X-Men: ‘Dark Phoenix’ Stars Explain How Cyclops and Jean Grey’s Romance Factors Into the Film

Few Marvel romances are as iconic and well-known as the one between Jean Grey and Scott Summers of the X-Men. As two of the original five X-Men, their romance spans more than 50 years of adventures. The relationship was solidified in the minds of many fans by its interpretation in X-Men: The Animated Series, part of a love triangle that also involved Wolverine. It was also translated onto the big screen in the original X-Men film trilogy, where James Marsden played Cyclops and Famke Jansen played Jean Grey. Tye Sheridan plays Cyclops in Dark Phoenix and Sophie Turner plays Jean. They spoke to ComicBook.com at WonderCon about how that storied romance factors into the next X-Men movie.

“I think it’s such a cool part of the story, and a big part of who they are and then why they do the things that they do,” Sheridan says. “Her love for Scott is one of the main reasons why it’s such an internal struggle for her, because embracing Phoenix, which kind of means losing Scott. It’s a very integral part of who she is.”

“Yeah, I know. I mean,” Turner adds. “I think we all love a bit of romance. It’s nice to see it in a film like this. I think, and especially like in this movie, I think that what’s happening with Jean is, you know, people will relate to on many different levels. I think we all talked about addiction, and how we wanted to use that as a reference for when someone’s addicted to a drug or alcohol or whatever. The substances, what it does to the people around them that they love, and that love them. There’s kind of this interesting parallel between that and what’s going on in this movie. Although, she’s you know addicted to power. It’s really interesting how love comes to play and really makes that tension much, much stronger. That tug-of-war much more complicated.”

In September, Dark Phoenix director Simon Kinberg explained why Scott and Jean’s romance is important to the film. “The love story between Scott and Jean is such an integral part of the Dark Phoenix saga in any iteration, whether it’s the comic book or the cartoons,” Kinberg. “Obviously we don’t have Wolverine, so that’s one less part of that love story. It is very central [to the movie], and they are a couple. As Jean starts to become more unstable, there are people in the X-Men who don’t think she can be helped and saved, many of whom think the world and others need helping and saving from her. And so Scott is probably the most prominent person who’s holding on to the hope that Jean can be saved.”

What do you think of Scott and Jean’s romance? Are you looking forward to Dark Phoenix? Let us know in the comments. Dark Phoenix opens in theaters on June 7th.

Additional reporting by Scott Huver

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