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Revision as of 04:25, 18 May 2006
Comics character| Phoenix | |
|---|---|
 Phoenix.Greg Land, artist. | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Marvel Comics |
| First appearance | X-Men #1 |
| Created by | Stan Lee Jack Kirby |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | Jean Grey-Summers |
| Species | Human mutant |
| Team affiliations | X-Men, X-Factor |
| Notable aliases | Redd Dayspring, Marvel Girl, Phoenix, Dark Phoenix, Black Queen, White Phoenix of the Crown |
| Abilities | Telepathy, Telekinesis, access to the power of the Phoenix Force, |
Phoenix, also known as Jean Grey, is a comic book superhero in the Marvel Comics universe. Early during her career she used the code name Marvel Girl and was a founding member of the X-Men (and remained a vital member of the team). Created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, she first appeared in X-Men #1 (1963).
Jean Grey is a mutant born with the abilities of telepathy and telekinesis.
Character history
Origin
Jean Grey was born to Dr. John Grey and Elaine Grey. She had an older sister named Sara Grey and they lived in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York where Dr. Grey worked as a history professor at Bard College. Her father, mother and sister were all humans but Jean turned out to be a mutant.
Jean's mutant psionic powers first manifested at the age of ten when they were prematurely triggered when her best friend, Annie Richardson, was hit by a car. As Annie lay dying, Jean instinctively linked to her mind and the trauma of experiencing her friend's death nearly killed Jean as well. The incident left Jean in a coma.
For three years, her parents sought the expertise of specialists to rouse Jean out of her catatonic state but only one, Professor Charles Xavier, was able to help. One day while they were training on the astral plane, Jean was able to sense a presence that Xavier was not able to detect. An aspect of Jean's subconscious mind manifesting as the Phoenix in the form of young Jean in a golden glow with a phoenix raptor effect reached out to this presence and briefly touched the mind of young Scott Summers who was then living in an orphanage (Classic X-Men #42 backstory). Xavier realized that Jean's young mind could not cope with her telepathy yet so he decided to mentally block her access to this ability, allowing it to evolve at the natural pace it would have save for Annie's tragic death. Even though Jean continued living with her parents until she was a teenager, she had many training sessions with Xavier. Jean Grey would develop her power of telekinesis at the age of thirteen.
When she became a teenager, she left her parents and began attending Xavier's "School for Gifted Youngsters" and became the first female X-Man under the name of Marvel Girl. Although it had been stated early on that Jean could only use her telekinesis to lift an equivalent weight to what she could lift physically, Jean was shown levitating the Beast and guiding streaming missiles into the bay in her very first mission.
Romance
Jean and Scott both had a crush on each other, but neither were aware of the other's feelings. Cyclops thought his optic blasts could severly hurt someone whom he loved. He also felt that he was no match for Warren, whom he thought Jean was dating at the time. Jean once had a date with Warren, but insisted on taking Scott along which confused and frustrated both men. When Jean left to pursue tertiary education at Metro College, it further served to widen the gap between Scott and Jean.
Warren decided that Jean was not actually interested in him and started a relationship with his old friend Candace "Candy" Southern. Jean and Scott later admitted they were in love with each other and started dating openly.
Jean also felt drawn to Logan, who was in love with her, but Logan now has come to respect Jean's relationship to Scott. Towards the end, they shared a deep friendship, although Wolverine continued to make sexual comments towards her in private. Ultimately, Scott seems to be the love of Jean's life.
Leave of absence
Requiring seclusion while he prepared to deal with a forthcoming invasion of Earth by the alien Z'nox, Xavier had the mutant Changeling impersonate him in order to supervise the X-Men in Xavier's absence, telling only Jean of his plan and swearing her to secrecy. However, the Changeling, as Xavier, died heroically in action and Xavier felt obliged to continue the pretense of his death.
