This is a huge post, because these issues can’t be broken up–it’s one long story, and one of the greatest of all time.
The superstar team of Chris Claremont, John Byrne, and Terry Austin created the group that spawned future Cyclops lover Emma “White Queen” Frost in The Uncanny X-Men #129. They started as sort of an evil version of Professor X’s Academy for Gifted Youngsters.
Very quickly, the group became a formidable opponent to the X-Men. So far, we’ve seen Mastermind plotting to psychically “turn” Phoenix into a black version of Sebastian Shaw’s fuckbuddy Emma Frost, the White Queen. The other members have been in shadow. But now we see them.
The X-Men visit the Club through the front door, for a gala. And so we meet Donald Pierce…
…AKA “The White Bishop.” He’s actually a cyborg with heightened strength.
No sooner do they arrive at the Club’s party, then Wyngarde finally turns her into Black Queen.
The rest of the team spring into action, and we meet Sebastian Shaw–who can absorb blows and use them as his own.
And Harry Leland, whose mass-control powers make people heavier, so they can’t move.
He makes Wolverine so heavy that he falls through the floor and into the sewer.
Ah, the iconic picture of Wolverine in the sewer, looking at the reader, that has become a classic shot—one used as a reference point for everything that makes the character great.
He then slices through members of the Club’s guard–three of whom will become members of Donald Pierce’s Reavers group in the ’90s. Wade Cole and Angelo Macon:
And Murray Reese:
But they’re not identifiable in these issues because they wear the blank-face masks of the Club’s security team.
The team is captured, but Jean shakes off Mastermind’s psychic hold and enables them to free themselves.
And then she turns on her Hellfire Club allies.
Because she’s Phoenix.
Mastermind’s mind-messing has unintentionally unleashed the Dark Phoenix. The power is too much for her, and on their way home from Hellfire Club, she blows up the Blackbird aircraft. Beast sees the crash from Avengers Mansion and arrives to help.
Consumed with the hunger of her power, Phoenix flies into space and destroys entire planets, and then begins her return to Earth. Naturally, that gets the attention of the Shi’Ar empire.
The power surge and her imminent arrival back on Earth is recognized by several Marvel characters who get single-panel cameos, as well as President Carter.
The X-Men fight her when she returns, until Professor X seems to dislocate the Phoenix Force and return Jean Grey to her own body.
But the Shi’Ar teleport all of them to their spaceship–intent on holding Jean accountable for the actions of the Phoenix Force that possessed her.
The X-Men fight to defender her at first, but Dark Phoenix takes over again, and Jean uses her powers to force Cyclops to kill her.
That is suicide–and the most impactful one so far in Marvel history,
Jean knows she has to die, she knows her own power is too strong for her to contain. She doesn’t want to have live and be in constant vigilance against the power inside of her. So, she says goodbye to Scott. Scott sees what she’s going to do and cries out. And in that moment, she has doubt—she screams his name and puts her hand reflexively forward in a defensive position. She’s not reaching for him, because the palm is up—she’s telling him at once to stay back but also crying for him. At the moment of her selfless suicide, she realizes she doesn’t want to die.
And I’m sure that’s all John Byrne.
Watcher and Recorder offer an epitaph.
Yeah, it’s the most written-about arc in comics because it’s one of the best.
In fact, I can’t think of a single Jean Grey story written after Marvel unwisely brought her back to life that was better than any of the stories that happened before her death.
The death of Phoenix is one of the best stories of the 1980s.
You are correct about Marvel’s unwise decision to resurrect Marvel Girl at the end of 1985. That resurrection totally invalidated the enormous power of the conclusion of the greatest storyline ever published in a comic-book series. Marvel Girl has been back on the Marvel scene for thirty-eight-and-a-half years now, without having really accomplished anything besides using up a lot of red ink. Marvel Girl/Phoenix would have served the cause of comics in general and Marvel Comics in particular infinitely better had she just simply remained dead these past four-and-a-half decades. I am all about the Original X-Men, and I was all about their return in the original version of ‘X-Factor’ in late 1985, ( especially considering how dismally most of them were being misused and squandered in the absolutely painful-to-read ‘New Defenders’ ) but I was dismayed and disappointed at the “Big Reveal of 1985” that the mysterious fifth member of ‘X-Factor’ would be Marvel Girl. Marvel Girl, as the Phoenix, died an extremely important and meaningful death five years earlier, and Marvel’s decision to reverse that important and meaningful death five years later totally annihilated the power of that death. Being a huge booster of the two most underrated and underused X-Men of them all- Havok and Polaris- I truly believed at the time, and STILL do- that the welcome reorganization of the Original X-Men- an awesome counterpoint to all the deliberately Politically Correct goings on in the regular X-Men series- ( Magneto’s “reformation”, etc.- Captain America was correct on this point- it is historically proven time and time and time again that a leopard CANNOT change it’s spots!!! ) would have been the ideal platform to bring Havok and Polaris front-and -center onto the Marvel mutant stage- which, as of this point in time, STILL HAS YET TO HAPPEN!!!! With Havok ( back ) on board, and Polaris stepping up as the official “girl” for this new iteration of the Original X-Men, the mid-late 1980’s ‘X-Factor’ could truly have served as a very powerful sister-series to the regular “All-New, All Politically Correct” X-Men series. Two of the truly saddest things in life are missed opportunity and unrealized potential. With the entire team of Original X-Men sans Professor X and the deceased Phoenix back together, the ‘X-Men’ comics could have truly been something to read and follow, and Havok and Polaris could truly and finally have had their long-awaited and long-overdue day in the Sun, all without completely obliterating the power and legacy of the most powerful and important comic-book storyline ever published. And, besides- what ELSE was Havok and Polaris doing in the late Eighties??? Just sad. Marvel did not WANT to use these two characters for the same reason which made the “New X-Men” so significant and so popular: Their ethnicity, or, more accurately, their LACK of ethnicity. Havok and Polaris were more-or-less retired from the X-Men for the same reason that ALL the original X-Men were given the heave-ho: They are WHASPS!!! White, heterosexual, Anglo-Saxon Protestants!! By the mid-Seventies and 1980’s, Marvel was determined that the X-Men were going to be their go-to vehicle for DIVERSITY, and absolutely NONE of the Original X-Men fit that Politically Correct criteria!! And THAT is the reason why Marvel Comics has failed to develop Havok and Polaris, and it will most likely REMAIN the reason why Marvel Comics fails to develop Havok and Polaris, and the rest of the First Class will also continue to languish in Limbo-Neglection for the same damn PC reasons! More is the pity, because, mutant for mutant, the First Class has got more interesting characters than any iteration of Neo-X-Men to date! Just my Politically Incorrect two cents. X-Celsior!!