As Marvel heroes go, Jean Grey might be one of the most popular. An Omega-level mutant, one of the founding members of the X-Men, and a character that has gone through seemingly countless transformations since her comic book debut in 1963, Jean has been a staple figure for a lot of fans so her popularity is understandable. But I’ve never liked the character. Between her frequent deaths and resurrections, the use of the character as a plot device more often than not, and her early representations as a cliche damsel in distress, something about Jean has always just annoyed me. So, when rumors started picking up that Sadie Sink would be bringing the character into the MCU with Spider-Man: Brand New Day, I was hoping that a rumor it would remain. Now, however, Brand New Day is here, Sink is definitely Jean, and as much as I hate to admit it, Spider-Man just made me like my least favorite Marvel character of all time.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day has done what I always thought was impossible and actually made me like Jean Grey. By giving her a slightly tweaked origin and introducing us to her on her own rather than as part of a larger team and going even further by our first impression of her being deeply flawed, it might just be Sink’s MCU version of the heroine that is the most interesting of them all that has so much more potential than any comic version to date.
A big part of Jean’s overall history in comics is that we largely got to know her as a part of the X-Men team, with her backstory being that she manifested her powers when her best friend died and, after falling into a coma from mentally linking with her dying friend, had her telepathic powers blocked by Charles Xavier. By the time we see Jean using her telepathy in comics, it’s under Xavier’s monitoring while she’s part of the X-Men. None of that is present in Brand New Day. The Jean we meet here has had access to her telepathy for some time and is being guided by her older sister. While it is possible that the trauma from the death of a friend is still a factor in Jean’s story, it’s not one that was presented here. Instead, we get a girl who is trying to learn how to survive. Her powers aren’t being modulated or manipulated. She’s exploring them organically. It gives Jean a lot more agency than her comics introduction ever did.
That in turn makes her development in the movie feel a lot more honest. One of my biggest complaints about Jean Grey in comics is that she has a “Mary Sue” quality to her. She’s a character full of self-sacrifice and super powers, but in the movie that is absolutely not the case. We meet Jean in the MCU as an outright villain, wreaking havoc and menacing people in her relentless pursuit of what we later find out is finding and rescuing her sister. This Jean is mad as hell and isn’t trying to save the world. She’s not even trying to offer herself up for others. She’s clawing her way through New York to save someone she loves and when it becomes clear that she can’t, she goes full scorched Earth on the person responsible — and has no issue with other people being collateral damage. Jean Grey is downright hateable and that’s actually interesting. We spend almost all of the movie with her being a threat, which is a nice change of pace, but then we also get to see why she’s such a threat. It’s an uno reverse of a twist that reveals the real threat in the movie but also doesn’t absolve Jean from what she’s done. This Jean isn’t trying to save the world. She wants stone cold revenge and rightly so.
One of the things that I’ve always disliked about Jean in comics is that most of her stories feel unearned to me. She shows up, is crazy powerful, and then just puts herself out to be a hero without there really ever being any real character work. The movie Jean has layers and what I think is particularly interesting is that the movie doesn’t absolve her of her sins. One of the things that I think a lot of people are missing when talking about Jean in Brand New Day is that she doesn’t just “get away” with everything she’s done. I’ve seen a lot of people online assume that Jean was simply let go but that’s not the case.
When Peter lets Jean into his mind, it’s to offer her understanding and show her that he understands loss. He’s trying to defuse the situation and not only save the people of New York but protect Jean as well. When Spider-Man gets shot, that changes everything that would have otherwise gone down with Jean. Frank’s focus becomes trying to save Peter and Jean, now understanding that Peter isn’t her enemy, does what she can to help him but also slips away in the chaos. When we see her on that bus leaving the city, she wasn’t released. She’s escaping — everyone else just has too much going on to make her the priority. What’s brilliant about this is she’s still a fugitive, but we also have now seen a different side of her. We know her suffering and we know she has the capacity to do good. By having her slip away while still grappling with her trauma, her loss, and her actions, the Jean we’ve gotten here is on a road to becoming a hero — heroics weren’t simply handed to her.
Ultimately, I never thought I’d like Jean Grey. Instead, Spider-Man: Brand New Day made the character interesting, layered, and dynamic in a way that the comics never really have. She’s not just some over powered figure with a self-sacrifice complex. She’s a flawed person with a heart and a lot of potential and, for the first time ever, I’m very excited to see where her story goes.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day is in theaters now.
