The Phoenix Force is an immortal entity with the cosmic power of destruction and rebirth that the universe created between states of being. It is the central hub of psionic energy from the past, present, and future, as well as all realities within the multiverse. It is also the Guardian of Creation and M’Kraan Crystal.

The Phoenix Bonds with Jean Grey

Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum created the Phoenix Force, introducing it 50 years ago in The X-Men #101 (October 1976). It connects to mutants in their time of need, giving them nearly unlimited power. Unfortunately, the power can corrupt the host driving them to madness and destruction.

The Phoenix Force travels to Earth when it senses that a human has grown beyond the physical realm and can connect with the Phoenix Force’s energy. Jean Grey telepathically attached herself to Annie Richardson in the hope of keeping her dying friend’s soul from crossing into the afterlife. Instead, Jean was pulled into the afterlife with Annie. The Phoenix cut the connection, but it continued to observe her for years.

When Jean was returning from a space mission, she was exposed to solar flare radiation that briefly unlocked her full potential as a telepath and telekinetic. She became a being made of pure thought and then the Phoenix Force saved her, turning her into the Phoenix. Using the new power, she repaired the M’Kraan Crystal but was able to maintain control of her powers.

The Dark Phoenix

The Hellfire Club witnessed the Phoenix’s power and recognized the potential in controlling such a being. Mastermind used the guise of Jason Wyngarde to seduce Jean, and he used a device that Emma Frost created to project illusions in the Phoenix’s mind. She came to believe she was her ancestor, Lady Grey, who operated as the Hellfire Club’s Black Queen and was in a relationship with Wyngarde’s ancestor. The Phoenix took on the identity of the Black Queen.

She helped the Hellfire Club in a fight against the X-Men, and Mastermind engaged Cyclops in battle. Mastermind killed Cyclops’ psychic image, breaking the hold over Jean and tearing the final barrier between her and the Phoenix’s full power. She renamed herself the Dark Phoenix, then she created a telepathic illusion that drove Wyngarde insane.

A battle with the X-Men ensued, then the Phoenix fled to space where she destroyed the D’Bari system’s sun, causing a supernova and killing the population. An intergalactic council convened with the Kree and Skrulls who decided that she was an even more dangerous threat than Galactus and needed to be destroyed.

The Struggle for Control

When she returned to Earth, Jean struggled between her feelings for her loved ones and the power of the Dark Phoenix. Professor X defeated the Phoenix in a psionic battle and Jean Grey regained control. The Shi’ar – who had fought her in space to prevent the destruction of another star – teleported the Phoenix and X-Men to the Blue Area of the Moon to execute her. When Cyclops was seemingly killed, the Dark Phoenix overpowered Jean’s control and the psychic restraints that Professor X gave her.

Lilandra wanted to destroy the entire Solar System in the hope of killing the Dark Phoenix. To prevent that, Professor X and the X-Men fought the Dark Phoenix until Jean regained control. Then Jean sacrificed herself by activating a Kree weapon that disintegrated her.

In the original story, that incarnation of the Phoenix was Jean herself. It happened when she reached her highest potential as a psi and became a being made of pure energy that reformed her into Phoenix. Later the story was retconned to reveal that the Phoenix Force is a cosmic entity that took Jean’s form and believed that it was her. The real Jean was protected inside of a healing cocoon in the Jamaica Bay where she was found by the Fantastic Four and the Avengers.