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Cyclops (Scott Summers) is a fictional character, a superhero that is the field leader of the X-Men in the . Created by writer Stan Lee and artist/co-writer Jack Kirby, he first appeared in The X-Men #1 (September 1963) and was originally dubbed Slim Summers. By #3, his name was changed to Scott and Slim was referred as a nickname. A mutant, Cyclops produces powerful "optic blasts" from his eyes, forcing him to wear specialized glasses at all times and a specialized ruby quartz visor in combat. His powers may have led to his inhibited, meticulous character. These same qualities, however, have made him an ideal leader for the X-Men. He is the son of Corsair (Major Christopher Summers) of the Starjammers; the brother of Havok (Alex Summers) and Vulcan (Gabriel Summers); the father of Cable (Nathan Summers); and the widower of Madelyne Pryor and Jean Grey and a long time friend with Beast (Hank McCoy). In alternate realities, he has also been the father of Marvel Girl and Ruby Summers, and the biological parent to X-Man and Cable's clone Stryfe.

The first X-Man recruited by Charles Xavier and one of the original five X-Men, Cyclops has had a large presence in X-Men-related comics since their inception. He has also been featured in almost every adaptation of the team in other media.

In practically every incarnation of the character, he has almost always been shown to be not only Charles Xavier's most loyal student, but also the one who most believes in his dream of mutant and human equality. His loyalty to Xavier has cost him dearly from time to time, yet the character remained by Xavier's side until recently. In turn, Xavier is known to view Scott as one of his most (if not the most) prized pupils, and looks upon Scott not as a mentor to protege, but rather as a father to a son.

He is played by James Marsden in the X-Men films. A young Cyclops appears in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, released in May 2009, played by Australian actor Tim Pocock.

In 2006, IGN.com rated Cyclops #1 on their list of Top 25 X-Men from the past forty years. Wizard Magazine also ranked Cyclops the 106th best comic book character of all time, of their list of the Top 200 Comic Book Characters of All Time.

Publication history

Cyclops has been a mainstay character of the X-Men since the character was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and seen in X-Men (vol. 1) #1. Summers remained a member of the team up through Uncanny X-Men #201, and was a regular in the first series of X-Factor up through X-Factor #70; he can currently be seen in the third series of Astonishing X-Men. Over the years, Cyclops has appeared in a few limited series including Adventures of Cyclops & Phoenix, Further Adventures of Cyclops & Phoenix, the second series of Astonishing X-Men, X-Men: The Search for Cyclops, and his own self-titled series Cyclops.

During Joss Whedon's run of Astonishing X-Men, Cyclops adopted a new attitude unfamiliar to most accustomed fans. After Emma's psychic intervention at the mansion, he temporarily lost his powers after owning up to his self-inflicted, traumatic past. This prompted an interview with Joss Whedon in Wizard magazine #182, when asked if Cyclops didn't have his powers any more, Whedon replied that "No, he doesn't have his powers. Well, he had a choice to either be completely out of control or bury them. He can't use them. That's pretty much it. But the thing that would be fun is that, with no powers, he's going to be the best that he's ever been. That's what the arc is about. [Cyclops has] been the team leader and the team washout in terms of popularity. He was defined by Jean so much, and I just think that this guy is so interesting in his struggle against mediocrity. Then, when it's all laid on the line, when you find out the thing that's been holding him back from being just a complete bad ass has been himself all his life, that he's been lying to everyone, including himself, about who he is-that should be freeing. The Scott we're going to see is going to be a little bit different. This guy is either completely out of control or in control of something we're not used to. I wanted him to be an unabashed tough guy. He is shooting people and turning very much into a leader. Not everyone is going to like it." Now, the X-Men leader has become more confident, outspoken, and audacious. This has had a significant effect on his leadership and his respect among fellow teammates, most notably Wolverine.

Fictional character biography

Youth

When Scott was a boy growing up in Anchorage, Alaska, his father, USAF Major Christopher Summers, took the family for a flight in their de Havilland Mosquito. It came under attack by an alien Shi'ar spaceship. As the plane went down in flames, Scott's parents fastened him and his younger brother Alex into a parachute and pushed them off the plane, hoping that they would survive. Unfortunately, the parachute caught fire and Scott struck his head upon landing. This caused brain damage to Scott, which is responsible both for his inability to control his optic blasts as well as prolonged amnesia about his childhood. Parts of his memory returned when he was unexpectedly attacked by the demon D'Spayre while on a leave of absence after Jean Grey's perceived death.

Scott spent most of his childhood in an orphanage in Omaha, Nebraska and was subjected to batteries of tests and experiments by the orphanage's owner, Mr. Milbury, an alias for the geneticist Mister Sinister, who also placed mental blocks on Scott.

