Jonathan Dobres

When people think of the Phoenix Saga, they’re usually thinking of the Dark Phoenix Saga, the one where Jean Grey’s god-like Phoenix persona goes insane, consumes a star, commits planetary genocide, and is put on trial by the Shi’ar for it. Ultimately, Jean takes her own life to protect the universe from the Phoenix, and her death sticks.¹ It’s one of the defining events of the X-Men canon, and indeed one of the biggest moments in all of comics.

But that is not this story. The first Phoenix Saga is decidedly less poignant, and only earned the “Saga” designation in retrospect, after Dark Phoenix shook the franchise. In the comics, the Phoenix Saga covers eight issues, from when Jean first manifests the Phoenix to when she voluntarily suppresses her powers in the name of not writing X-Men into a corner where one member of the team is an incarnated god.

X-Men: The Animated Series very roughly follows the beats of the original comics. The biggest difference is that the show has the benefit of knowing what’s coming with Dark Phoenix. So while in the comics Jean and the Phoenix aren’t even the primary focus of those issues—that’s Xavier and Lilandra—here the Phoenix has a much bigger role, with a lot of foreshadowing. The show also has Jean sacrifice herself at the end of this story (though not exactly kill herself), which makes me think she’ll survive the Dark Phoenix story coming in just a few more episodes.

Needless to say, season 3 is tackling some big stuff, and Fox went all in. They aired “Out of the Past” in prime time over the summer, and they aired these five (!!!) episodes in a single week, night after night. This was Event Television for twelve year-old me. I remember this week of my life, that I was mad when I had to miss an episode because the school year had just started and I had homework. But I’ve won, you see, because thirty years later I give myself homework. Homework about the X-Men.

Strap in for this entry, because I’m foolishly tackling all five parts in one post. The first two parts are pretty solid, but things go downhill once a galactic empire is involved and the show introduces a bunch of new characters (the Starjammers) whom you simply will not find interesting. If I had it to do over again, I’d do everything I could to keep the fight on Earth and delete the Starjammers entirely. It’s three episodes straight of fun if slightly pointless melees and escalating power levels, culminating in the Phoenix’s noble self-sacrifice. The strongest part of the finale is, surprisingly, Charles Xavier and his ability to maintain hope even when the very light is being pulled from the sky. It’s an example of inner strength that is speaking to me very loudly these days.

Part 1: Sacrifice

Air date: September 5, 1994

This episode opens with Xavier having visions of a galactic war and someone in a bug-like spacesuit. He’s certain that something terrible is going to happen at the Eagle One space station, and that the X-Men must infiltrate it to stop…something. Xavier can’t quite articulate what it is. Nor does he have any reason to trust these visions, it’s worth saying, but he sends the X-Men into space anyway.

What jumps out at me about this story is how fun it is. The action is fairly straightforward, but every character gets something to do, which keeps things entertaining. Even Jubilee has a fun scene, playing an airheaded teenager to distract security so that the team can sneak onto the shuttle. She’ll eventually get rescued by Storm, who blows out a window and scoops her up, which again, is a fun little moment for a character who would otherwise be powerless on a weather-free space station.

The team incapacitates the regular shuttle crew (as heroes do) and Jean puts the whammy on the only remaining original crew member, Dr. Corbeau, so that he’ll continue to perceive them as his regular staff. Things are uneventful until the team gets to the Eagle One station and Jean starts having Trap Vibes. Sure enough, everyone gets gassed, and we get the reveal of Shi’ar Emissary Erik the Red, who is here on behalf of the Empire to stop “the rebel Lilandra” from coming through a nearby wormhole. Even by this show’s standards, Red looks like an action figure. He attempts to finish the job by airlocking the X-Men, but Jean rouses just long enough to avert disaster and save the team.

“All I remember is someone standing over us, gloating,” she says, which for my money is a hall of fame hilarious line.

The action ramps up in the third act, as Cyclops and Red fight each other, critically damaging the station in the process. By this point, Lilandra has entered our star system via the wormhole, and our team has no choice but to escape along a path that will go straight through her ship’s “energy contrail”. The shuttle has a device on board that might be able to shield it, but of course, it must be operated manually. This is where Jean takes matters into her own hands, absorbs the necessary knowledge from Dr. Corbeau, knocks out her husband, and commits to doing the heroic thing. The episode closes with a flash of flames and a Phoenix-like image.