Fred Duncan, the X-Men's FBI liaison, considered the united team to present an easy target for "the ever-growing population of evil mutants" and felt the X-Men would be more effective acting as individuals and spread across the United States. At the same time, Professor X's will confirmed that his estate would serve as a charitable trust with each of the five active X-Men a trustee, to ensure that they would need to stay in contact with each other. Jean and Scott remained in New York while Hank and Bobby relocated to California. Warren remained mobile across the United States.
Jean later completed her college education and found employment as a model. Her first assignments were swimsuit presentations. At this time, Jean was introduced to Lorna Dane (Polaris) and they soon became friends. Jean was also introduced to Alexander "Alex" Summers, Scott's younger brother, who was just graduating from college. He would soon serve with the X-Men as Havok.
Xavier was revealed to the others to be alive, as he helped them defeat the Z'Nox. Later the Fantastic Four would team up with the X-Men to have a final encounter with the Z'Nox hoping to eliminate their bid for the Earth. While flying in space Jean Grey had a brief subsconscious encounter with the Phoenix (X-Men: The Hidden Years #8-#9).
Phoenix
Many months later, after Xavier had recruited a new team of X-Men to help save the others from Krakoa, most senior members left as did Jean, who involuntarily found herself attracted to new member Wolverine. Cyclops, however, refused to leave, feeling that he would be incapable of leading a normal life due to the uncontrollable nature of his powers. He genuinely felt that he only belonged truly to the X-Men, which upset Jean. She still remained in contact with the X-Men and became good friends with one of her new teammates, Ororo Munroe a.k.a. Storm.
Sometime after this, Shi'ar agent, Davan Shakari, in the guise of Erik The Red appeared, charged with the mission of killing Professor Xavier in order to prevent him from coming into contact with an alien refugee (who would later be revealed as Lilandra) to whom Xavier's mind had been connected to. He brainwashed Havok and Polaris into serving him to accomplish this, but was thwarted by the X-Men. Weeks later, while Jean was having a romantic evening in Manhattan with Scott, she was abducted by Sentinels along with Wolverine and Banshee. They were taken to an abandoned S.H.I.E.L.D. orbital platform under the command of the anti-mutant activist Steven Lang, who was plotting to unleash a new generation of Sentinels modeled after the X-Men themselves. The other X-Men came and rescued the three from Lang.
During the destruction of the space station, the X-Men and one of Lang's captives, Dr. Peter Corbeau, who had also helped the X-Men reach the station to begin with found themselves in a perilous situation: the shuttle they had arrived in had been damaged in a earlier fight with the Sentinels, leaving the hull exposed and the auto-pilot completely destroyed. Compounding the problem was the impending threat of a gigantic solar flare, as well as one of the worst solar storms in history. A decision was made that someone would have to stay at the controls and pilot the ship, while everyone else would remain in the shuttle's heavily-shielded life cell. Knowing nobody else had a chance of surviving long enough to pilot the ship to safety, Jean used her telepathy to absorb Dr. Corbeau's piloting knowledge, and planned to use her telekinetic powers to screen out the radiation as she piloted the ship back to Earth. Cyclops, who had attempted to stop her, was knocked out by Jean's mental bolt and carried into the life cell by Banshee. Jean valiantly piloted the ship until her telekinetic shields started to give way under the onslaught of the intense radiation.
The strain of holding the solar radiation at bay with her powers had destroyed the psychic shields Xavier had placed in her mind as a child. In order to save the lives of her friends, her beloved Scott, and herself Jean "achieved her full potential as a psi, becoming briefly a being of pure thought before reforming herself as the Phoenix". The shuttle crashed into Jamaica Bay. Jean emerged from its remnants, imbued with vast cosmic powers announcing, "Hear me, X-Men! no longer am I the woman you knew! I am fire! And life incarnate! Now and forever I am Phoenix!" It was later revealed that Jean's original body was actually placed into a healing cocoon in the depths of Jamaica Bay and the Phoenix Force helped Jean psionically clone a new body using her genetic template, and then transferred almost all of Jean's mind and soul (save for a few fragments of her spirit which refused to leave Jean's original body) into the cosmically created clone's body. It was the stubborn soul fragments which prompted Phoenix to place her old body in the healing cocoon, as she could not bear to extuinguish their spark. Since the Phoenix Force replicated Jean's body so perfectly (and because Phoenix had transferred Jean's mind and soul to her new body), not even Professor X could detect the difference between Jean and the Phoenix. As Phoenix, Jean's psi-powers became stronger and stronger, "backed by the power of the Sun itself". She began to manifest a fiery bird-shaped energy aura whenever she used her powers to their fullest extent.
