The latest X-Men movie is a travesty, an abomination, and is offensive to any long-time fans of the X-Men comics! Why is this you ask? Why should this bother me so much? Well, in order for me to tell the tale I have to “spoil” a few nasty surprises in the movie (although I think that these surprises spoiled my enjoyment of the movie instead). But first, a brief history of the X-Men:

To begin with, Wolverine and Storm are NOT founding members of the X-Men. The X-Men were founded by Professor Charles Xavier who was trying to combat the growing numbers of evil mutants by organizing a group of good mutants, training them to use their powers for the benefit of all mankind. His first student was Scott Summers (Cyclops), followed shortly thereafter by Warren K. Worthington III (Angel), Henry McCoy (Beast), Robert “Bobby” Drake (Iceman), and finally Jean Grey (Marvel Girl). He trained these teens to function as a superhero team and prepared them for the inevitable appearance of the mutant terrorist Magneto. The original team had a lot of teen angst and explored the problems of mutants in society. Mutant was equated with “Communist” (as this was the 1960s), and the fear that either one could inexplicably appear in the average American family horrified the general public. Mutations only manifested at puberty, the same time that teen rebellion began. The fear would not translate across the generations and as time went by mutants became more respected and less feared. In fact, the X-Men continued in the comics throughout the 1960s and 1970s with only a short hiatus due to unpopularity with the Marvel fans at large. The original members were joined by Scott’s brother, Alex Summers (Havok), and Polaris, a green-haired mutant girl who claimed to be Magneto’s daughter. They continued to war against Magneto and his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants (Toad, Mastermind, Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, Blob, Unus, etc.) until Magneto was defeated by Mutant Alpha and devolved to childhood. During this time the Sentinels were constructed and sent against the X-Men numerous times. They fought the mysterious Factor Three who used Banshee (Sean Cassidy) to attack them.

When Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum came on board, with Giant-Sized X-Men #1, the book had been faltering in popularity. There was an ongoing renaissance in the comics industry; new artists, new writers, new visions of the Marvel Universe just waiting to erupt. Team books were regaining in popularity and with that in mind Claremont took the lessons he learned working on DC’s Legion of Super-Heroes and applied them here to the X-Men. In short, the old X-Men were lured to an island looking for the most powerful mutant ever discovered by Cerebro. They were attacked and Cyclops was allowed to return to lure others like him to the island. Professor X recruited new mutants from around the world, assembling an international team that could only understand each other through his mental tampering. Joining Cyclops was Sunfire, Storm, Banshee, Colossus, Nightcrawler, Thunderbird, and Wolverine (an insignificant Canadian character who had just appeared in the Hulk). These neophytes were quickly trained and sent to the island to recover the others. They found that the island itself was the mutant, feeding on the original X-Men like a parasite to absorb their mutant energies. It now was going to feast on the new X-Men as well. However, through teamwork, they managed to defeat the living island and hurl it into space. The incredible scope of the battles, and the interactions of the characters, reinvigorated the book.

From there we saw the death of Thunderbird in the second regular issue of the New X-Men, the loss of the original members as they parted ways (except Cyclops who remained team leader), the departure of Sunfire, new Sentinels, and the creation of the Phoenix from the death of Jean Grey. The X-Men found themselves in space more frequently (possibly influenced by Claremont’s Legion of Super-Heroes) and became a true super-hero team instead of a band of mutants trying to fit in.

The popularity of the new characters was evident as the X-Men sold out on a regular basis. With the addition of the artist John Byrne, the book became a smash hit! Byrne advanced the story of the Phoenix, introduced Kitty Pryde to the X-Men, and had them battling Magneto again, dinosaurs in the Savage Land, aliens, old villains who kept resurfacing, a tangle with Alpha Flight, and finally the Hellfire Club, a band of evil mutants who used their ill-gotten fortunes to take-over big business in New York City. They lured Jean Grey with the help of Jason Wyngarde (aka Mastermind) to join their ranks, twisting her personality with a psychic illusion generator to better become the Black Queen. The unleashing of her passionate id combined with the increased power as the Phoenix caused her to lose control and in her battles with the new X-Men she destroyed the mind of Jason Wyngarde, overcame Professor X (but did not kill him), and flew off in a rage to devour a sun light years from Earth, sentencing millions of alien lives to death in the resulting supernova.

As a result, the Shi’ar sent agents to capture Jean Grey when she returned to Earth. Before they arrived, Scott and Jean became truly romantically involved, not just the puppy love of their youth. They established a psychic bond and Jean demonstrated how powerful she had become by blocking Cyclops’ eye beams with her mind. The team had also tackled the reality-warping powers of Proteus on Muir Island and it was during this time that Jean discovered what she was truly capable of doing. When Jean was later captured, the entire X-Men team (including Angel and the Beast) were taken on board a Shi’ar vessel and they fought for the life of Jean Grey on the Moon. In a titanic battle, many of the X-Men were defeated by the Shi’ar Imperial Guard (mocked up versions of Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes) but in the end, when Scott was cut down by an energy beam, Jean reacted and became the Dark Phoenix once more. In a moment of clarity she told Scott she loved him and telekinetically activated a laser turret to shoot herself, thus ending the threat of Dark Phoenix forever. Jean Grey’s death was one of the few heroic deaths that Marvel stood by for the longest time. It made the event more emotional and true than any other in comicdom. Cyclops had to deal with her death for a very long time. All the other X-Men had looked at her as a big sister and missed her terribly, especially Storm with whom she had bonded as the only other woman on the team for the longest time. The Wolverine-Jean Grey romance never really happened in the comics but was later hinted at in the Classic X-Men reprints.

******************  SPOILER ALERT  ******************

If you’ve seen the movies, you can see how divergent the movies are from the comics. Of course, it’s hard to compress 40+ years of adventures into three 2 hour movies. But there’s nothing that says they had to even try! Calling these movies “X-Men” is like claiming that the “Little House on the Prairie” is your family’s personal home movies. The movie characters have little or no relation to the actual characters except the name. You could claim creative license, but I say why not just make your own characters then? Capitalizing on a popular name to make mockeries of beloved characters’ histories is a shame. The X-Men are not “Wolverine’s Band of Merry Mutants.” They never were and should never be. Just because a homicidal maniac becomes popular in today’s society doesn’t mean that he gets to run the country as President! (Oh wait, bad example…:) ) I think that the death of Cyclops and Professor X just clinched it for me. I lost all interest in the movie after those events. Not only was Cyclops my favorite character, he was also a founding member and should have been treated with more respect. The ending was also very weak. There were at least two other means of defeating the Phoenix without killing her, and Wolverine was not required for either of them. I think Nightcrawler was left out of this one on purpose so Kitty would appear useful and Juggernaut could be used as well. By the way, Juggernaut was never a mutant. He was the half-brother of Professor X who got his powers from the Jewel of Cytorrak, a magical artifact. He hated his little half-brother and wore the helmet to negate Professor X’s mental powers. Without it he was vulnerable. Otherwise, “Nothing can stop the Juggernaut!” Mystique was never allied with Magneto - she was a free agent who organized her own Brotherhood of Evil Mutants featuring Blob Pyro, Avalanche, and Destiny. So many wonderful, memorable characters, reduced to a few misconstrued minutes on celluloid. The shame of it all is that the children who do view this movie will only know the characters as these atrocities of bad acting and over-the-top special effects. I gave up on the X-Men in their “gritty period” after issue #200 or so. Marvel lost focus and became all hype. It pains me to see that this tradition is still going strong. They did right with the Spider-Man movie, but no other Marvel movie lives up to the same quality, and my hopes die a little more with each sequel….