Exclusive preview: X-Men Red Annual #1 reunites Jean Grey with her friends and teammates

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May 24, 2018

It’s not easy coming back from the dead, even when you’ve done it before! Jean Grey has a bit of a reputation for cheating the grim reaper. After The Dark Phoenix Saga, it was revealed that Jean had never really died at all. It was just the Phoenix pretending to be Jean. But then, years later, death caught up with her. Even with all of the powers of the Phoenix at her command, Jean perished. And this time, everyone thought she was gone for good.

Earlier this year, Jean was brought back to life during the Phoenix Resurrection miniseries, before she started a new team of X-Men. Next week, writer Tom Taylor and artist Pascal Alixe will fill in the gap between Jean’s return and her redefined mission in X-Men Red Annual #1.

Our exclusive preview begins with a brief overview of Jean’s life and death. But the Phoenix was never going to let her rest forever.

The only reason that the Phoenix brought Jean back was to once again merge with her. Jean was an ideal host for the cosmic entity, but she finally broke the cycle of death and rebirth by rejecting it. The next page picks up immediately after the Phoenix departed.

It’s not unusual for Jean’s teammates to be wary of her power, but this time they’re simply worried about her emotional state. Perhaps they even wondered if her resurrection would last without the Phoenix to sustain her. But she really is back among her friends and family.

Because Jean was dead for over a decade in real time, she missed many of the X-Men’s trials and triumphs. She is also going to learn about their conflicts with each other, and that’s something she won’t be very happy about.

Marvel’s description for this issue suggests that Jean will also mourn for her friends and family who have passed away during her absence. But she also has “family members she didn't know existed,” and this may be their first meeting in the Marvel Universe.