The Phoenix continued Jean's relationship with Cyclops. She later lost control of her powers and became the Dark Phoenix, attacking her friends and teammates, and destroying the D'Bari star after being manipulated by Mastermind. Jean was able to regain her sanity long enough to commit suicide in the Blue Area of the Moon rather than risk becoming the Dark Phoenix again and killing anyone else. The "Dark Phoenix Saga", the lengthy story of the decline and fall of Phoenix, by Chris Claremont and John Byrne, is regarded as one of the best comics stories of all time.
Jean Grey would wake up in the Afterlife (later, continuity would re-name it the White Hot Room.) She found herself on top of a tower floating in a space-like realm wearing a white version of her Dark Phoenix outfit. She was greeted by Death in the form of a Cosmic Construction Worker. Death allowed Jean to build onto his tower. Jean discovered that she was building the towers for her victims as Dark Phoenix and was made to relive the deaths of the D'Bari. Death explained to Jean that it was her destiny to become Phoenix. Jean is an avatar of the Phoenix due to her spirit being "most closely carved from it." Jean questions why didn't the Phoenix leave her when all was said and done. Death tells her that she is where the Phoenix came from. Death says that she wasn't far wrong when she thought it was a figment of her imagination. The Phoenix, he tells her, is the sum and substance of all that lives and is not a being nor an entity but only a force. Death tells Jean Grey that her "unique ability" is to be the one to wield the power. He tells her that it belongs to her in the same fashion that the sword Excalibur belonged to King Arthur and that it would come to her children. In the end, Jean Grey is sent back to life and her soul is returned to her original body in the cocoon (which is almost fully healed), but the fragment of Jean's soul that remained in her original radiation-poisoned body rejected the memories of the Dark Phoenix, so those memories were accidentally transferred to the Madelyne Pryor clone. For now, Death says, she will not remember what she has learned (Classic X-Men #43 backstory).
Return
The Avengers had detected unusual energy readings at the bottom of Jamaica Bay and sent Prince Namor to investigate. He found a strange pod lying on the bottom of the bay. The Avengers sent the pod to the lab of Reed Richards, the leader of the Fantastic Four. During Richard's analysis, the pod cracked open and Jean emerged. Jean, seeing differences between the members of the Fantastic Four she knew versus the ones before her, attacked them. They eventually convinced Jean to calm down. Jean had no memories from the time she flew the shuttle until she hatched from the cocoon. Unfortunately, due to the technology Reed used to hatch her, she was now without her telepathy, but as a side-effect, the power of her telekinesis had increased dramatically. Also, a large portion of Jean's Phoenix powers had left her while she was healing, and merged with Jean's future daughter Rachel Summers, who had assumed the mantle of Phoenix in Jean's absence. Jean would later go to her home and touch a Holoempathic crystal that the Shi'ar had made and given to her parents after Dark Phoenix died. Once Jean touched the crystal, she relived the experience between her and the Phoenix on the shuttle. The former members of the X-Men were contacted and she reunited with most of them.
Cyclops, in the meantime, had moved to Alaska to be near his grandparents and met a pilot who named Madelyne Pryor, the clone of Jean Grey. They married, producing a son, Christopher Nathan. When Scott heard Jean was alive, he left Pryor and joined Jean to create X-Factor. He called Madelyne to try to persuade her and their son to come to New York. When he received no answer, he assumed that his wife had left him.
In truth, Madelyne and their son had been kidnapped by the villain, Mr. Sinister. It is revealed that Mr. Sinister had created Madelyne from the DNA of Jean Grey. His clone was perfect except that she did not become conscious until the Phoenix's death on the moon sparked the clone's mind. He thought the offspring of Jean Grey and Scott Summers would be a genetically superior mutant who possessed incredible powers.