The X-Men

When Scott is sixteen, he runs away from the orphanage, and wanders the streets. While wandering, he walks across a construction site and his head trauma activates, causing an optic beam, also causing a metal crane to fall toward an onlooking crowd. He thinks quickly unleashing a second blast that destroys the crane. The crowd thinks this is an act of violence, and forms a lynch mob. He encounters Jack O' Diamonds and battles the villain. Scott is found by Charles Xavier, who erases the crowd's memories. Xavier then asks Scott to join the X-Men, and he gladly accepts, as the first official member. In the X-Men's first field mission, he battles Magneto. With the X-Men, he battles the Blob. He also becomes romantically attracted to Jean Grey. With the X-Men, he then clashes with the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants for the first time. He soon becomes the team's field leader, a position he will traditionally hold over the years.

Cyclops has a relationship with Jean Grey during their time in the "original" X-Men. For a long time, he refuses to admit, even to himself, that he has feelings for her, afraid he would be hurt again or that his optic blasts would hurt her - or anyone else he cared about for that matter - and also because he feels he is no match for his wealthy teammate Warren Worthington III, a.k.a. Angel, who is at first also romantically interested in Jean. What Scott doesn't know is that Jean actually has a crush on him, but is too shy to make a move. Finally, on Bobby Drake's 16th birthday, they reveal their passion for each other and begin to date.

When the X-Men are defeated by Krakoa, Cyclops is the only member able to escape and return to Xavier. He helps train a new group of X-Men, which includes Storm, Colossus, Nightcrawler, and Wolverine to rescue the others. When the other original X-Men (Angel, Beast, Iceman, Jean Grey, and later additions Havok (his own brother) and Polaris) decide to leave in light of the arrival of the new X-Men, Cyclops stays, feeling that he will never be able to lead a normal life because of the uncontrollable nature of his powers.

At first, Scott believes that his parents died in the plane accident and is unaware that they, in fact, had been captured and sold into slavery by the Shi'ar. As an adult member of the X-Men, Cyclops meets his father, now known as Corsair, leader of the Starjammers, a group of aliens opposing what they see as the tyranny of the Shi'ar empire. Several more years pass before he learns his father's true identity. He later comes into contact with his grandparents, who he learns are still alive and own a shipping company in Canada.

Cyclops privately questions his relationship with Jean after Jean dies trying to pilot a space shuttle through a solar flare, and then is reborn as Phoenix, feeling that this reborn Jean was not the same Jean he had loved. Yet when he thinks her dead for an extended period of time after a battle in the Savage Land, Scott is not able to mourn her, and believes this meant he didn't really love her anymore. He briefly dates Colleen Wing. However, when Scott and Jean are reunited on Muir Island to fight Proteus, he rediscovers his love for her, and they share a passionate kiss on the way home. A few days before Jean dies, Scott psychically proposes, and she accepts. After her death, he quits the X-Men, unsure of what to do anymore. He signs on as crew of a fishing boat, captained by Lee Forrester. After an adventure in which Lee's father is possessed by D'Spayre, and Cyclops and the Man-Thing must fight D'Spayre, Scott and Lee find themselves shipwrecked in the Bermuda Triangle, where they stumble upon Magneto's new base of operations.

Scott soon returns to the X-Men. He then discovers that Corsair is actually his father. Eventually, Scott marries Madelyne Pryor, a woman who bears a strong resemblance to Jean. Scott later battles Storm for undisputed leadership of the X-Men, and after being defeated he retires from the X-Men. Madelyne bears him a son, Nathan.

X-Factor and Inferno

Shortly after the birth of Nathan, it is revealed that Jean is not dead. The Phoenix is revealed to be a cosmic entity who had supplanted Jean, placing her in a healing pod at the bottom of Jamaica Bay, to be eventually revived by the Avengers and the Fantastic Four. Cyclops leaves his wife and son and returns to Jean, although Warren moves in on the now single woman. Jean joins with Cyclops and the other original X-Men as X-Factor, who pose as mutant hunters but in reality are trying to help their genetic brethren. Meanwhile, Pryor goes on to be an assisting member of the X-Men, apparently sacrificing her life during the Fall of the Mutants with her teammates, although she was left with feelings of despair over the loss of Scott, who felt bad himself over the way he had handled the situation.

No longer married, Scott moves on. During an adventure, his teammate Warren, the Angel, loses his wings. Bitter, Angel is transformed by a villain the team recently encountered, immortal mutant Apocalypse, into Death, general of his Horsemen. Iceman manages to bring Warren back, who becomes Archangel.

The demons S'ym and N'astirh corrupt Madelyne's feelings of self-despair, transforming her into the Goblin Queen. Madelyne seeks revenge on Scott for leaving her. When it is revealed that she is a clone created by geneticist Mister Sinister, essentially for the purpose of becoming a brood mare, Madelyne can't take it any more and kills herself. Scott seemingly kills Sinister with an optic blast, and pursues a romance with Jean, reclaiming his son. Scott soon learns that Mister Sinister ran the orphanage in which Scott was raised, and battled Sinister over this.

