10 Most Tragic Deaths In The History Of Marvel Comics
1. Jean Grey
If Gwen Stacy is the most defining death of the Spider-Man books, a superhero whose whole career is based on people around him dying, then Jean Grey is undoubtedly the same for the X-Men titles. There are a lot more dead mutants, for one thing, and Jean Grey has died a lot more times than Gwen Stacy has. We're going to focus on one particularly tragic death here, though.
No, not the time Magneto infiltrated the X-Men whilst pretending to be new mutant Xorn, went mad and murdered her when she tried to stop him. No, not when she was erased from existence by Thanos. No, not when Wolverine stabbed her to death. No, not when she submerged herself in a glacier when possessed by the Phoenix Force. Nor the time Sentinels killed her. Or Apocalypse. Or that other time with Wolverine. Or when she crashed a spaceship.
Obviously we're talking about The Dark Phoenix Saga, that X-Men classic about how dangerous women are when they discover their sexual agency. And that sexual agency is manifested in the form of a big fiery cosmic presence that allows you to destroy entire civilisations in the blink of an eye, which we're pretty sure isn't normal. Following Jean's supposed death in that spaceship she was chosen and resurrected by the Phoenix as its new host, boosting her already impressive psychic abilities and letting her do all the cosmic fire stuff as well. Unfortunately it was timed with Jean being coaxed to the dark side by the nefarious Hellfire Club, during which time she destroyed an inhabited star system. Woops.
Put on trial for mass genocide by the Shi'ar empire (the aliens who all wear feathers for some reason), Jean and her fellow X-Men are ordered to fight to the death against their accusers' greatest champions. Ultimately Jean chose to end her own life, terrified of what the Phoenix Force might get her to do next. She explains her choice to her long-suffering and tearful husband Scott, before activating Shiar weapons and vaporising herself. It hardly matters that the many deaths of Jean Grey have become a running joke in comic book fandom - this is still one of the most tragic endings to any character we've seen.