With her purpose fulfilled, he turned Madelyne over to the Marauders to dispose of. She was then rescued by the X-Men and joined them where she was presumably killed in Dallas defeating the Adversary. Roma, the celestial guardian, resurrected Madelyne and the X-Men. Wanting to rescue her son from Mr. Sinister, Madelyne made a pact with the demons S'ym and later N'astirh from Limbo. The goblins used her despair to make her the Goblin Queen. Because of her deep mental depresson from before, the transformation drove her over the edge. Deciding to use her newly recovered son, Madelyne attempted to sacrifice him in a ritual that would bring the demons of Limbo into our reality and thus bring about a permanent Inferno. The joined forces of the X-Men and X-Factor fought the Goblin Queen. Madelyne died in a climactic battle with Jean after she linked their minds together and killed herself hoping the link would kill Jean as well. Fortunately it didn't, as the small amount of the Phoenix Force that Jean still retained awoke, and helped her separate from Madelyne. However, Jean gained all the memories of Madelyne and the Dark Phoenix. Later, Jean expelled the personas of Madelyne and Dark Phoenix but kept the residual memories.
As a result, Cyclops and Grey were able to resume their relationship and eventually married. During their honeymoon, they were taken into the future to raise the baby Cable during the Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix miniseries. Shortly after returning, she resumed using the name Phoenix as an attempt to redeem both the entity and herself in her mind and also to honor her daughter, Rachel, who had been announced dead.
The list of the Twelve had both Phoenix and Cyclops on it. They decided to help the X-Men in this turning-point battle. In the end, Cyclops apparently perished as he merged with the villain Apocalypse. During this time Phoenix and Psylocke switched powers, with Jean adding Psylocke's shadowy telepathic powers to her own telepathy, while losing her telekinetic powers to Psylocke. Phoenix had to deal with having to rely on her fighting skills to handle enemies who were immune to telepathy, and began manifesting fiery raptor effects as the physical manifestation of her powers.
Later, Prosh would recruit Phoenix along with Mystique, Juggernaut, Iceman, and Toad for a special mission. During this mission, the X-Men would relive key events in their past. Jean would relive her experience as Dark Phoenix in the afterlife as well as learn that Xavier knew all along that she was an Omega-level mutant. Jean would also reawaken the Phoenix Force to talk to and touch Eternity so that she and the others could defeat The Stranger, as shown in X-Men Forever. Soon after, Jean learned that Cyclops was alive, so she began a search for her lost husband with her son Cable. They found him and Jean used her newly increased telepathic powers to separate Cyclops from Apocalypse's spirit. Having her husband back gave Jean the strength to accept her role as host of the Phoenix Force, and access the telekinetic powers it had recreated for her.
Marital problems
A combination of Jean's new duties as headmistress, her re-emerging Phoenix powers and Scott's temporary merger with the evil mutant Apocalypse drove a wedge between the couple. Scott and Jean started to have marital problems; Jean had attempted time and again to rebuild their relationship, but Scott remained constantly distant, refusing to even sleep with her. The one time that Scott did attempt to explain to Jean about his feelings of boredom with his own personality after being possessed by Apocalypse. Their relationship became further strained when Jean began showing signs of the Phoenix Force, which Cyclops thought would lead to another disaster though he made little effort to aid Jean.
Jean had displayed greater Phoenix powers when the U-Men attacked the school and threatened the children. Later, when Xavier was about to die Jean rescued him by absorbing his mind into her consciousness and then splitting his mind up into the minds of other mutants before putting his mind back together as a part of a plan to defeat Cassandra Nova. After Phoenix and Charles set up the X-Corps, an Araki of the Shi'ar warns Xavier of the upcoming judgment of the Phoenix and that "the Phoenix has hatched and she is merciless". The Shi'ar vowed not to return to earth until the "disinfection period is over". This would be a prelude to the Shi'ar's decision to destroy the entire Grey Family line in later time.