Shortly after the X-Tinction Agenda, Scott reencounters Apocalypse, who infects Nathan with a techno-organic virus. Although Scott saves his son with the help of his fellow teammates and through the combined strength of Nathan, Jean, and himself defeats Apocalypse, he was unable to save his son from the fatal infection. Distraught, Scott sends his son into the future where he can be cured.

Next, Xavier's psionic enemy, Shadow King, returns to combat the X-Men and X-Factor. After his defeat, Cyclops and X-Factor rejoin the X-Men team, and Scott is named leader of a newly created "Blue Team".

Return to the X-Men

After Cyclops' return as field leader, much of the Blue team is kidnapped by Omega Red and the ninjas of The Hand. After the captured teammates' rescue, Mr. Sinister sends Caliban, a former X-Factor member, to kidnap Cyclops and Jean for Stryfe, a madman and rival to Cable, both time-lost mutants. Stryfe tells the two that he is Nathan, sent to the future and abandoned. In a fight, Cable and Stryfe apparently die. Afterwards, the team battles Omega Red again, and fellow teammate and telepath Psylocke tries to lure Cyclops into an affair behind Jean's back. Ultimately, however, Cyclops remains with Jean. Cable returns as well and reveals to Cyclops that he is the real Nathan Christopher Summers.

Second Marriage

Scott Summers and Jean Grey finally marry. During their honeymoon, they are brought into the future where they raise Cable for the first 12 years of his life during The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix miniseries. After helping Cable defeat the future version of Apocalypse, they are sent back to the past. At the request of Rachel Summers, Jean assumes the Phoenix identity. Mister Sinister, involved with the machinations of Apocalypse and Stryfe and still alive, tells Cyclops that there is another Summers brother, and leaves him wondering.

As Cyclops deals with the fact that his son is now old enough to be his father, the X-Men are forced to battle their mentor when Professor Xavier is transformed into the evil Onslaught as a result of mind-wiping Magneto. Although the X-Men defeat the evil entity and free Xavier, most of Earth's heroes are lost for a time. Xavier, who is left powerless after Onslaught's defeat, is arrested for his part, leaving Scott and Jean as leaders and co-headmasters of the school. However, the pair go into retirement following Operation: Zero Tolerance, in which Cyclops is gravely injured when a bomb is placed in his chest.

Merging with Evil

Scott and Jean return to the X-Men some time after at the request of Storm, when she grows concerned about the mental well-being of Professor X (who had returned sometime prior). Their return then leads to the events of The Twelve, in which Apocalypse locates twelve mutants which can power a machine to allow him to take the body of Nate Grey, the X-Man. In order to save Nate, Cyclops willingly merges with the villain Apocalypse. He is believed dead until Jean and Cable track him down to Egypt and separate him from Apocalypse, killing Apocalypse's spirit in the process.

New X-Men

Upon Cyclops' return to the X-Men following his possession, his personality has been altered as a result of being bonded with Apocalypse. This change causes a rift between him and Jean; he claims Apocalypse made him question not only their relationship, but his life as a whole. He is instrumental in preventing the mutant Xorn's suicide and in recruiting the powerful mutant to the X-Men. The two establish a close friendship; similarly, repeated missions with Wolverine result in the growth of a tentative friendship between the two veteran X-Men.

When Jean begins to show signs of the Phoenix Force again, the distance between the two grows larger and Scott begins what others would dub his "celibacy kick." Jean attempts several times to confront Cyclops, but he continues to push her away, claiming that Apocalypse had changed him too much on the inside. When Xavier leaves Earth while under the control of Cassandra Nova, Jean is left as Headmistress of the school. Her new responsibilities along with her growing powers, force Jean to put her attention elsewhere leaving Scott feeling ignored. Instead of attempting to reconcile with his estranged-wife, Scott turns to Emma Frost, a former villainess who had reformed, been the headmistress of Generation X, and eventually joined the X-Men. Their relationship ostensibly begins as a series of psychic therapy sessions, but Emma takes advantage of this situation to get closer to Scott. Under the guise of counseling him, she instigates a telepathic affair.

When Phoenix discovers the affair, Cyclops claims he and Emma shared only thoughts and thus had done nothing wrong. Meanwhile, Emma's snide and mocking jeers provoke a hurt and angry Jean to psychically confront her, using the full-power of the Phoenix Force to 'burn away the lies'. She forces Emma to admit her true feelings for Scott, and also come to terms with her many failures, sins, and personal demons. Furious at both himself and Jean, Scott confronts her and demands she read his mind; Jean finally complies, only to discover that Scott and Emma never actually engaged in any physical contact, though Emma had offered it. Yet, despite the fact that the affair was not a physical one, to a telepath such as Jean (who for years shared an intimate psychic rapport with Scott) the incident is just as bad if not worse.

