The X-Men's Most Iconic Story Is Brutally Called Out By Marvel Lords

Legendary Marvel Comics creator Kurt Busiek has expressed his dismay at the X-Men comics title during the mutant superhero milestone.

Marvel Comics legend Kurt Busiek, the man responsible for helping bring the Avengers to the modern page, has a strong dislike for the iconic creative team behind another team of Marvel heroes... The Amazing X-Men. Long before becoming a writer for Marvel Comics, Busik was already a big fan of the Marvel Universe, along with other future entertainment powerhouses like George R.R. Martin.

Busiek first became a fan of Marvel's "Children of the Atom", 1967's X-Men #37 directed by Roy Thomas, Ross Andru, Artie Simek and Don Heck. Titled "We Are the Jury," the issue features an original cast of teenage X-Men of Cyclops, Marvel Girls, Iceman, Angel, and Beast who will face off against "The Third Factor," a group of former Mutant enemies Blob, Vanisher, Mastermind, Unus the Untouchable. While the Silver Age X-Men often gained fans like Busiek and other cult readers, the title failed to find the same success as top Marvel titles like The Fantastic Four and The Amazing Spider-Man. In 1975, under the leadership of Len Wein, Dave Cockrum and Chris Claremont, the X-Men needed a major makeover to achieve the popularity the book describes tried.

A new era of X-Men joins fan-favorite mutants Wolverine, Storm, Colossus, Nightcrawler, and Thunderbird, ushering in a new era of villains and supporting characters within the established continuity. While Busik remains loyal to Marvel's Merry Mutants, Coulter finds his loyalty to the book starting to wane when the X-Men encounter a new threat, known as Hellfire. Clubs emerged in the form of secret societies of wealthy mutants. In a letter published in Uncanny X-Men #143's "X-Mail" letter column in 1981, Busiek stated that issue 138 would be his last, posted to Reddit by user Zthe27th. While Busiek didn't say exactly what made him leave the book, Kurt simply called the team "a twist of what they used to be." In his letter, the frustrated young fan said he had hoped for two years that the book would improve, but after learning how the "Dark Phoenix Saga" ended, he decided to quit after Cyclops left the Mystic X team The Series - Man #138. The issue in which his letter appeared examines the aftermath of the "Dark Phoenix Saga," now featuring teens Kitty Pryde aka Sprite is the newest addition to the team.

Kurt Busiek Reversed An Iconic X-Men Storyline

Following another 80's Marvel classic in Frank Miller and Klaus Janssen's Daredevil #181, "The Dark Phoenix Saga" delighted many longtime X-Men and Marvel fans polarized. The iconic cosmic storyline is famous for the heroic sacrifice of Jean Gray, who was previously controlled by an ancient cosmic force. Instead of continuing to be a superhero, he decides to remove her from the books by allowing her own death. There's ample evidence that Jen's sacrifice was the end result of Marvel's editorial, which seems to upset Busik. Jane may not have been the most popular member of the team before Claremont took the title, but she's been an integral part of the X-Men's core since the team's debut in 1963. Jane's sudden exit from The Extraordinary X-Men may even have spurred Kurt's own unexpected role in bringing Jean back from the dead.

In the decades following Busiek's X-Men letters, Coulter made it clear that it was never the "Dark Phoenix Saga" itself that kept him away from the X-Men, but the components Associated with the current state of the comic. In an interview with AIPT, Busiek said it was mostly about character selection and writing related to the X-Men. Coulter even admitted that his decades of experience as a comic book veteran softened his stance on the initials column commentary somewhat. Like so many others, Chris Claremont and John Byrne's extraordinary X-Men is a comic that provided Kurt Busiek with a huge inspiration for his role as a creative force to be reckoned with in the comics world .

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