Why Comic Fans Hate Cyclops
Breaking down just why it's so often been a tall ask to truly get behind Scott Summers.
The character of Scott Summers, aka Cyclops, has long been a staple of Marvel Comics.
Created by the iconic duo of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, Scott would debut in September 1963 as one of the original members of the X-Men. Positioned as the leader of Charles Xavier's merry band of mutants, Cyclops was the poster boy for what the X-Men stood for.
He's one of the top dogs of the X-Men - an X-Men team who would eventually go on to become the hottest act in the world of comic books at one point in time - but Cyclops has become almost a figure of mockery amongst readers over the years.
For a number of reasons, people have often struggled to embrace Cyclops as anything but an annoyance, to the point where some readers flat-out hate the guy. And to be fair to those who have their issues with Cyclops, it's not like Scott has always been an easy guy to get behind.
Taking a look back through his storied history then, here's a breakdown of just why the Cyclops character has been a major turn-off for fans across the decades.
8. The Clean Cut Good Guy Is Always A Hard Sell
Across so many mediums, it's only gotten harder and harder to make the good guy (or gal) an appealing attraction to an audience.
Whether it's in movies, TV, comics, books, or even something like professional wrestling, fans often get to a point in time where they simply don't want to be drawn to the clean-cut hero who always does the right thing. Granted, Cyclops has been depicted as deeply flawed in certain moments, yet the overarching feeling towards the character is that he's the goody two-shoes of the X-Men world.
You can look at someone like Superman, where for the longest period of time people instead gravitated more towards the dark and brooding Batman. Or to hark back to pro wrestling, people were all about the multi-faceted and edgy CM Punk as a more appealing alternative to the baby-kissing, granny-hugging, hand-slapping John Cena.
Simply put, for Cyclops, his years of being the sensible head, the moral compass, and the flawless good guy only served to push readers away from him, as there were far more interesting characters in the rest of the roster.
It was only when the waters began to get a little murky for Cyclops that he became of any sort of interest to readers both die-hard and casual. But by then, the perception of the character had already been long established.