Unable to fully confront everyone about his actions, Scott runs away from the Xavier Institute just after Emma has been shattered in her diamond form and supposedly killed. He soon finds himself at Hellfire Club which had been turned into a sleazy strip club and tries to get drunk off white wine while generally trying to escape the responsibilities, expectations, and demands he feels are unjustly placed on him by the X-Men. He then accompanies Wolverine and Fantomex to the government-created time-pocket called The World and then Asteroid M. During his time with Wolverine, Scott reveals that he feels his relationship with Jean is stagnant and that the two of them had not progressed romantically since their initial teenage romance. He also confesses that he feels that Jean is so concerned with the school and her new powers that the two no longer communicate like before and that he feels left behind due to Jean once again being connected to the Phoenix Force. When Scott finally returns to the X-Men, their new teammate Xorn (who was revealed to be Magneto, but was subsequently retconned as an imposter) attacks the X-Men. Having at last reached full Phoenix power, Jean confronts Xorn-Magneto and is killed in the process. As she is dying, Scott apologizes for hurting her, but Jean instead tells him that she understands and has never seen him more alive and urges him to live on.

Headmaster

Scott, however, is devastated by Jean's death, and considers leaving the X-Men once more. It was revealed in the "Here Comes Tomorrow" storyline that, had he done so, it would have led to an apocalyptic alternate future. To prevent this, a resurrected, future-version of Jean uses her powers as the White Phoenix of the Crown and telepathically nudged Cyclops into a real relationship with Emma, reaching out to him from this alternate future. Together, the pair rebuild the Xavier Institute as co-headmasters.

The new relationship between Emma and Scott leads to problems between them and the rest of the X-Men, all of whom believe that the pair are doing Jean's memory a disservice. Rachel Summers in particular feels hurt and angry by her father's lack of remorse for the psychic affair that hurt Jean before her death and Emma's part in it, and takes on the last name of Grey in place of Summers. The other X-Men eventually come to accept the relationship and both Scott and Emma manage to reconcile with Rachel in their own ways, such as introducing Rachel to Jean's other family members.

Deciding that the X-Men need to play more of a role in emergency rescue and aid, and thus garner attention on mutants in a more positive light where mutant abilities are used for the good of people, Cyclops hand-picks a new team in Astonishing X-Men, which is subsequently used by Marvel as the chief representation of the X-Men. The team faces an alien named Ord of the Breakworld, who supplies Earth scientist Dr. Kavita Rao with a "cure" for mutation. The team subdue Ord, but not before learning that one of their own will be responsible for the destruction of Ord's homeworld in the coming year. Not long after, the X-Men's Danger Room becomes sentient, attacking the X-Men and seeking to ultimately kill Xavier. Calling itself "Danger," "she" reveals that Xavier knew she had been self-aware since Shi'ar technology was installed in the Danger Room years ago, but chose to ignore her, effectively inhumanely using her only to train his teams of X-Men. After her defeat on the island of Genosha, the X-Men abandoned Xavier in disgust, with Cyclops no longer welcoming Xavier's input at the School or with the team.

Cyclops also tutored a squad at the institute called The Corsairs, named after Cyclops' father. The team consisted of Dryad, Quill, Specter, and the three remaining Stepford Cuckoos.

Astonishing X-Men

In Astonishing X-Men #14, during an impromptu telepathic "therapy session", Emma Frost presented Cyclops with the possibility that his lack of control over his optic blasts actually stems not from physical brain damage, but from a sort of mental block that the young Scott imposed upon himself after the combined traumas of the loss of his parents, separation from his brother, and shocking manifestation of his powers; this is seen as a coping mechanism, giving Scott something to focus on and try to maintain some sort of control over at a time when events completely out of his control had effectively shattered the life he had led up to that point.

Scott admits that this theory is the truth, further admitting that he had blocked making this decision out of his memory, to preserve the fallacy in his own mind and prevent others from discovering his "secret." The issue ends with Scott apparently in a catatonic state, with his eyes uncovered and displaying their natural shade of brown, with no evidence of his powers manifesting. Later he manifests, and has full control over his optical blasts, although it was only temporary.

Deadly Genesis

After the events of House of M, nearly all mutants were left depowered, and Xavier was missing. A mysterious villain then attacked and easily defeated several members of the team, including Cyclops and his alternate-reality daughter, Rachel. The two were captured and taken to an undisclosed location, which Cyclops vaguely remembered visiting in the past. Eventually managing to free themselves, Cyclops and Rachel attempted to escape, only to run into their captor (revealed to be Vulcan), who informed Cyclops that he was the X-Man's younger brother. A powerless Professor Xavier confirmed this information in the final book of the miniseries. This new information has left Cyclops resentful towards his mentor and has gone so far as to demand that Xavier leave the school as it is no longer 'his.'

Civil War

Cyclops, along with the other surviving original X-Men, declare neutrality on the subject of Civil War, reasoning that the X-Men sympathized too much with Captain America's side - who, like the X-Men, were persecuted for wanting to do the right thing - but believed that the mutant race had suffered too great a loss recently to take a side either way due to the recent depowerment of so many mutants. When Bishop leaves the team to join the Registration supporters and locate the escaped 198, Cyclops eventually helps the futuristic X-Man in recovering them.