After two seasons as a supporting character, Jean is finally front and center. She’s the one who psychically disguises the team as the shuttle crew, has vibes about a trap, and stays conscious long enough to avoid getting airlocked. And that’s before everything she does in the climax!

It’s a good start for this multi-part story. Everyone gets something to do, and there are a lot of little character beats throughout that make an otherwise straightforward story engaging and fun.

Stray observations:

• Xavier summons the team in the middle of the night. Storm is casually fabulous, and Gambit walks in from a night out, also looking great. These are role models.

• Xavier’s bedroom is enormous, maybe the size of my entire apartment.

• I really cannot emphasize enough that Xavier has absolutely no reason to trust his visions. Sure, Erik the Red is villain-coded, but so is Lilandra. Shi’ar fashion favors an insect motif that does not exactly inspire implicit trust.

• On the toilet: Rogue, still!

Part 2: The Dark Shroud

Air date: September 6, 1994

We pick up exactly where we left off: Jean is struggling to pilot the shuttle through deadly radiation. It looks like she’s going to succumb, until something fiery travels from the wormhole and into her body. Suddenly, she’s wreathed in flames and strong enough to land the ship in the waters off New York City (after nicking the Empire State Building, peanuts by this show’s standards). The team breaks out of the shuttle after a little drama and they all surface on the water, except Jean. Suddenly, she bursts out of the bay and proclaims that she is the Phoenix!

We simply have to talk about the way they drew Phoenix’s hair in this pivotal moment. It makes no physical sense. It’s at least ten times the volume of her entire head. It somehow covers her ears despite being blown out like a dandelion. That side-part just keeps going and going, implying that Phoenix has a skull like a xenomorph. There are plenty of later shots where her hair looks normal, but right here in the dramatic debut, they made some weird choices in what I think is a failed attempt to evoke the famous comic cover.

Anyway, after this brief moment of empowerment, Jean falls unconscious and plummets into the waters (Jean remains Jean). Once the team pulls her out, she’s physically back to normal (including her hair), though comatose. Later, at the hospital, she’ll say that she feels like she could, “Reach out and touch the moon, and crack it in my hand,” a totally normal sentence that does not foreshadow any planetary genocides.

The episode then wisely slows down to check in with everybody. Xavier and Cyclops get into the kind of shouting match we haven’t seen since season one. Cyclops blames Xavier for withholding information from the team, which nearly got his wife killed. Xavier feebly says that he provided all the information he had, which I will point out means he sent the X-Men on an extremely dangerous mission while barely understanding why (I am very much on Cyclops’s side here). Xavier also calls Cyclops a poor leader on top of it. Beast, gentle but stern, calms them both down, then heads outside to check on Wolverine, who is processing his feelings by beating up some trash cans. Beast suggests that they might both be happier at a bar,² but the big blue softie has some trouble hailing a cab, and Wolverine decides he needs some alone time, as is his way.

Xavier also tries to get some space, but before he can get anywhere, a big purple laser shoots down from Lilandra’s ship and incapacitates him. A decidedly evil looking double of Xavier rises out of his body and laughs.

Cut to Wolverine on the subway, which suddenly goes dark. He’s attacked by what appears to be Lady Deathstrike, then Sabertooth, and then Deadpool. Wolverine rolls out of the subway car and is confronted by Evil Xavier floating over him, his cape a weird fit against his normal business suit. Xavier glues Wolverine to the train tracks and leaves him to die (very Snidely Whiplash of him), and begins harassing Gambit and Jubilee in Times Square. By this point Wolverine has joined up with them and sniffed out (literally) that Evil Xavier isn’t real, though everybody’s at a loss as to how to beat him.

While all this cool, fun stuff is happening, Cyclops is puttering around Jean’s room at the hospital. He’s on the phone with Rogue, telling her to wrap up her mission and get back to New York as soon as possible (thus explaining, at least vaguely, why we haven’t seen her since the end of season 2). Evil Xavier materializes and starts assaulting Cyclops. Before he can get too far, however, Jean invokes a little Phoenix power and instantly vaporizes him. If this seems like an easy out, that’s exactly the point. The Phoenix is on a whole other level, and no one, not even Jean herself, realizes that yet.

