No X-Men character has died more than Jean Grey. An Omega level mutant, Jean is linked to the cosmic Phoenix Force – which, frankly, makes sense given she has a tendency of dying and rising from the dead time and again. At this stage, it’s turned into something of a running gag.
The irony is that Jean’s most famous death – at the end of the “Dark Phoenix Saga” – was intended to be permanent. In the arc, Jean had gone insane and become the so-called Dark Phoenix, and writer Chris Claremont had originally intended her to be depowered. Editor Jim Shooter insisted that wasn’t enough for someone who had literally committed genocide, and as a result, the final version of the Dark Phoenix Saga ended with Jean committing suicide. Shooter set up a rule that nobody could ever bring her back unless they found a way of absolving her for her crimes – and in so doing, he unwittingly laid down a challenge for all future writers. The rest, as they say, is history.
By now, even the X-Men have gotten used to the idea that Jean Grey will die and rise again. Ignoring various occasions when the entire planet or universe was destroyed like the Incursions that set up Jonathan Hickman’s Secret Wars event – here’s your ultimate guide to the many deaths of Jean Grey.
The Dark Phoenix Saga
Jean Grey’s stories of death and resurrection begin with her apparent suicide on the surface of the Moon, in Uncanny X-Men #137. Fearing that she would become Dark Phoenix once again, Jean telekinetically manipulated alien technology to gun herself down. Years later, Marvel revealed that this wasn’t the real Jean at all; rather, she’d been replaced by the Phoenix Force incarnation, while her body was repaired in a cocoon. It was a neat way of getting around Jim Shooter’s golden rule.
Jean Grey Was A Victim Of The Infinity Gauntlet
Jean Grey’s next death was during Jim Starlin’s epic Infinity Gauntlet miniseries. In the comics, Thanos snapped his fingers to kill half the life in the universe as an offering to his beloved Lady Death. A number of prominent superheroes were among the snap victims, and in one scene in Infinity Gauntlet #2 Captain America looked a list of the heroes who had vanished. Jean Grey was notably included among them. This time around, Jean was brought back with all the other snap victims when time was eventually rewritten
Jean Grey Was Killed By Sentinels
It wasn’t long before Jean apparently died again, in Uncanny X-Men #281. In the book, the X-Men were attempting to negotiate a truce with the Hellfire Club, but they were interrupted by a lethal Sentinel attack. Emma Frost’s students, the Hellions, were slaughtered despite the X-Men’s best efforts. Jean herself was seemingly killed, but she hit upon a strange method of staying alive, switching her consciousness with the mind of Emma Frost in a fairly confusing plot. Quite how that meant her body’s life-signs dropped to zero for Sentinel scans remains unclear.
Wolverine Killed Jean Grey…
Jean Grey’s next death was in New X-Men #148, when she and Wolverine were trapped aboard a space station that was crashing into the sun. It was a powerful and emotional issue, one of the highlights of Grant Morrison’s run, and it built to a climax in which Wolverine decided to spare Jean the agony of burning to death. Instead, he stabbed her with his claws. Ironically, the death didn’t last; it triggered Jean’s transformation into Phoenix.
…And Then Jean Grey Died Again, Courtesy Of Magneto
Just two issues later, Jean Grey died again – and this time it stuck for over a decade. The X-Men’s battle against Magneto went tragically wrong when the Master of Magnetism released an electromagnetic pulse to induce a massive heart attack, with Jean once again dying in Cyclops’ armies. It was a major miscalculation on Magneto’s part, as Wolverine fell into a Berzerker Rage and killed him in return. In truth, this is probably one of Jean’s most bizarre deaths, as it doesn’t make any sense at all; how can an EMP trigger a “planetary-scale stroke?“
Jean Grey’s (Short-Lived) Return In Phoenix: Endsong
Jean Grey returned in Phoenix: Endsong, resurrected by the Phoenix Force once again. This time, the X-Men knew things were going out of control, and they attempted to contain Jean. History repeated itself, with Wolverine forced to stab Jean with his Adamantium claws, killing her – only for the Phoenix to resurrect her once more. He kept doing this time and again, at least eight times in all. In the end, the X-Men realized they were dealing with little more than a reanimated corpse, albeit one that allowed the Phoenix to access Jean’s memories.
The Death Of All-New X-Men’s Jean Grey
A (slightly deranged) experiment by the Beast brought the original X-Men into the present day, and for a time they lived as the All-New X-Men. Jean Grey blazed her own trail, but ultimately wound up pursued by the Phoenix Force, which wanted her out of the way. She was consumed in a blaze of Phoenix fire – and her psyche became trapped in the White Hot Room, along with all the other Phoenix Hosts. Incredibly, in a demonstration of pure power, Jean took control of the White Hot Room and bent the Phoenix Force to her will. This, frankly, was probably Jean’s most impressive resurrection of all – and it was ironically happening shortly after the real Jean Grey was resurrected as well.
Jean Grey’s Death in House of X
Finally, Jonathan Hickman’s X-relaunch has already killed off Jean Grey once. In House of X #4, Jean was part of a team sent on a suicide mission to a Sentinel construction plant in close orbit around the sun. The mission was a success, with the Sentinel plant destroyed, and Jean was the last survivor, floating in an escape pod and using her telepathy to keep the X-Men back on Earth updated. The pod was swarmed with vengeful Sentinels, and she died when it was torn open to the vacuum of space. It’s actually one of the grimmest deaths to date, even if it didn’t last; the Hickman-era X-Men have learned how to synergize certain mutant powers to resurrect the dead, and they brought Jean back the very next issue, along with her teammates.
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Death has always been something of a revolving door in comics. The old joke was that death only counted for Uncle Ben and Bucky, but the latter came back as the Winter Soldier, so even that isn’t true anymore. But Jean Grey most certainly holds the record for superhero deaths, having been killed and resurrected a stunning 15 times. What’s more, now that the mutants have conquered death, it’s surely only a matter of time before she’s killed and resurrected once again.