World War Hulk

Cyclops is listed at IGN as a target on Hulk's "Hit List" of characters. He is seen fighting the Hulk in World War Hulk: X-Men #1 and in issue #2, he uses a full beam blast to stop the Hulk, refusing to let the Hulk take Professor Xavier regardless of his own feelings towards his mentor regarding the truth about Krakoa. While it peels off some of the Hulk's skin, he was able to walk towards Cyclops and clench his entire face, effectively containing the blast. After Hulk left when Mercury told him about the mutant race being near-extinct, Cyclops began to forgive Professor X while the wounded were being tended to.

Messiah Complex

Cyclops leads a team to Alaska to find the new mutant detected by Cerebro. When the team arrives, they find nearly every child in the town killed, dead Marauders and Purifiers, and the baby gone. He sends a team consisting of Wolverine, Nightcrawler, Angel, and Colossus to find former Acolytes for information on the Marauders. He argues with Xavier, who complains about not telling him about his team. Scott tells Xavier it's not his X-Men anymore and that he can do what he wants. Scott also calls in X-Factor to help with the situation, asks Rictor to infiltrate the Purifiers, and asks Madrox and Layla Miller to go see Forge. Upon discovering that Cable has kidnapped the new born mutant, Cyclops orders the reforming of X-Force with Wolverine leading the team. Their first mission is to hunt down Cable and retrieve the baby. Cyclops later breaks all ties with Professor X and asks him to leave the mansion, as Xavier continues to question Cyclops' judgement. Later on, Cyclops is seen with his own team and X-Factor, to help out Wolverine against the Reavers and to capture the baby from Cable. Cable eludes the X-Men.

After finding the Marauders' hideout on Muir Island, Cyclops dispatches X-Force and Bishop to go there and retrieve the baby. During the final battle, Cyclops sends the New X-Men against the Marauders, believing that Sinister's forces will be caught off guard by unfamiliar opponents. The students prove to be effective. Cyclops then confronts Cable demanding the baby. Cable, with a gun pointed at his father, begs Cyclops to let him escape into the future with the baby, however Cable gives the child to Cyclops, after Xavier points out that the future of all mutantkind is at stake and Cyclops, as leader of the X-Men, speaks for mutantkind. Cyclops holds the baby and, realizing that the child deserves the chance to make its own destiny, gives her back to Cable. Cable teleports to the future just as Bishop fires a round at the child. The shot misses her and hits Xavier in the head. Cyclops strikes Bishop with an optic blast, and Cyclops declares the X-Men disbanded.

Manifest Destiny and controversy

During the interim period, Cyclops goes on a vacation with Emma to the Savage Land after refusing Tony Stark's request to have the X-Men as part of the Fifty State Initiative. There, they are contacted by Warren asking them for assistance in San Francisco. Scott and Emma are successful in rescuing not only Warren and the other X-Men, but also in rescuing San Francisco as a whole. As a result, the Mayor of the city offers to help the X-Men reestablish themselves in the city. After building a new headquarters, Cyclops sends word to all the world's mutants that San Francisco, which has welcomed the X-Men with open-arms, is now a safe haven for mutant-kind and that all are welcomed to join them. The X-Men's presence is widely approved of by San Francisco, including the police, who now hire the team to aid them in cases that might be out of their area.

Cyclops dispatches Wolverine to track down Mystique and revives X-Force as a clandestine black-ops team whose mission is to take down threats to the X-Men that they cannot deal with while under the public eye. Cyclops places Wolverine in charge of the team and adamantly keeps X-Force's existence secret from the other X-Men, including Emma Frost (manifested as a psychic "black box" in his mind that Emma is unable to open), also demanding that X-Force remain unknown to the public. However, Cyclops utilizes other X-Men for parts of the groups mission, including Beast and the Stepford Cuckoos. The team is sometimes less careful, leaving blood-stained clothing around, piquing Emma's suspicions. The controversy of Cyclops' decisions as leader of the X-Men is further highlighted during the Skrull invasion of San Francisco when he readily utilizes biological warfare against the Skrulls by knowingly infecting them with an adapted version of the Mutant Legacy Virus created by Beast without first determining if there was also a cure.

In another controversial decision, Cyclops sends X-Force to track down the Leper Queen who is infecting mutants with a strain of the Legacy Virus to use their uncontrolled powers in attacks against humanity in order to stir up anti-mutant hysteria. While on the mission, Beast locates Cable in the future and Cyclops orders X-Force to abandon the current mission and prepare for transport to the future to assist Cable and the baby. Despite knowing that the Leper Queen has kidnapped and intends to kill Hellion, Surge, and Boom Boom, and despite the protests from both X-Force and Beast that a few more minutes is all that is needed to kill her and save the students, Cyclops activates the time machine. Though Domino is only moments away from killing the Leper Queen, the team is transported to the future and the Leper Queen shoots Boom Boom in the head, while Hellion and Surge are injected and sent to the United Nations building for another attack.