Scott eventually turned to Emma Frost to talk. Emma easily seduced Cyclops and began to have a psychic affair with him, by ironically taking on the telepathic appearance of the Dark Phoenix. When Phoenix walked in on the two in bed, a psychic battle erupted between the two telepaths with Phoenix using the full extent of her powers on Emma. Phoenix also tells Emma that "the fire of the Phoenix burns through lies, you understand? The gaze of the Phoenix is like an X-Ray tearing through all self deceptions."
Cyclops attempted to justify his actions, by stating that a telepathic affair was not as bad since it was "only thoughts". In the end however, Cyclops ran out on both Phoenix and the X-Men for a short while, only to end up aiding Wolverine on a personal mission. Cyclops later rejoined the team to help them fight Xorn, in the guise of Magneto. Xorn/Magneto had sent Wolverine and Phoenix to his Asteroid M base, which he rigged to travel on a crash course with the sun. Phoenix confided in Wolverine that the Phoenix burns through that which doesn't work. As they are about to die, Wolverine reluctantly stabbed Phoenix so she would not have to die in the intense solar heat. Seconds before they were to collide with the sun however, the Phoenix Force fully manifested within Jean and she saved them both, wearing a fiery version of her Dark Phoenix uniform.
Once Wolverine finishes healing, Phoenix tells him that by killing her, he helped her release the "Phoenix Consciousness." Phoenix uses her powers to rearrange the molecules of the asteroid to form a crystal bird-shaped space ship and they head back to Earth to help the others. In the storyline Planet X, Xorn mortally injured Phoenix by transferring a large amount of electro-magnetic energy to her brain, inducing a "planetary-scale stroke." As Phoenix died in Scott's arms, she told him to live.
Here Comes Tomorrow
Phoenix was then resurrected in the last arc of New X-Men: "Here Comes Tomorrow," which takes place 150 years into the future. In this future, a Sublime-controlled Beast has achieved dominion over much of the world, with a small rag tag team of mutants, humans, and machines standing in Sublime's way. The fate of the universe rests in which side can acquire the Phoenix Egg on the Moon. Sublime's henchmen would steal the Phoenix Egg from the Proud People. Interrupting Phoenix's incubation period, Sublime is able to hatch her before she regains her full memory and thus is able to exert influence over her. This time, a secondary mutation had allowed her to evolve to the extent where she could command all the cosmic power of the Phoenix Force without being corrupted by it. Sublime refers to the Phoenix Force as Jean's "ultimate mutation" and her powers as "telekinetic godhood". Sublime makes references that the power exists within her blood, traits, and organs. He uses the blood of the Phoenix, to give himself the powers of Phoenix. Jean Grey is also revealed to have a mental link to the Phoenix Consciousness through the "crown chakra" of her mind. Sublime has Phoenix eradicate an insect-like species called the Termids before the remaining X-Men are able to get her to come to her senses.
This future timeline grew out of Scott Summers refusal of Emma Frost's offer to re-open Xavier's Institute. As a result, Hank McCoy took up the burden of re-opening the school and under the pressure, begins taking the drug “Kick”. "Kick," however, is revealed to be the aerosol form of the villain John Sublime, who possesses Hank McCoy and drives him insane. 150 years later, the near-immortal Beast tried to resurrect and use Phoenix to destroy the world, only to be defeated by Phoenix. Phoenix then carries out her disinfection and aborbs the future universe into the White Hot Room. She then transcends into the “White Hot Room,” a higher plane of reality with all the other Phoenix hosts. She once again wears a white variation of her Dark Phoenix outfit and is revealed to be the "White Phoenix of the Crown". She then used her unparalleled psychic talents to heal the timeline by sending her husband Scott Summers a mental "push" past his mourning and into loving Emma.
Somehow knowing her fate before she died, Jean made a holoempathic imprint of her full essence and everything that she was, for her daughter Rachel "Grey" Summers. She did this so that no matter what happened to her body, her soul would always be with Rachel.
