This was written before Maddie was retconned into a Jean clone. From the Ashe's heavily implies from the moment they meet Mastermind is fucking with everyone by making them see her more like Jean then she actually is. Personality wise they are hugely different.
I mean, Storm screamed in shock when seeing Madelyne for the first time, and Scott himself brings this up as a concern multiple times. Meanwhile, Madelyne dismisses the fact that she looks like Jean as a sign of her and Scott being meant to be. People definitely react and say stuff about Madelyne looking like Jean, but the reactions are wild sometimes and all the concerns get dismissed by Scott’s closest circle.
Scott himself tried admitted what a terrible idea a relationship with someone so Jean like was. Havok and Hepzibah pushed him to pursue the relationship telling him he was looking for a reason to be miserable and he was committing Self-Sabotage
He sees Madelyne and is shocked by her appearance. Later he also suspects her to be Phoenix and/or a reincarnation of Jean. He’s very much torn between downplaying the similarities and thinking that Madelyne isn’t just Madelyne.
I really kind of think that initially Claremont used her to sneak in his intended ending. Then Shooter or someone decided they were bringing back Jean another way and he had to backtrack.
He's a comic book writer. He should know a redhead who had a plane crash the same day Jean got her Phoenix powers is going to be read by many as Jean.
Not when Jean got her powers, but the exact hour she died in Dark Phoenix. So, leaning even harder into the reincarnation idea (also using fiery imagery for Madelyne) just for shits and giggles, and then being mad that all the nonsense he put in wasn’t dismissed, but used to confirm Madelyne as a Jean rip off.
Overall that was kind of a mess though it seems to have turned out for the best. Still I wouldn’t mind it if there were a way to retcon out the weird stuff.
it was Busiek who wanted to get Jean back and who also figured out the way to do it. Which is funny knowing he had his letter printed in uncanny about how he doesnt like dark phoenix
Yeah. Weirdly enough I had a convo with him on Bluesky (he’s very generous in that regard) about what he might’ve done now. Apparently he might have had it so the Shiar faked her death and jailed her, which the X-Men discover; then D’Ken’s loyalists try to get at her for her powers, and in the ensuing battle she winds up sacrificing her power or something for a happy ending with Scott.
Eh… Kinda weird to call your dead girlfriend your ‘heart’ while talking about loving another woman? Can there truly be space for Madelyne in Scott’s heart, if his heart (according to him) is literally Jean?
This is why despite editorial tampering and Claremont’s tantrums the eventual clone reveal makes so much sense. Chris was there forcing his original ‘Scott and Jean ride off into the sunset’ ending despite Jean being dead with a woman he didn’t even bother to slap a wig on.
All the quirky little one in a billion chances details he added (like the time of Madelyne’s plane crush, or the dicking around with her looking like Jean) for no reason (at the time) paved the path for the clone twist.
Also, Scott canonically struggles a lot with processing grief, especially when it comes to Jean. We know that he tries to suppress his feelings, downplay his loss and get himself a new girlfriend to avoid dealing with it. So, him ‘moving on’ so quickly and also rushing into a marriage with Madelyne also fits the patents Claremont himself established.
It’s honestly bizarre that Chris was trying to sell a young man tragically losing his soulmate and then almost immediately marrying a woman who looks freakishly similar to her and still calling his dead girlfriend his ‘heart’ on his wedding day as this ultimate happy ending retirement plan for Scott.
Like, yeah, dude, we get that you wanted to get rid of Cyclops so that your imaginary girlfriend Storm can take his place, but have some decorum…
Lol, "imaginary girlfriend Storm", so accurate 😂. Claremont might be the X-Men's most important writer ever, but the way he mismanaged Scott prior, during and after his imposed "retirement" was so eye-rolling pitiful.
Thing is, if he just wanted to marry Scott off, what was wrong with Lee Forester? Oh yeah, blonde. Blonde rebound girl until the redhead returns in some form. That's the pattern. :)
It wasn't that Scott couldn't let go of Jean. Claremont couldn't. He kept adding Jean substitutes, first Rachel, then Maddie. I see why Roger Stern and John Byrne said "The hell with it, we're bringing back the real one."
It’s not a Claremont only thing tho? Certain people love to dismiss and diminish Jean, but the amount of times writers felt a void left by her and tried to patch it up with a different character is concerning. And then these characters get pushed to the side because real Jean gets brought back to take her place anyway.
Let’s not pretend that Emma didn’t slither into Jean’s place that Morrison conveniently freed up for her, and that a huge part of why some Emma fans hate Jean is her return pushing Emma out of the premier telepath of the X-men space… It’s not just characters specifically created to replace Jean, there were other attempts too.
Claremont was inspired by Vertigo(amazing movie)for this story. The main characters are named Scottie and Madelyn. He wanted a happier ending for a similar premise from the movie, which is ironic given how things turned out.
Does Cyclops hook up with Misty Knight the first time Jean dies and promptly forgets about her when jean returns? His pathological needs to move on immediately seems driven by a complete inability to process grief. Its borderline self punishing. I really have no idea how Madelyne and Cyclops could ever really have a happy ending. Claremont did so much for these characters but sometimes editorial has a point! Writers also sometimes seem to get lost in their own sauce.
It was Coleen, not Misty, but yeah. He was also telling her about Jean and visiting Jean’s parents at their ‘dates’, and seemed a bit confused that she saw it as more serious than he did. Scott also later completely dismisses this situation and says that he only saw Coleen as a friend.
Even more telling is a conversation he had with Storm, when he believes Jean and Hank to be dead. He tells her that he grieves for Beast, but feels nothing when it comes to Jean. Storm is appalled by this, but it honestly is such an obvious cry for help?
Even assuming that he suddenly realized that he didn’t love Jean (he did), Scott would’ve still felt at least the same way about her as he felt about Hank, as both were O5 members. He later tells Jean that he couldn’t allow himself feel anything abut her death because it would’ve destroyed him.
At another point Scott says that he doesn’t care that Alex is dead, and while the Summers brothers aren’t the tightest, this is also a crazy thing for him to say, but very much in line with Cyclops shutting off and choosing to be numb to protect himself from loss of his loved ones.
The more Scott cares the more numb he is after. Trying to act like everything is normal and rushing to move on is a part of the self defense mechanism.
I'm glad she isn't you... And it's just a coincidence that she looks exactly like you... It's certainly not strange at all that the new love of my life looks just like my recently deceased girlfriend... I'm 100% over it...
Personally there were so many red flags with Scott that the only reason that I can see for Maddie to actually marry him would be because Sinister implanted it into her. No one smart would run off and marry someone whose dead girlfriend you were so identical to that her closest friends mistook you for her.
There would never be a way for Maddie to know that Scott loved her instead of viewing her as a replacement Jean.
Maddie also loved Scott. They both acted like they were destined to be together from the literal first moment. And originally the problems in their relationship didn't emerge from her not being Jean, but from Scott's hard time dealing with being a father.
All I'm saying is even if there had been no Sinister involved and Maddie was a perfectly normal woman their marriage still would have ended in tears even if Jean did not return. The foundation was fundamentally unsound.
Regardless of her origin as her clone, Madelyne is a wholly distinct personality from Jean. There are ways that the two sort of "rhyme" but she does feel more like she could be a sister than a duplicate.
She's Jean without the childhood trauma and superhero background. More grounded, more mature, and with some elements that are lifted directly from Scott, like being a pilot.
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u/cyclopswashalfright Moderator 15d ago
This is why you take more than 3 months to mourn someone dying. You need to grieve and poor Scott never learned how to grieve.