plane crash that happened the exact moment Phoenix died. I think at this point, Maddie had even demonstrated that she knew Scott's favorite breakfast even though he had never told her.

The fact that they meet in UXM #168 and are married by #175 also doesn't help matters, especially since all her paneltime for those issues revolved around the coincidences between her and Jean. The scene at Logan's wedding where Lilandra almost attacks Maddie before Xavier tells her she's not Jean but just a lookalike always astounded me because would the Shi'ar Empress really so easily buy a story like that? If I had been Lilandra, I'd jump to the conclusion that the X-Men brought Jean back and couldn't even be bothered to hide her away or come up with a good story to explain her return besides sharing a resemblance. I find it hard to believe for a second that she'd believe that and wouldn't retaliate unless her psychic bond with Xavier helped to confirm what the X-Men actually believed.

No, that's not me trolling at all. I find it very odd how Beast's fandom has been so distraught by the last few years of his character assassination and are just waiting for someone to restore him back to normal, but some Cyclops fans actually revel in that dark period of his becoming a tyrant and still cling to those years of character assassination like that was the real Cyclops and the character who existed from 1963-2001 was somehow the fraud. The discrepancy between the two amazes me but it seems Beast fans are less concerned with how "cool" or "edgy" their favorite character comes across as. They just want him treated like a human being with some modicum of decency and respect, the way he used to be. Before Beast gets saved with a retcon, I'm still waiting for the day some writer saves Cyclops with a retcon that he was never Magneto 2.0 but some Skrull imposter, Sinister clone, or Apocalypse infused abomination.

[Gray Lensman]

I'm the exact opposite. I was not a fan of Wolverine when I first got into the X-Men. I felt he was overexposed, exceedingly violent, and relied on the shtick of his claws to be interesting plus his hidden past which really wasn't all that gripping once it wasn't hidden any longer. I didn't care for the rule breakers or rebel characters. Scott was much more up my alley as the "boy scout." It was around Schism when I flipped on the two characters. Suddenly, I saw Logan had the morality and decency that Scott had long lost as he devolved into Mutant Hitler.

One - you'd have to go a LOT further than Scott did by Schism to even reach Magneto, much less Hitler.

Two - While the actual events of Schism had me agreeing with Logan in the long term, I still think he was utterly wrong in the moment. But, given the mental crisis he had been put in over in his solo series (being manipulated into killing five of his own children) I can understand why he acted that way.

Three - Marvel really, really dropped the ball after Schism. If the debate was over kids fighting, whose comic has kids in combat and whose didn't? I'll spoil it for you - Wolverine and the X-Men constantly had his students in Danger and Uncanny X-Men never really had Scott's students on the page, undermining the entire narrative be refusing to actually show even a single moment of it on the page. If it wasn't for writer interviews I would never have known that was the supposed angle they were going for, and even then the non-Scott writers showed how little they understood every time they spoke about him. Remender especially said Scott doesn't believe in free will, when reading the actual panels would show that he has the opposite problem: Scott presumes agency exists in places it does not, and doesn't understand that offering a choice might not actually be that way when seen by someone from outside - all because he was offered a choice that was no choice at all before he became a child soldier, and he never really understood that remaining on the streets and wanted by the police vs being protected and trained in Xavier's mansion was no choice at all.

[Gray Lensman]

No, that's not me trolling at all. I find it very odd how Beast's fandom has been so distraught by the last few years of his character assassination and are just waiting for someone to restore him back to normal, but some Cyclops fans actually revel in that dark period of his becoming a tyrant and still cling to those years of character assassination like that was the real Cyclops and the character who existed from 1963-2001 was somehow the fraud. The discrepancy between the two amazes me but it seems Beast fans are less concerned with how "cool" or "edgy" their favorite character comes across as. They just want him treated like a human being with some modicum of decency and respect, the way he used to be. Before Beast gets saved with a retcon, I'm still waiting for the day some writer saves Cyclops with a retcon that he was never Magneto 2.0 but some Skrull imposter, Sinister clone, or Apocalypse infused abomination.

I put Utopia Scott as someone doing what must be done to ensure that there is someone left to live Xavier's dream someday, even if it means sacrificing his place there to accomplish it. He did things he never would have considered before based almost entirely out of the desperation of his situation - in Bendis' X-Men run, adult Scott isn't willing to kill and stops the teen characters from doing so, as without the looming threat of imminent extinction he was free to start returning to his usual form. I don't consider Utopia Scott to be aspiring, but someone who was willing to sacrifice his own soul to ensure someone would still be alive in the future to condemn him, rather than remain a hero to the dead and gone. There was a tragic nobility in that which I found compelling.