Chris Claremont circa 2008
Uncanny X-Men #94-279, 381-389, 444-473
Two hundred twenty-two issues in total, one hundred eighty-five of those consecutively, all that spanning portions of four decades, and that is representative of Chris Claremont's work JUST on Uncanny X-Men. That says nothing of X-Factor, New Mutants, Excalibur, Wolverine, or his forays into X-related mini-series, one-shots, annuals, and various other X-centric work. He holds the honor of being the writer on the Guinness World Record holding X-Men #1 from 1991 (8.1 million copies and nearly $7 million) as well as being the father of the mutant boom
For this writer, Claremont holds the distinction of being the definitive X-writer. He established the personalities, breathed new life into the existing characters, fleshed out the "new class" that he inherited, and gave strong identities to those he created. His ability to define a characters' identity was second-to-none, usually done in the form of lengthy interior monologues, and he truly turned the sketches of some of comic's best artists into three dimensional beings. He is the reason I got teary-eyed when Nightcrawler died in Second Coming, when Colossus sacrificed himself to cure the Legacy Virus, and when little Illyana died of that same virus. It wasn't the writers handling the book at the time, as good as they may have been, but rather the character I had grown so attached to during the initial 185 issue run in which Claremont defined the core of each X-Man. Even a character as briefly lived as the original Thunderbird was given a very strong identity that made the reader actually care about his death, despite his life only lasting the course of three issues. That is a testament to the ability of Claremont to get inside his characters.
This is the man responsible for stories that have stood the test of time with repercussions that still carry today: Dark Phoenix, The Mutant Massacre, The Trial of Magneto, The Brood Saga, and my personal favorite...the run of stories that carried the team from "Fall of the Mutants" to "X-Tinction Agenda", especially the "Australian Saga" chunk. He mastered the art of the slow burn, allowing stories to fester in the background before taking over the top slot. The best example I can think of for this took place in both UXM #218 and UXM #232. In the former, the reader simply sees Havok & Polaris ran off the road by a speeding bus and you see the fallout from the perspective of the two mutants. Jump ahead to the latter, 14 issues later, and we finally see the events landing that ultimately led to Havok & Polaris' hit-and-run with Harry Palmer. The Mr. Sinister/Madelyne Pryor/Jean Grey story, the Genosha story, the Siege Perilous, all stories that culminated over months and years. All that in the days when only the major story arcs were collected in trades.
The effect Claremont had on the X-Universe is seen in nearly every author that followed him on the books. With Scott Lobdell, Steven T. Seagle, Joe Casey, Alan Davis, and Ed Brubaker, there were some traits of Claremont in each. Matt Fraction, with his use of on-going subplots, and general treatement of the book, may as well be the reincarnation of Claremont. It's funny because I hated Fraction at first...but that's a story for another blog. Oh yeah, and fuck Chuck Austen's run...
So thank Claremont for the stories that have endured decades, that have inspired movies, that turned Wolverine into a pop culture figure, and drove fanboys into protest over the potrayal of Gambit. And after you do all that, you can then tell Claremont that it might be time to call it a night....
...To Be Continued...
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