Mutant/Anti-muting rioting and the return of Madelyne Pryor

Footage of Cooperstown, Alaska from X-Men: Messiah Complex is eventually released to the media by Simon Trask, designed to deceive the public into believing that the destruction was caused by the newborn mutant messiah rather than the Purifiers. The footage, coupled with Trask's newly formed "Humanity Now! Coalition" pushing anti-mutant legislation, dubbed "Proposition X," aiming to control mutant reproduction, causes an increase in mutant hate crimes, causing Scott to open the X-Men's base to anyone seeking refuge. During this time, his growing secrecy concerning X-Force and Emma's suspicions that he is keeping something from her which begins creating a rift between himself and Emma. Taking advice from Storm that Scott's actions are always in the best interest of mutant-kind, Emma secretly agrees to participate in Norman Osborn's Cabal in her own attempt to insure the protection of the mutant population.

Scott encounters his dead ex-wife, Madelyne Pryor, again when she inexplicably returns as a psychic ghost, calling herself the Red Queen and with a newly assembled all-female team of mutants calling themselves the Sisterhood. Her team attacks the X-Men and Madelyne steals a lock of Jean's hair in Wolverine's possession, with the goal of using it to locate and inhabit Jean's body, allowing her to be reborn. Scott employs Domino to exhume Jean's grave and swap her body with another. Unaware of the switch and spurning Scott's attempt to reach out to her, Madelyne attempts to possess the body, but seemingly disintegrates into nothingness as no other body than Jean Grey's can house an entity of Madelyne's level of power.

Utopia

After the battle with Madelyne and the Sisterhood, Beast confronts Scott and Emma, stating that he is aware of both of their clandestine actions and that they will discuss them at length together or their secrets will tear the X-Men apart. In the limited crossover tie-in, Dark X-Men/Dark Avengers: Utopia, the growing unrest among the mutant population and calculated instigation from Trask and Humanity Now! leads to violent rioting from mutants against the anti-mutant coalition in San Francisco. Though supported by the mayor, Cyclops is largely viewed as the leader of the remaining mutant population by the media and he takes the brunt of negative media and public opinion, implicated as endorsing and sending the X-Men to lead the rioting. Trask capitalizes on the hysteria, portraying Humanity Now! as victims of oppression in order to push Proposition X. Norman Osborn utilizes the Dark Avengers to stop the riots and arrest Cyclops and his team of X-Men, calling in Emma to lead a new team of "Dark" X-Men. Emma agrees to lead the team, which will answer to Osborn, as the Black Queen. Marvel writer Matt Fraction indicated that Emma's alliance with Osborn will place Scott and Emma at odds with one another, providing "a profound schism." Cyclops travels to Osborn's base on Alcatraz Island to speak with him. Osborn tells Cyclops that they can end the riots and hysteria here right now but Cyclops interrupts him and orders him to surrender. A shocked Osborn asks what he means and Cyclops replies that Osborn needs to get the riots under control and then withdraw H.A.M.M.E.R. and the Dark Avengers and leave San Francisco to him and the X-Men. When Osborn refuses Cyclops leaves telling Osborn that he tried. After Cyclops leaves, Osborn tells Victoria Hand that when the time comes Osborn is going to kill Cyclops personally.

As Emma's Dark X-Men slowly get the city under control, Cyclops continues to form his plans to deal with the situation. Scott assigns his X-Men (such as Mirage, Domino, Mindee Cuckoo, and Psylocke) different tasks, as well as having another team observe Emma's team, as they deal with a group of bio-sentinels attacking San Francisco. When asked how they're expected to take out both the Dark X-Men and Dark Avengers, Scott retorts "Who said you're the squad that's supposed to stop the Avengers?"

Scott's plan finally comes together as he has Magik teleport X-Force into H.A.M.M.E.R's Alcatraz Island, where they take on the Dark X-Men and Avengers, while Magik teleports all the captured mutants to safety. X-Force is aided by Emma and Namor, who are revealed to be double-agents against Osborn. Immediately after, Scott has the X-Club resurrect Asteroid M which crashed into the Pacific Coast a few years prior. Cyclops then orders Magik and Pixie to teleport every X-Man and allied mutant to what he now calls 'Utopia'. During a press conference, Cyclops informs the world that they have left the United States and that they reject Norman Osborn and his methods.

Relationships

Although being typecast as the sensible, stiff loner, Cyclops has had several serious relationships. Unfortunately, most if not all of them have ended poorly. One striking feature is the fact that he seems attracted to women with telepathic abilities (and vice versa). He was married to both Jean Grey and her clone Madelyne Pryor, who both proved to have very strong telepathy; his latest girlfriend, Emma Frost, is a high-order telepath as well. Psylocke, another powerful psionic talent, once blatantly tried to seduce him, although this was due to the subtle influences of the ninja assassin Revanche's personality that were still in her mind at the time.

