From: bgrubb@dante.nmsu.edu (GRUBB)
Subject: Rachel Summers, Phoenix, and the Multiverse
Organization: New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM
Distribution: na
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 14:27:41 GMT

Marvel's writers are FUBARing Rachel Summers, Phoenix, and their Multiverse
by not having a consitant idea of what they are doing.

Rachel Summers has had at lease three versions of her history presented.

Version 1: Senator Robert Kelly and Charles Xavier are killed by the 
Brotherhood of Evil Mutants on Oct 31,1980.  Kelly's death sets off the series 
of events that created Rachel's world of 2013. (Uncanny X-men #141-142)

Version 2:  There are constant statements and allutions Rachel is from the 
world of UX# 141-142, though there have been changes.  The most glaring change 
is that Charles Xavier was killed by the US army after the US started hunting 
mutants as opposed to the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.  In UX#199 Rachel has a 
flashback to UX #136, which implied that "Jean Grey" {The quotes denote 
'Phoenix pretending to be Jean Grey'} was her mother.  This idea was 
reinforced in Excalibur #25 as was the connection to UX# 141-142 in Excalibur 
#26

Version 3:  This version, to date, has been told in only Excalubur #52. It is 
now established that it was Mastermind blowing up Pittsburgh with a nuclear 
device that triggered the Anti-Mutant movement (pg 18) that lead to Rachel's 
world.  It was also stated that the timeline that Rachel came from NEVER had a 
Phoenix and Jean Grey was killed trying to stop Mastermind. Charles Xavier is 
killed by the US army as in Version 2 and that Rachel's memory had been 
scambled or altered by the Phoenix Force which had joined with her right 
before she entered the past.  The alteration of Rachel's memory by the Phoenix 
Force throws out everything Rachel remembered about her world as 'tainted' and 
so unreliable. {Yep, it is a retcon of Rachel.  It still does not explain the 
discrepency between Rachel's world and what Kate Pryde told us about their 
world in UX# 141-142 which is stated to be the world Rachel came from in 
Excalubur #26.  I suppect that this version was created because someone 
relised that if Phoenix existed in Rachel's future and existed in only one 
timeline (as Claremont suggested) then logicly Phoenix could NOT exist in the 
present Marvel timeline.}

The concept of the Phoenix force as a unique entity in the entire Marvel 
Multiverse is totally FUBARed as well. The idea that Phoenix is unique was 
reinforced during the Crosstime caper in which Rachel comments that during the 
entire trip they never ran into another Phoenix.
There are three main problems with this idea (in assending order of 
importance):
1) What if has shown at least eight Earths with Phoenix in them:
 A) Dark Phoenix goes nuts and destroys the universe. (What If Vol 1 #27)
 B) Nightcrawler gets the Phoenix force and is killed.(What If Vol 2 #?)
 C) Alantas Attacks succeeds and Rachel gets killed.(What If Vol 2 #?)
 D) Wolverine meets Conan and later Conan frees Dark Phoenix and she 
    destroys the universe.(What If Vol 2 #?)
 E) Inferno is lost and Phoenix purges the demons before the Tribunial
    fries the Earth.  It then returns to the Universe.(What If Vol 2 #?)
 F) Korvac banishes Phoenix, Silver Surfer, and Dr. Strange from his 
    timeline and later on destroys that timeline.  Later on all three 
    return but only Dr. Strange remains in the timeline; Phoenix and 
    Silver Surfer go history or dimension (I don't remember which 
    exactly) hopping for a new home. (What If... Vol 1 #32)
 G) Phoenix really becomes Jean Grey but is found out after the US becomes
    anti-mutant and goes into seclusion while most of the X-Men get killed
    and at the end it saves the X-Men and returns to the universe (What If... 
    Vol 2, #32-33)
 H) A vampire Jean Grey claims the Phoenix force and later 'lives' in the
    Dark Dimension. (What if Vol 2, #37 and #39).
{Most people ignore everything What if does and that is why it is ranked so 
low on the list.}
2) The Guardians of the Galaxy, a timeline which diverged between Dark Phoenix 
and Rachel Phoenix, is more of a problem then the What If worlds.  It is a 
regular book, it happens in an alternate future, and more important it has 
just resently effected a part of the mainline Marvel universe.  Its Phoenix 
cannot as easily be ignored as the What If, but since it effects were outlined 
only in Guardians of the Galaxy and not other books people can choose to 
ignore it as well.
3) The last and most important problem stems from the very idea of alternate 
timelines itself.  If timelines branch when different events happen (as Marvel 
has presented) then how can Phoenix just vanish from other worlds whose only 
difference is that a particular atom of uranium decayed rather then another 
atom or light excited one electron as oppossed to another or some unknown 
farmer in China died instead of lived.  {Not all alternate worlds have to be 
ratically different, some may only have different atomic, microscopic and/or 
microevent histories and still be nearly identical to each other at the 
macroscopic level.}

The problem with Phoenix seems to stem from the fact that the writers at 
Marvel failed to take into consiteration what making any character unique in 
the Multiverse intailed and how the Marvel Multiverse of alternate histories 
worked.

The Marvel Multiverse:
The dimensions side of the Marvel Multiverse is in good shape; few people
could confuse the Dark Dimension, Kang's Limbo and DarkChild's Limbo with
each other or Earth.  The alternate history section is, on the other hand, a
mess. Marvel seems to be playing with the 'go back in your own past and create
a new timeline' (Where the traveler directly causes changes in history) idea 
{reprecented by Bishop}, the 'you can only enter into another Earth's past' 
(Where history has diverged before the point the traveler arrived) 
{Represented by Rachel Summers and Guardians of the Galaxy}, and the 'you 
can't change history because you being there is part of history' (Time loop) 
idea {The Thing becoming Blackbeard the pirate is one example, the resent 
battle between Thor and Loki being another.}. There needs to be a standard 
idea of how time and dimension travel should work before things get more 
messed up. And patch fixes like the Time Variant Authority to try to prevent 
the time stream from becoming Grand Central Station are not going to solve the 
problem because other writers may not use them.

These are all examples of three major problems at Marvel:
1) little control over characters or continuity of their pasts.  With retcons 
like Rachel's, no wonder some people have trouble understanding characters 
{The "What's his history THIS issue?" situation with Wolverine is a REAL 
mess.}  There is something to be said about some continuity, Marvel.
2) Having too many people time/dimension traveling and inconsitant use of 
beings and orginzations that are supposed to control parts of time/dimension 
travel like the Tribunial (fries planets that endanger the multiverse), the 
Time Variant Authority, and Otherworld.
3) Having inconsitant results of time travel as stated above.

Comments welcome
Xref: sparky rec.arts.comics.xbooks:4140 rec.arts.comics.misc:13317