Endsong
The Shi'ar resurrected the Phoenix Force prematurely in hopes of destroying it while it was relatively weak, resulting in a fragmented Phoenix. The Shi'ar referenced Jean Grey as the Phoenix's Heart and a part of its very Self and hoped to kill her for good. The entity managed to escape and fled to Earth, where it needed a host to sustain itself. After possessing a firefly, the entity resurrected Jean and bonded with her once more. The last thing they knew they were One in the White Hot Room about to enter the Crown and waiting to "incubate and be reborn anew" before all this happened. Jean knew something was wrong and this was not the way.
Jean realized that the Phoenix Force was resurrected too early and was mentally unbalanced. She had a confrontation with the X-Men before teleporting Wolverine to the North Pole where she had him stab her several times, leaving the Phoenix weakened and allowing her to once again gain control. When Wolverine questioned her whether she was Jean or the Phoenix, Jean responded "I am always Jean and always the Phoenix". Jean says that she was scattered in a trillion directions and that she is "out of balance and must try again". Jean then plunged herself through the ice, freezing instantly. When the X-Men arrived, Wolverine told them that "Jean is dead. Or as close as she can get." When the Phoenix Force returned from the ice, she possessed Emma Frost as the new love to Scott Summers' life. Emma, however, was consumed by the Phoenix Force because she was unable to contain it. As the Phoenix Force prepared to destroy the world, Scott, left with no other choice, fired his optic blasts at the ice encasing Jean. She immediately rose out of the ice into the sky.
The revived Jean telepathically assaulted the Phoenix possessed Emma, forcing her to the ground. The Phoenix Force shocked at this exclaims "Jean Grey, how are you doing that, without me... without my power?". Jean responds "I am you. Don't you remember?" Jean then exorcised the Phoenix Force out of Emma, telling the Phoenix Force she'll understand everything once all their pieces are together in the White Hot Room. The Phoenix Force admits "Because you and I are One," essentially declaring that Jean Grey is the original Phoenix.
After Jean once again bonded with the Phoenix Force, the X-Men discovered the true reason for her return: she felt alone and unloved. Emma called out telepathically to her Stepford Cuckoos and focused the empathic impressions of all Jean's dearest friends. She felt their love for her and this allowed Jean and the Phoenix Force to achieve a perfect balance between them and once again she became the "White Phoenix of the Crown" in the white/silver and gold Phoenix costume before returning to the White Hot Room, where she currently remains. Parting from Scott, she asked one last request before leaving: to see his eyes.
Powers and abilities
Jean Grey is an Omega-level mutant and is the physical avatar of the godlike Phoenix Force. Jean Grey's dual psionic potential gives her the mutant gifts of telepathy and telekinesis. Her telepathy allows her to read the thoughts of others, project her thoughts into the minds of others to influence decisions, manipulate or change memories, place one under her telepathic command, cast her mind into the astral plane or fire stunning "mental bolts" capable of knocking out or turning someone brain-dead. Jean is also one of the few telepaths skilled enough to communicate with animals (but mainly animals with high intelligence, such as dolphins, dogs, and ravens). When Phoenix absorbed the specialized telepathic powers of fellow X-Man Psylocke, her own telepathy was increased to the level where she could physically manifest her telepathy as a psionic firebird; whose claws could inflict both physical and mental damage. Phoenix also learned that by using her amplified telepathy to increase the speed of neural signals in the brain, she could increase another mutant's powers to incredible levels, but the effect was only temporary. She also briefly developed a psychic shadow form like Psylocke had, but instead of a red tattoo over her right eye, Jean had a gold Phoenix emblem. Phoenix is considered to be one of the Earth's most powerful telepathic minds, rivaling Professor X. Her telekinetic ability can be manifested in many ways, some of which include levitating herself, objects, or other people or projecting a telekinetic shield capable of withstanding missile blasts. By focusing her mental energy at a specific target, she can release devastating force blasts. Phoenix can also revive, absorb, rechannel and preserve any kind of lifeform. Other hosts of the Phoenix force in other alternate universes have been using that power throughout the comics, since the Phoenix is the sum of all lifeforce.