He has also dated non-mutant women. Cyclops (during a time in which he thought Jean was dead) went on a date with Colleen Wing and then he briefly dated Lee Forrester prior to meeting Madelyne Pryor.

When he married Madelyne Pryor, Scott had thought he had found a replacement for Jean. Over time however, he realized that while Maddie looked like Jean, it was not her emotionally. Scott then began to emotionally distance himself, while fixating unhealthily on Jean. Scott would later leave Maddie and their child, upon hearing of Jean's return.

When Cyclops married Jean Grey, he seemed to have reached a happy ending. However, following his brief period possession by Apocalypse, Cyclops returned to the X-Men, feeling that his long-time love/obsession with Jean was a lie. In the same manner as he did with Madelyne, Scott began to distance himself from Jean both emotionally and physically. Then, using Jean's expanding mental powers as an excuse, Cyclops began having sexual therapy sessions with Emma Frost, which led to a telepathic affair between the two. When Jean confronted Scott, he made the claim that it had only been thoughts which they shared and thus he had done nothing wrong, knowing full well however that to a telepath, thoughts could be just as real as the physical actions. Scott then left the X-Men for a time to understand his own conflicting feelings. He returned to tell Emma that he had made a decision between her and Jean, but Jean was killed in battle before it was revealed which woman he had picked.

After Jean's death, Scott felt disillusioned with Xavier's dream, left the X-Men, and refused Emma's offer to reopen the school. Had the school remained closed, this outcome would have led to an apocalyptic future. To avoid it, Jean, who was resurrected in this apocalyptic future, used her Phoenix Powers to absorb this future timeline into the White Hot Room. She then mentally pushed Scott past the guilt he felt over her death and made him accept Emma's offer of reopening the school with her. The two have since been together, however not without problems, particularly in light of the recent House of M storyline in which Emma has alienated herself from many people by completely reformatting the school's workings and the events involving the Hellfire Club's return. As of the current Divided We Stand stories, their relationship seems to be back on track. The relationship begins to deteriorate again with Cyclops keeping secrets about the actions of X-Force, and Emma not telling him of her agreement to join Norman Osborn's secret alliance known as the Cabal. However both had their secrets revealed to each other and their relationship seems to be back on track once again, apparently stronger than ever. Unfortunately, almost immediately after, their relationship hit a new road-bump. During a battle with Osborn's Dark Avengers, Emma absorbed a piece of the Void (a dark evil power) from the mind of Sentry. In order to keep the bit of evil contained, Emma has transformed permanently into her diamond form. While this keeps the evil power controlled, it shuts off Emma's emotions and empathy, causing her to become cold, rude and snide towards all, even her boyfriend.

Powers and abilities

Cyclops has the power to emit beams of energy from his eyes. Although the beams have the appearance of red light (i.e., electromagnetic radiation in a red wavelength), they do not give off heat and instead deliver tremendous concussive force. Early accounts describe Cyclops' eye beams as the product of his body metabolizing sunlight and other ambient energy (much as his brother Havok metabolizes cosmic radiation) and releasing this energy in the form of beams (hence in some stories Cyclops depletes his body's energy reserves and needs to recharge through exposure to sunlight). Later accounts state that Cyclops' eyes contain inter-dimensional apertures, releasing powerful energies from that dimension into his own in the form of beams. Additionally, these later accounts state that his body's natural metabolization of ambient energy is necessary to open the apertures in his eyes. Whatever their exact source, these beams or 'optic blasts' are tremendously powerful, able to rupture steel plates and pulverize rock. Depending on the size of the aperture opening, the beams can be released in various widths, appearing in enormous bursts on rare occasions. Their effective range is approximately 2,000 ft. They have been observed to level a skyscraper, or can be focused tight enough to punch a pin hole in a dime. Cyclops' beams are also able to reflect off certain shiny surfaces; in concert with Cyclops' intuitive sense of spatial geometry, this reflective quality of his beams allows him to bounce the beams off many different surfaces in rapid succession so as to strike a desired target from an unexpected angle.

Summers is immune to the harmful effects of his own powers—his mind generates a natural psionic field which surrounds his body and is attuned to forces that keep the apertures in his eyes open. The psionic field safely absorbs the energy of his beams if they should come into contact with his body, harmlessly shunting them back to their dimension of origin. This also protects him from the natural opposing motion from the beams' projection that would act on his body and his head and neck in particular. In original depictions, Scott cannot control his power due to a head injury in his childhood, though this is later retconned in Astonishing X-Men Vol. 2 as being due to a self-imposed mental block he made as a child to deal with the traumatic events of his life. With the help of Emma Frost, Scott is able to briefly bypass his own mental block and control his powers, though he reveals that his control is waning and temporary. Because of his general lack of control over his mutant powers, Cyclops requires his trademark visor made with synthetic ruby quartz—the only substance that can safely contain his optic blasts due to the quartz naturally resonating with his body's natural psionic field. Cyclops can also manually adjust his visor to change the width of his optic blasts. Although he typically wears his visor, he has also utilized casual sunglasses and contact lenses made from the same ruby quartz as his visor lens. Scott is also immune to the power of his brother Alex, and vice versa. However, he has only a limited resistance to his brother Vulcan's powers.

