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Brian Miller
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Joined: 28 July 2004
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Posted: 27 May 2020 at 2:44pm | IP Logged | 1 post reply

Every chance he gets he hints that Phoenix was a beautiful, benign
force that was corrupted by Jean’s human spirit. I maintain it’s the other
way around

***********

This has to be the “fundamental” difference he was talking about.
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Rebecca Jansen
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Joined: 12 February 2018
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Posted: 27 May 2020 at 7:38pm | IP Logged | 2 post reply

All I can say is that the thirteen-fourteen year old me who thought X-Men #137 was a cracking good story found the follow-up fairy-tale version in X-Men #153 yucky, the re-run of Madelyn Pryor and Mastermind culminating in #175 extremely underwhelming, and the What If Phoenix Hadn't Died almost an insult to our intelligence (and I usually did like Mary Jo Duffy's writing). Kitty dressing up as Dark Phoenix on the cover of #157 made me plain angry (something missing from many fans who seem totally happy with crude manipulations to sell extra copies).

They, Chris Claremont and whoever else, made a sow's ear out of a silk purse. From a Rolls Royce story to a fleet of Yugos or Ladas... it was almost the clown car with big floppy feet and rubber noses spilling out sometimes in regurgitating Phoenix for some kind of sales spike... I'd much rather he'd have kept working on Spider-Woman with Leialoha art; that was a classy run for the most part.

Maybe it's a lesson to creative people to leave on a high note when achieved or risk merely trying to stoke the embers of what once was? Or maybe I'm the one who is wrong because the sales were high and fans lapped everything and anything up? I don't know, has all the Starlin Captain Marvel and Warlock stuff after the '70s been much more than dimming echoes of the original runs? As a Grateful Dead song once put it "don't dominate the rap Jack, if you got nothing new to say"... nothing much to add then move on to something you can bring new life to... the thing that was great was when it was fresh and full of ideas and new possibilites. Mostly raking back over those endlessly isn't doing what worked then at all!
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Robert Bradley
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Joined: 20 September 2006
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Posted: 27 May 2020 at 9:17pm | IP Logged | 3 post reply

Every chance he gets he hints that Phoenix was a beautiful, benign
force that was corrupted by Jean’s human spirit.



Which is the exact opposite of how you should want to portray your heroes.
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Jim Burdo
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Joined: 19 April 2020
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Posted: 28 May 2020 at 9:43am | IP Logged | 4 post reply

Chris will never accept this. He cannot let go of Phoenix. Every chance he gets he hints that Phoenix was a beautiful, benign force that was corrupted by Jean’s human spirit. I maintain it’s the other way around.

--

My impression is that he regards it as a force beyond good and evil that it's wielder can easily lose control of, like fire.
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Eric Sofer
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Joined: 31 January 2014
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Posted: 28 May 2020 at 10:16am | IP Logged | 5 post reply

And... Shooter laid down his whim of iron on you, forcing you to leave? Did he realize this? Did he know he was inconsistent in applying his rules? Did he know what you had done for Fantastic Four, and was he aware that without you, it would never again sell as well?*

I mean, granted that Shooter did some awfully good things for Marvel; but was he always such a putz?

*Of course, no one back then knew that the FF would be Persona Non Grata'ed quite so hard. Idiots.
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Brian Miller
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Joined: 28 July 2004
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Posted: 28 May 2020 at 10:24am | IP Logged | 6 post reply

Claremont has an interesting question in the interview that made me
wonder if he was aware of ELSEWHEN. He asked “when John went
into Shooter’s office and demanded ‘either he goes or I go!’ what if
John stayed on X-MEN and I went to FANTASTIC FOUR?”
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Shaun Barry
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Joined: 08 December 2008
Location: United States
Posts: 6828
Posted: 28 May 2020 at 5:25pm | IP Logged | 7 post reply


Sorry, for me personally, a Chris Claremont FF series would have been unreadable.



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Dave Kopperman
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Joined: 27 December 2004
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Posted: 28 May 2020 at 5:28pm | IP Logged | 8 post reply

Claremont did write an FF series briefly in the 90s, and I found it surprisingly enjoyable (the art by Alan Davis didn't hurt at all). 

Edited to correct: Davis was off after the first three issues, and Scott Lobdell wrote those, so Davis and Claremont didn't overlap.


Edited by Dave Kopperman on 28 May 2020 at 5:31pm
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Wallace Sellars
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Joined: 01 May 2004
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Posted: 28 May 2020 at 7:47pm | IP Logged | 9 post reply

The art on those three Alan Davis issues of FF was great, but after he left, so did I.
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Vinny Valenti
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Joined: 17 April 2004
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Posted: 29 May 2020 at 6:23am | IP Logged | 10 post reply

Gotta assume by now that Claremont is aware of ELSEWHEN. Back when there was rumblings of EVERMORE around 2009 , a forum post purporting to be by him said "Speaking strictly as a fan, I'd love to see it".
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Dave Kopperman
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Joined: 27 December 2004
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Posted: 29 May 2020 at 7:54am | IP Logged | 11 post reply

 Wallace Sellars wrote:
The art on those three Alan Davis issues of FF was great

Indeed.  Also interesting that he was one of the few illustrators I can think of whose work can actually withstand the totally over-the-top effects colorists of that era used, which is really on display here.

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Brian Miller
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Joined: 28 July 2004
Location: United States
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Posted: 29 May 2020 at 8:04am | IP Logged | 12 post reply

I listened to a different Claremont interview on the way home yesterday
and it got around to his casting an X-Men movie and, just like JB, he
cast Bob Hoskins as Wolverine. Don't know if they ever discussed it,
but if not, wow, what a coincidence.
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