Xavier, now rescued, says that the Shi’ar psychic probe overwhelmed his own mental safeguards and released his worst impulses. Until he feels he’s fully back in control, he’ll be recuperating with Moira McTaggart. The episode even has time to follow Xavier to Scotland, where we’re reintroduced to Moira and her new boyfriend, Sean Cassidy (aka Banshee). Xavier is just settling into his room when he gets hit with another tortuous psychic ray. Moira and Sean fail to notice the massive blast of light directly behind them because they are making out.

Once Xavier stops screaming, the bug-suited alien finally materializes in the flesh and reveals herself as Lilandra Neramani, sister to the mad Shi’ar emperor, D’Ken. She explains that her brother is after the Crystal of M’kraan, which she has stolen, lest its vast power endanger the universe. Also, she says that she and Xavier are cosmically linked, no pressure! Before we can get any more exposition out of Lilandra, none other than the Juggernaut busts through the wall like the Kool-Aid Man.

This episode is one of the entries that leaves me thinking, “Wow, they crammed all this into twenty minutes?” The Phoenix emerges, the X-Men get emotional about it, Evil Xavier torments the team, Regular Xavier decides to recuperate in Scotland, and Lilandra presents us with a massive exposition dump. Characters have a chance to breathe for the first time in quite a while despite all the action, and those moments add a lot of depth.

That said, Part 2 doesn’t make quite as good use of characters as Part 1 did—the show is reverting to old habits that put Wolverine in a cool fight while Cyclops stands around worrying. Xavier’s evil psychic projection is unique to the TV show (it isn’t Onslaught). It’s there to foreshadow what happens when powerful psychics lose their self-control, which again, is the show setting things up for Dark Phoenix. Actual Phoenix moments are still pretty light here, but Jean dispensing with Evil Xavier the way someone might swat a fly is a sign of things to come.

Now That’s What I Call ’90s: Cyclops’s gigantic cellphone.

Stray observations:

• Beast is wearing a Howard the Duck t-shirt.

• Let’s take a moment to appreciate how this show pronounces “M’kraan”. When you read that word, were you thinking “EM-kron”? Because I sure wasn’t.

Part 3: Cry of the Banshee

Air date: September 7, 1994

A middle chapter that suddenly changes the setting to the British Isles might seem like an odd choice, but the reason is simple: it’s what the comics did. Again, the “Phoenix Saga” wasn’t originally structured as such, and this story just sort of happens in the middle of the key events. In the comics, Banshee had already been a member of the X-Men for a while, so the sudden invitation to Cassidy Keep made a little more sense. Nightcrawler was also on the team at the time, and in issue #102’s wildest moment, he’s hauled away by leprechauns.³ Nothing like that happens in this episode, but at least we get Rogue back.

Going into this episode, I’d remembered that Banshee has scream-based powers and can fly. What I forgot is that these two things are linked: he can only fly while screaming. To rescue Xavier from Juggernaut, Sean Cassidy leaps off a cliff, emits a high pitched wail, and begins levitating through the air. You really have to hear it.

“Cry of the Banshee” feels thin compared to the previous two episodes. Juggernaut and Black Tom Cassidy⁴ kidnap Lilandra at the behest of Erik the Red. This installment mainly escalates the stakes from Earthbound troubles to the galactic-level Shi’ar stuff. The action is fun, and I certainly enjoyed seeing Rogue punch Juggernaut through two brick walls (as did the animators, clearly), but ultimately it’s pointless. The X-Men fight a huge melee to just barely get Lilandra away from Juggernaut, at which point Gladiator shows up. Gladiator, captain of Emperor D’Ken’s guard, sports powers explicitly based on Superman’s and is seemingly unstoppable. He just throws Juggernaut across a lagoon. And right when it seems like Gladiator has everything in hand, Jean awakens as the Phoenix in New York, zips halfway around the world, and launches Gladiator back into orbit like he’s the missing member of Team Rocket.

I do like how Black Tom seems to be the only guy on the show who can read a room. The instant Gladiator demonstrates that he’s an order of magnitude stronger than Juggernaut, Black Tom hands over Lilandra, says, “My regards to the Emperor,” and books it for the exit.

The stars of this episode are Xavier, Lilandra, and the Phoenix. The psychic connection between Xavier and his new space babe is what’s really moving the story along, as she’s able to send Xavier some imagery that clues everyone in to where she’s being held. And of course, it’s the emergence of the Phoenix which ultimately saves the day (or really, the hour here). D’Ken’s ship has entered Earth’s solar system, he’s getting close to his goal, and “the legend, the child of crystal” is the only being who can really stop him.

