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6. Chris Claremont's X-Men (1975-1991)



By: Chris Claremont, Dave Cockrum, John Byrne, Len Wein, and others
Originally published in: Giant-Size X-Men #1, X-Men #94-280, X-Factor #65-70

It's nowhere near a perfect run. Some will argue the quality dropped off around the time of Secret Wars II, others that only the John Byrne issues were good, and some true purists will even argue it was never the same after the death of Dark Phoenix. But none of that is really the point to me.

While continuity is nothing new in comicdom, it's extremely rare to see it done well. Roy Thomas was rocking continuity back when Claremont was still an unknown copy editor for Marvel, making his readers feel a little closer to the material by repeatedly referencing past events they'd recall, often for no good reason, but Claremont took it to a whole new level with the X-Men. Really starting with the death of Jean Grey (which Claremont had neither intended nor wanted), he began using continuity to create real emotional repercussions for his characters, allowing them to grow and change organically across issues in response to events they endured. Continuity was referenced endlessly to the point that it was often overwhelming for any but the fiercest of loyal fans, and yet that continuity mattered and carried true weight. X-Men was a series that truly rewarded you for being along for the ride, growing alongside these characters and often getting to know them better than the important people in your own life because you understood where they'd been, how they felt about where they'd been, and how where they'd been had transformed them since. You knew what made them tick, understood their transformations, and knew full well that nothing was sacred or off the table in the long run.   It was essentially one massive, super-powered soap opera, and I love it for that. It was also the first mainstream superhero book where the female characters got just as much representation on the team and in the limelight (sometimes more).

Sure, the quality does dip tremendously around issue #200 or so, but the growth, drama, and history continue forward, exciting new characters and new directions being introduced even while the individual stories are often quite forgettable. All that growth and sense that nothing was sacred ultimately took the title in some weird and really unpopular directions that other writers pulled the franchise out of with X-Factor #65-70 and X-Men #279 and #280, bringing a somewhat fitting conclusion to Claremont's saga that Claremont himself never would have been able to find. Still, all those post-issue #200 events counted and continued to matter after the fact, adding to the vast tapestry that was the ever-growing saga of the X-Men.

And therein lies the true appeal of this run. Nearly twenty years under the control of a single creator, the X-Men's became the most coherent, memorable, and well-preserved continuity in all of mainstream comicdom, still mined for gold and generally well-adhered to long after Claremont was gone. First getting into the franchise at the tail end in 1990 and continuing on after Claremont left through around 1994, that continuity was the stuff of mythology for myself and my friends. We prided ourselves on the trivia and tidbits we knew, and I remember collecting those X-Men trading cards largely because it was convenient reference material for following that dense but rewarding continuity.

Some can't stand all the continuity and work required to follow Claremont's X-Men, and I can't fault them for that, but, for me, it's absolute crack.