Silver Age Cyclops Statue
The X-Men have been a part of the Marvel Universe almost from the beginning, created by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee. The legendary duo had many successes, and while X-Men was not a huge one from the start (it eventually became a series of reprints of older issues) it would play a large role in the development of that universe. It wouldn't be until the mid-1970's that the book became really popular with the work of Chris Claremont, and from there it became the top book (and eventually books) at Marvel.
The silver age run of the X-Men did yield much fruit that later ripened. The major villain (Magneto) was established, along with the Sentinels and the characters that made up the X-Men were introduced and brought to life. Over the years the roster changed, but the goal of the X-Men was always the same - to protect a world that hated and feared mutants. The team's true leader was Professor X, but he couldn't always be there to lead the team so he trained one of his young pupils to take the reins in combat. That young man was Scott Summers, code-named Cyclops.
 Cyclops follows the Marvel tradition of having flawed characters. His mutant ability comes in the form of powerful optic blasts, but he has no control over them. There seem to be two things that keep them in check - ruby quartz lenses and his eyelids. To allow for control in battle he wears a visor that helps him direct those energies relatively safely (relative to whether you are with or against him). Since the character was created in the 60's he couldn't get contacts or lasik laser surgery to help him out.
Scott isn't the only mutant in the family, and his brother Alex is better known as Havok. Their father is the galaxy-spanning Corsair, who really was kidnapped by aliens when the plane he was flying was captured. Scott's mother pushed Alex and Scott out of the plane with the only parachute, and they floated to the surface while their parents were lost. The parachute wasn't designed to handle the weight of the two boys, and it fell too quickly and they crashed to the ground. Alex was unharmed but Scott suffered brain damage that prevents him from controlling his powers, and he uses that as an excuse when he misses a question on Jeopardy. It seems Jean Grey has heard it as an excuse for other things...
The leader of the silver age X-Men is a natural start for a series of statues based on them, and that's where Diamond Select Toys and Collectibles (DST) started. Statues of the other four charter X-Men - Beast, Angel, Marvel Girl and finally Ice Man, will join this statue and all five statues will be in scale with each other, and share the same sculptor to ensure continuity for the look of the pieces. Each statue in the series has one character from 'X-Men' that can be attached to the front of the gestalt piece to add a logo similar in style to the Hollywood sign. The letters are not glued and can be easily added or removed at your discretion. The releases of Cyclops and Beast are relatively close together, but there is more space planned between Angel and Marvel Girl. DST has yet to reveal the Ice Man sculpt.
 The plan for this series of statues is an innovative move on Diamond's part. It's innovative because DST has designed the five statues to join together to form a larger diorama of statues, but all the statues can also stand alone. Bowen did something similar with the Fantastic Four, but the bases were not designed to join together in as integrated a design but were rather generic shapes that could link for a group pose. There were definitely problems that came up during design around ensuring that the five statues would be able to fit together yet not look strange alone, and these have been worked out.
The plan to create a larger overall aesthetic isn't without risk. In addition to the extra design work there is the chance that making a set of five statues that go together may not go over with the public. If this set does well there is always the possibility of other groups to follow in the future, but only time will tell on that one.
A word about the boots. One of the images in the gallery shows the statue with the silver age Cyclops released in the Classic X-Men boxed set by Toy Biz. That set is several years old and there is a big difference - the boots. The Toy Biz version has yellow cuffs and soles, but blue otherwise and the statue is all yellow. Who's right? Both, actually. Throughout the early issues of X-Men the boots would variously be shown as either all yellow or yellow and blue, sometimes varying within the same issues. The covers usually depicted the boots as being all yellow, but interior pages were just as likely to look blue or yellow. Blame Marvel!
The statue is eight inches tall atop a two-inch base, and Rudy Garcia did the sculpting honors for Cyclops and the other statues in this series. The statues are called medium statues, and medium is a size of French fries that is unavailable at McDonald's restaurants. To help out Rudy (and be some of the billions and billions served at Mickey D's), the Chinese people have teamed up and made 3000 copies of the statue (along with a full-color certificate of authenticity), and even went to the trouble of painting them. That would be enough, but they went above and beyond by packing the statue in non-toxic Styrofoam to make sure it arrives free from damage. The box that surrounds the Styrofoam has images of the statue against a subdued background with many panels from early issues of the comic.
More Pictures of Cyclops
| Where to buy the Silver Age Cyclops Statue: This statue is a limited edition of 3,000, and it retails in the $75 USD price range. It is available at comic book stores, as well as at various online toy and collectible retailers. |
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