Stray observations:

• Muir Island is supposed to be near the northern tip of Scotland, while Cassidy Keep is somewhere in northwest Ireland. These locations are hundreds of miles apart, but the show treats them—as the actors treat their Scottish and Irish accents—as if they are very close together.

• Another hall of fame line from Cal Dodd:

  Jubilee: Anybody know what Lilandra looks like?

  Wolverine: She’s from another galaxy. You see a woman you don’t know? Rescue her.

Part 4: The Starjammers

Air date: September 8, 1994

It’s important to remember that this show started in a mall. Yet two short seasons later, here we are with a cosmic entity who calls herself Phoenix, a galactic emperor with an apostrophe in his name, and the Mad Libs take on space pirates known as the Starjammers.

God, I hate the Starjammers. Originally conceived as a new property, there just wasn’t room in Marvel’s crammed late-70s publication schedule for a proper debut, so Dave Cockrum and Chris Claremont decided to shoehorn them into X-Men. This is the only reason why the Starjammers’ leader, Corsair, is also Cyclops’s father. The only other members of the team who are even slightly memorable are the big lizard guy (Ch’od) and the sexy cat-woman (Hepzibah). There’s also Raza (I’ve seen this episode twice and I still forgot he was there), and finally Cr’reee, Ch’od’s fluffy pink pet. I am out of apostrophes. From here out, I am going into debt to use contractions.

We pick up immediately following the events of Part 3. Phoenix tells Cyclops that she needs his help to save the galaxy and he’s like, “Yes!” I mean what long-term relationship hasn’t been there, you know? Jean uses her powers to transport the whole team (minus Jubilee, Storm, and Xavier) to the crystal’s location. Every psychic on Earth feels it, including Doctor Stephen Strange and the Hellfire Club Inner Circle (who will pop up again during Dark Phoenix).

The teleportation act conveniently exhausts Phoenix and takes her out of play for a little while. This is where the Starjammers bust in. The sound design during this tussle is terrible, especially Hepzibah’s meowing noises, which somehow overpower every other sound. The Starjammers manage to subdue the X-Men by reconfiguring their stun field for humans, which also knocks out Corsair (hint, hint). They make off with the crystal and Cyclops.

Meanwhile, Gladiator is literally hauling Erik the Red—and his entire cruiser—back to D’Ken. I would like you to remember this feat of astounding strength for just a little bit later. D’Ken starts laying into Erik just as Corsair interrupts with a proposition: he’ll hand over the M’kraan crystal for half the imperial treasury. D’Ken agrees, of course intending to immediately betray and murder the troublesome Corsair. Corsair, meanwhile, explains to Cyclops that he intends to use Cyclops’s powers to assassinate D’Ken. Cyclops wants no part of it, never mind that D’Ken is planning to do something that will probably unmake the universe. Scott Summers has principles, even if they’re really dumb.

Corsair and Cyclops have an ironic heart to heart about both being from Earth. When Corsair explains that he wants revenge on D’Ken for killing his wife, Cyclops asks, “Is one woman’s life enough to risk the fate of an entire galaxy?” Sure hope that line doesn’t come back to haunt you, stud.

The two enter D’Ken’s throne room, but before anyone can get murdered, Phoenix regains enough strength to zap the X-Men in. A fun melee ensues, including Rogue delivering a satisfying punch to Gladiator. This absolutely should not be possible, because we just saw this same guy tow an entire spaceship with his bare hands. Beast quotes Emerson while helping everyone escape, until Rogue can lift the door. But D’Ken has beaten them all. He has Gladiator capture Lilandra, and then grabs the M’kraan crystal. Phoenix tries to stop him, but “is not yet strong enough”. The crystal contains a “negative galaxy” that might pull the whole universe inside it, and D’Ken has just turned it on.

For everything I just wrote, not a lot actually happens in this half hour. The Starjammers are boring, Phoenix gains and loses strength as the script requires (as does Rogue), and characters are mostly just teleporting between different spaceships. We are very far from the mall indeed.

Favorite Rogueism: “Lilandra’s out colder than a leftover hush puppy!”

Stray observations:

• During Phoenix’s initial telepathic sweep for D’Ken’s ship, one psychic aboard seems to notice the intrusion. It’s a nice detail about the weird array of beings out there in the universe, but nothing else comes of it.

• As Phoenix, Jean speaks in a stiff, formal way that is not much of an improvement for poor Catherine Disher.