Jean's Phoenix Force powers manifested later and boosted her psi-powers on a quantum scale allowing her to rearrange matter at a subatomic level, to fly un-aided through space, create intense heat and thermal energy blasts by stimulating molecular activity, manipulate the voluntary and involuntary responses in the human body. She manifested a "telekinetic sensitivity"; that let her feel the texture of objects she had a telekinetic hold on, feel when other objects came into contact with them and probe them at a molecular level to identify alien materials or feel when two things she "held" were similarly composed. In addition to this, when the power of the Phoenix force is engaged, she is surrounded in a flame-like energy corona that takes the form of a large bird of fire.
Later, Jean learned that not only was she the physical embodiment of the Phoenix Force, but she was the "White Phoenix of the Crown" and as such, had the power to control and repair entire timelines and travel to other dimensions by creating portals between realities. Also, it was revealed that Phoenix's mind resonates across the multiverse and may be a nexus of realities.
Because she is the Phoenix, Jean will resurrect herself after death. Sometimes she resurrects almost immediately; while other times she stays an extended period in the White Hot Room to allow the Phoenix to leave and do "Phoenix Work" (affecting timelines, repairing realities, etc). She can resurrect later within a new body formed from a Phoenix Egg/cocoon.
Namesake ancestor
- Main article: Lady Grey
Alternate versions
Age of Apocalypse
In the Age of Apocalypse, Jean was a student of Magneto (and never had a codename), and never learned how to fully master her telepathy. She fell in love with fellow student Weapon X, until her capture with Mr. Sinister who used her DNA (combined with the DNA of Cyclops) to clone the perfect mutant. Weapon X rescued her, and they remained together, until Jean learned of an attempt to drop nuclear bombs on the USA to kill Apocalypse. Jean went to stop the attack with the aid of Cyclops (and held back ALL of the nuclear bombs with her telekinesis), but died at the hands of Cyclop's brother Prelate Havok. Sinister found that Jean's DNA contained special properties, and that she should have access to the powers of "Mutant Alpha", the legendary "first mutant". He helped her resurrect herself, and she did display the powers of "Mutant Alpha" (which was actually the Phoenix Force). He tried to use her to kill Magneto and his X-Men, but she turned on him and incinertated him with a psychic blast. She is the current leader of the AoA X-Men.
Ultimate Jean Grey/Marvel Girl
In the Ultimate Marvel continuity, Jean Grey was reimagined as a responsible yet outgoing teenage girl. She had a passionate affair with Wolverine, but soon dropped him for Cyclops after he admitted to her that he first joined the X-Men to act as a mole for Magneto and ultimately assassinate Professor X.
Ultimate Jean Grey had spent time as a child in a mental hospital due to having problems controlling her telepathy and having troublesome visions of a Phoenix raptor. Professor Charles Xavier found Jean Grey while she was in the mental hospital.
In the "Hellfire and Brimstone" arc, she is shown to be possessed by a so-called Phoenix Force and becomes nearly insane, but escapes its grip. The Hellfire Club believed that Jean was the perfect host for a Phoenix god, yet Xavier claimed that Jean's Phoenix powers were the result of Jean's own mutation and out of control telepathy. Jean briefly believed the Phoenix to be an intergalactic demon bent on destroying the world through her before accepting Xavier's explanation that there was no Phoenix entity but just her evolving powers. Ultimate Thor questioned Xavier's logic. However, the exact nature of the Phoenix in the Ultimate Universe remains unclear. In further arcs, Jean Grey's powers emanate as a halo in Phoenix Form and it is shown that she sometimes has difficulties controlling her vastly grown powers. This has led to speculation that there will be an Ultimate Marvel re-imagining of the Dark Phoenix Saga. Such speculation seems to bear fruit as current Ultimate X-Men scribe Robert Kirkman, has introduced the "Ultimate version" of the Shi'ar and Lilandra Neramini.
