Cyclops (Marvel Comics)

The first-born son of Corsair, Scott Summers is the older brother of Havok and Vulcan. His first and most enduring love interest is his current wife Jean Grey with the two having a daughter, Rachel Summers, from an alternate future. Other significant love interests include his ex-wife Madelyne Pryor—a clone of Jean and mother of his son Cable—and fellow X-Man Emma Frost. Cyclops' archenemy is Mister Sinister, who is obsessed with the Summers and Grey bloodlines and has often manipulated events in Cyclops' life, resulting in various clashes with the X-Men.


Cyclops is most often portrayed as the archetypal hero of traditional American popular culture—the opposite of the tough, anti-authority antiheroes that emerged in American popular culture after the Vietnam War (e.g., Wolverine, his X-Men teammate).^[4][5]


James Marsden initially portrayed Cyclops in the 20th Century Fox X-Men films, while a younger version of the character was portrayed by Tim Pocock in the 2009 prequel film X-Men Origins: Wolverine, and he was portrayed by Tye Sheridan in X-Men: Apocalypse (2016) and Dark Phoenix (2019) as well as a cameo in Deadpool 2 (2018).

Relationships[edit]

Cyclops has had multiple serious relationships and is rarely written without a romantic female relationship. Cyclops' relationships are particularly complicated because of the many retcons involved in the publication history of the Jean Grey and Madelyne Pryor characters.


In terms of publication time, Cyclops's longest and deepest romantic relationship would be with Jean Grey, whom he would eventually marry but not before she would appear to tragically die protecting the X-Men. Grieving from this loss, Scott leaves to the Summers family reunion where he meets and starts to pursue Madelyne Pryor. Scott would become obsessed with Madelyne's similarity to Jean.^[170] Madelyne turns out to be a clone of Jean and becomes a supervillain but not before Scott marries Madelyne and has a child with her. A romantic love triangle would later be created when Jean was reawakened from a coma and brought back to life by the Fantastic Four. These relationships would be resolved over the duration of Cyclops's appearance in the X-Factor series. Asked whether or not Cyclops was really in love with Madelyne, X-Factor writer Louise Simonson answered, "I think she was a substitute for Jean."^[171] Uncanny X-Men writer Chris Claremont noted that Cyclops's love for Madelyne was genuine and intended as a means of retiring the character from the team, stating, "It's a metaphor for us all. We all grow up. We all move on."^[172]


Jean Grey and Scott finally marry in X-Men #30. Afterward, Scott seemed to have reached a happy ending. Subsequently, Scott becomes possessed by Apocalypse and the lingering effects from this would taint his relationship with Jean. This combined with Jean's returning Phoenix powers creates stress in their romantic relationship. Confused, Scott turns to Emma Frost, who takes advantage of Scott's emotional problems, which leads to a telepathic extramarital affair.^[173] When confronted by Jean, Scott claims that they shared "only thoughts" and that he had done nothing wrong; Jean, however, disagrees and demands that Emma explain herself, but Emma only jeers and insults her. Enraged, Jean unleashes the immeasurable Phoenix ability on Emma, rifling through her memories and forcing her to confront the truth about herself.


In the aftermath, Scott then leaves the X-Men for a time to understand his own conflicting feelings. He returns to tell Emma that he had made a decision between her and Jean, but Jean is killed in battle before it is revealed which woman he had picked. After Jean's death, Scott feels disillusioned with Xavier's dream, leaves the X-Men, and refuses 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 abilities 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, although not without problems, particularly in light of the "House of M" storyline in which Emma alienates herself from many people by completely reformatting the school's workings and the events involving the Hellfire Club's return. As of the 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,^[174] and Emma not telling him of her agreement to join Norman Osborn's secret alliance known as the Cabal.^[175] However, both had their secrets revealed to each other and their romantic relationship seems to be back on track once again, apparently stronger and closer than ever.^[176]


A wedge is driven between Scott and Emma's relationship during the war with the Avengers, with Emma and the other members of the Phoenix Five becoming more and more corrupted by the Phoenix Force while Cyclops tries to control his portion as his allies go out of control. In the end, Scott betrays Emma by attacking her and stealing her portion of the Phoenix Force. Following the end of the war with the Avengers, Scott and Emma's relationship has ended.


The time displaced version of Cyclops was in a relationship with Jean, but she ended the relationship when discovering their future.^[177] He later began a budding relationship with X-23,^[178] prior to leaving the X-Men to join his father, leaving Jean and Laura devastated.^[179][180] The present-day Scott was romantically approached by the time-displaced Jean at one point but he flatly stopped her advances.^[180] The displaced Scott has confirmed that he is still in love with Jean, but is unaware of the past Jean's location.