• Gambit promises to buy Rogue a M’kraan crystal for Christmas. Awww.

• D’Ken’s costume has an extraordinarily ugly pink and green butterfly motif going on. This dude is a galactic emperor and this is the best he can do?

Part 5: Child of Light

Air date: September 9, 1994

D’Ken merges with the M’kraan crystal, and from here out, it’s a cosmic crisis for which the X-men are poorly suited, but it’s a Saturday morning cartoon, so there are going to be lovingly animated superhero fights anyway. These fights happen within the crystal’s interior universe, after the X-Men, the remnants of D’Ken’s forces, and a good chunk of Earth’s sun are sucked into it. There’s really no point to the fights other than killing time and looking cool—D’Ken is the god of this strange universe and no one other than the Phoenix can beat him. I’m sure this all felt exciting when I was twelve, but as an adult all I can see are the story’s rough edges, the way that Phoenix conveniently exits and re-enters the plot, and the way the fights help run out the clock until her inevitable sacrifice.

The happenings on Earth are probably the strongest part of the episode, and even then, only if you’re willing to read between the lines. Xavier, Storm, and Jubilee are desperately trying to hold things together as the crystal’s vortex drains the light from the sun and destabilizes the planet. Xavier explains the situation to Jubilee in a way that probably wasn’t much comfort: “Soon it will absorb the sun itself, the entire solar system, including the Earth. The rest of the galaxy will soon follow. Though by that time we will have long since ceased to care.”

It’s a worldwide catastrophe—all hell is breaking loose everywhere, all at once. We see cameos from Sunfire, Mjnari, Alpha Flight, and the unmistakable hand of a certain friendly neighborhood Spiderman. Storm barely manages to save New York from a tsunami and screams, “IT IS AS THOUGH THE EARTH HAS GONE MAD!” Professor Xavier is bizarrely calm through all of this.

Or at least “bizarre” is how it seemed to me at first. He is pretty much the only person on the planet who has managed to avoid having a nervous breakdown. And why? Because he has an unshakable faith in his X-Men, an ironclad belief that ultimately good will triumph over evil. It is this faith that allows him to keep his wits about him during an unimaginable cataclysm, and thus help as many people as he can. Sitting here in March of 2025, watching a portrait of someone staying calm, focusing on solving whatever problems he can, and above all, maintaining hope that good will triumph is speaking to me pretty loudly.

Anyway, cartoons. The X-Men continue their futile fight against D’Ken until the script decides that it’s time for Phoenix to rally. She was the first person after D’Ken to get sucked into the crystal and has spent most of the episode crushed like a pancake. It’s one of the show’s strangest images, and I have a theory as to why we’re seeing it, but I’ll save that for a few episodes from now.

Phoenix joins the fight and teleports everyone back to Lilandra’s ship. She explains that she thinks she’s figured out how she can beat D’Ken, thanks to Jean’s very human empathy. It’s a tearful goodbye—Phoenix and Cyclops do the dramatic levitate-and-kiss thing—and a bit of a rushed climax, a mashup of The Wizard of Oz and Captain Planet. Phoenix re-enters the crystal, pulls on the best aspects of all the X-Men (the imagery is almost Biblical), and quickly obliterates the mad emperor, who thanks to budget constraints, is represented as a floating head in a bubble.

The M’kraan crystal has stabilized, and Phoenix explains that to keep it out of everyone’s hands, she has no choice but to babysit it in the heart of the sun. “The light! Oh, Scott, if only you could see it,” Catherine Disher intones over animation of sun flares. The episode is trying to have it both ways here—Jean is “dead” in the sense of being permanently inaccessible, but not exactly deceased.

Everyone’s very broken up about losing their best girl. Xavier tries to explain the legend of the Phoenix to Cyclops, but he’s not particularly interested in mythology lessons at this moment. Personally I think Beast’s Dickinson quote is a much more powerful closing thought: “Parting is all we know of Heaven, and all we need of Hell.”

Stray observations:

• Gambit and Rogue almost kiss!!! If only they hadn’t been sucked inside the event horizon of a magic crystal at that exact moment. But at least they’re alive.

• Lilandra became Empress of the Shi’ar the minute D’Ken merged with the crystal. She invites Xavier to join her in outer space, but he’s too committed to mutant/human peace here on Earth.

• The Starjammers are irrelevant here, as they will continue to be forever.