The Shi'ar are now reimagined as a "Church of Enlightenment" and Lilandra is its leader. At present Xavier and Lilandra are attempting to uncover if Jean is the host for the Phoenix Force. The Shi'ar believe the Phoenix Force was held captive by an alien armada that utilised their own technology and the powers of the Phoenix itself to create a planet that it would be imprisoned in; that planet the Shiar believe is Earth.
Marvel Mangaverse Jean Grey
Although Marvel's Mangaverse line sometimes seemed to be reimaginings of the regular Marvel line, it also seemed completely confused on what characters were doing what. In the first volume of Mangaverse, Jean is indeed a powerful telepath and does call herself Marvel Girl, but does NOT have access to the powers of the Phoenix Force. Instead, those powers were bestowed in the first volume of Mangaverse upon Rogue when she absorbed Jean's powers. However, in a series set in the Mangaverse (although this seems to be an offshoot of the Mangaverse as the characters are much different in appearance and characterization for the most part, with the sole exception of Jean, whose physical appearance remains the same in Volume 1 of Mangaverse and the X-Men: Ronin story) Jean herself becomes the Phoenix, though her Phoenix powers are stated to be separate from her mutant powers, indicating that in the Mangaverse, the Phoenix may be either a form of chi which no mutant prior has accessed, or else it is a being or force which is residing in her body. Unlike with the mainline and Ultimate Universes, Jean must discharge excess power as the energy of the Phoenix builds within her. This version of the X-Men and Jean Grey have not been seen since the X-Men: Ronin storyline presented under the Mangaverse universe.
Appearances in other media
Jean Grey was a character X-Men animated television series in the mid-1990s and was voiced by Catherine Disher. She also guest starred on at least one episode of Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends in the early 1980s.
- In the feature films X-Men, X2: X-Men United and X-Men: The Last Stand, Grey was portrayed by Famke Janssen. In the film series, she is the team’s medical doctor. In the first two films, she was not as powerful as her comic book counterpart but, near the end of X2, she exhibited what may have been Phoenix-like powers. In X-Men: The Last Stand, she appears in a form similar to (but never explicitly named as) Dark Phoenix and exhibits almost godlike powers. She joins Magneto and his Brotherhood of Mutants.
- In the animated TV series X-Men: Evolution, Jean was voiced by Venus Terzo. Jean is portrayed as very beautiful and popular. Her powers are similar to the early comic books; she possesses telepathy and telekinesis, initially only being able to move objects with her mind that she would normally be able to move by hand. Professor X, the world's greatest telepath, later trained her to use and refine these powers. When her powers surged, Jean found herself losing control, overhearing thoughts without effort. The X-Men helped her to regain control, leading her to form a psychic rapport with her teammate Scott Summers. After recently graduating from Bayville High, Jean has taken an instructor's position at the Institute. She is also currently romantically involved with Scott (Cyclops). The series ended with glimpses of the future for various characters, and Jean was shown transforming into Dark Phoenix. Had the show been renewed for a fifth season, this subplot would have been further developed.
- Jean Grey had made rare appearances in early video game spinoffs (as Marvel Girl, a playable character in X-Men Mutant Mayhem for the PC, Jean Grey as a support character in X-Men for the Sega Genesis, and Phoenix (in her blue-and-gold uniform) in X-Men: Gamemaster's Legacy for the Sega Game Gear), but recently has had much bigger video game roles, when she appeared as Phoenix in both X-Men: Mutant Academy games for the Sony PlayStation, and as Phoenix and Dark Phoenix in X-Men: Next Dimension for the PS2, Xbox, and Nintendo Gamecube. She also appeared as Ultimate Jean Grey in X-Men Legends and its sequel X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse as an important playable character.
- In the webcomic The Wotch, Jason is turned into a near duplicate of Jean Grey. His last name, Grey, is also a refrence to her and his redhead obsesion.
External links
- MDP:Jean Grey - Marvel Database Project
- Wikitree: Jean Grey
- Jeangrey at X-Girls4 Central
- UncannyXmen.net, Spotlight feature on Jean Grey/Phoenix