Skills

Spatial Awareness: Cyclops seems to possess an uncanny sense of trigonometry, in this sense used to describe his observation of objects around himself and the angles found between surfaces of these objects. Cyclops has repeatedly demonstrated the ability to cause his optic blasts to ricochet and/or reflect off those objects in a trajectory to his liking. This is commonly called a "banked shot" when applied to this talent. Cyclops has been observed causing beams to reflect from over a dozen surfaces in the course of one blast, and still hit his intended target accurately. It is his sense of superhumanly enhanced spatial awareness that allows him to perform these feats as well.

Expert Pilot: Cyclops is an expert pilot of fixed-wing aircraft, a skill he appears to have inherited from his father. It has also been implied that his trigonometric sense improves his abilities in the air.

Master Strategist and Tactician: Cyclops has spent most of his superhero career as the leader of either the X-Men or X-Factor and has developed exceptional leadership skills. According to Nick Fury's files, Scott's abilities are at their best in tense situations. Fury notes that the less time Cyclops has to think about a decision, the better that decision is.

Master Martial Artist: Cyclops also has extensive training in martial arts and unarmed combat, holding black belts in judo and aikido. His level of skill is sufficient to defeat six normal men with his eyes closed and he has in the past held his own against such dangerous opponents as Wolverine and Ghost Rider.

Other versions

In other media

Bibliography

• The X-Men #1-93
• Giant Size X-Men #1
• The X-Men #94-138
• The Uncanny X-Men #150-175, 197-201, 316-342, 350-360, 374-376, 394, 492-present Annual Vol. 1 #3-18, '95-2001, Vol. 2 #1-2
• X-Men #1-71, 109-113, 181-191, 105-207, Annual Vol. 1 #1-3, '95-2001, Vol. 2 #1
• New X-Men #114-156
• Astonishing X-Men Vol. 2 #1-3
• Astonishing X-Men Vol. 3 #1-present, Giant-Sized Astonishing X-Men 1
• X-Factor Vol. 1 #1-70, Annual #1-6
• Marvel Comics Presents Vol. 1 17-24
• Adventures of Cyclops & Phoenix #1-4
• Further Adventures of Cyclops & Phoenix #1-4
• X-Men: The Search for Cyclops #1-4
• Cyclops #1-4
• X-Men: Phoenix - Endsong #1-5
• X-Men: Phoenix - Warsong #1-5
• World War Hulk: X-Men #1-3
• X-Men: Legacy #226-p, Annual #1

References

1. Cyclops to Appear in X-Men Origins: Wolverine
2. The Top 25 X-Men
3. [1]
4. revealed in Uncanny X-Men #156
5. X-Men #144
6. revealed in Classic X-Men #41-42
7. as revealed in X-Men (vol. 1) #38-42
8. X-Men (vol. 1) #1
9. X-Men (vol. 1) #3
10. X-Men (vol. 1) #4
11. X-Men (vol. 1) #7
12. X-Men (vol. 1) #32
13. Giant-Size X-Men #1
14. X-Men (vol. 1) #94
15. X-Men (vol. 1) #107-108
16. X-Men (vol. 1) #129
17. Uncanny X-Men #138
18. Uncanny X-Men #144
19. Uncanny X-Men #150
20. Uncanny X-Men #154
21. Uncanny X-Men #175
22. Uncanny X-Men #201
23. X-Factor #1
24. X-Factor #36
25. X-Factor #39
26. X-Factor #68
27. X-Men (Vol. 1) #97
28. X-Men: The Search for Cyclops Books 1-4
29. Astonishing X-Men # 23; Giant Size Astonishing X-Men
30. IGN: Hulk's Hit List Revealed
31. World War Hulk: X-Men #3
32. X-Men Vol 2 #207
33. Uncanny X-Men #499
34. Uncanny X-Men #500
35. Astonishing X-Men #25
36. Uncanny X-Men" #504
37. Secret Invasion: X-Men #1 - 4
38. Uncanny X-Men #507
39. Uncanny X-Men #504
40. Uncanny X-Men #505
41. Uncanny X-Men #503
42. Uncanny X-Men #511
43. Uncanny X-Men" #509
44. Uncanny X-Men #510
45. Uncanny X-Men #505
46. Dark Avengers #7
47. Uncanny X-Men #514
48. Dark Avengers #8
49. Uncanny X-Men #504-505
50. Uncanny X-Men Annual #2 (2009)
51. Dark X-Men: The Confession #1
52. New X-Men Vol. 1
53. "Secret War TPB" Appendix

External links

• Cyclops at the Marvel Universe
• Spotlight feature on Cyclops at UncannyXmen.net
• The Summers Family Tree