The shift from Byrne to Claremont on X-Men - what really changed the vibe?

I was reading some old issues from 1981 and then 1984 and the whole feel of the book switched from this tight action-focused plot to these long, soap-opera style character arcs. Over about three years, John Byrne left and Chris Claremont took over fully, which brought way more internal drama and less big punch-ups. Which approach do you think actually made the series better for the long run?

2 comments

2 Comments

zarap143d ago

Disagree completely. Claremont's soap opera stuff is what made Uncanny the book it became, the longform character work is why those stories still hold up today. Byrne's run was solid but it was all surface level action, Claremont gave the characters real depth.

alice_wilson733d ago

Actually you're both kinda right and wrong at the same time... Claremont did a lot of the heavy lifting on the character stuff but the Byrne run was definitely more than just surface level action. The thing is, Byrne co-plotted a ton of those classic Claremont stories, like the Dark Phoenix Saga and Days of Future Past. Those were collaborations, not just Claremont doing all the work. Byrne's art and plotting gave those big emotional moments their real punch. Without Byrne's sense of pacing and action, some of those quieter character beats wouldn't have landed as hard. So it's not really fair to say Byrne was just surface level when he helped shape the very stories people love Claremont for.