Spécial Strange #36
Spécial Strange #36 brought French readers the concluding chapter of 'Days of Future Past' — Uncanny X-Men #142, one of the most consequential two-part stories in Marvel history, in which Kate Pryde's mind-traveling gambit narrowly prevents Senator Kelly's assassination and the Sentinel-ruled dystopia of Earth-811 from becoming inevitable. For a generation of French readers who had been following the Claremont/Byrne run issue by issue through the Spécial Strange quarterly, this number delivered the payoff of years of serialized mutant storytelling — including the first appearance of Henry Peter Gyrich in an X-Men story and a full display of Mystique's Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. It also reprinted Uncanny X-Men #144, a quiet but structurally important Cyclops solo story by Claremont and Brent Anderson that resets Scott Summers after the trauma of the Dark Phoenix Saga, rounding out one of the densest anthological packages Editions Lug published in its first decade of Spécial Strange production.
In "Quelle ère est-il ?", the X-Men face a desperate clash as the Brotherhood targets Senator Kelly, with Kitty's future self temporarily inhabiting her present body to turn the tide against Mystique and her allies. The stakes are high as the team scrambles to protect Kelly, only for Kitty’s consciousness to snap back to her own time just as the crisis unfolds. A month later, the fallout leads Kelly to entrust Gyrich with a secret Sentinel initiative known as "Project Wideawake." Written by John Byrne and Chris Claremont, with art by Byrne and inks by Terry Austin, this pivotal issue features a striking cover by Jean Frisano.
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We Buy Collections ▸History
Spécial Strange launched in July 1975 as a quarterly anthology from Editions Lug, the Lyon-based publisher founded by Marcel Navarro and Auguste Vistel, and served as the primary vehicle for reprinting X-Men material in France throughout the late 1970s and 1980s. The series maintained a stable three- or four-feature format — a main X-Men serial, a Marvel Team-Up Spider-Man adventure, and a Marvel Two-in-One Thing story — running quarterly for nearly a decade before shifting to bimonthly publication with issue #43 in January 1986. Issue #36 appeared in June 1984, roughly three and a half years after the original American publication of Uncanny X-Men #142, placing it squarely in the era when Lug's reprints were still running significantly behind Marvel's US release schedule. Editions Lug was later acquired by Scandinavian publisher Semic, which continued the line under a revised logo beginning with issue #60 in 1989.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Published June 1984 by Editions Lug, 88 pages, full color, in the long-running quarterly Spécial Strange anthology series.
- Lead story ('Quelle ère est-il?', 22 pages) reprints Uncanny X-Men #142 (February 1981), 'Mind Out of Time!' — the second and concluding part of 'Days of Future Past' by Chris Claremont, John Byrne (pencils), and Terry Austin (inks); notably, Terry Austin also penciled and inked the original cover of UXM #142.
- UXM #142 marks the first appearance of Henry Peter Gyrich in an X-Men story, and prominently features Rachel Summers, Mystique (Raven Darkhölme), Destiny (Irène Adler), Avalanche, Pyro, the Blob, Sebastian Shaw, Moira MacTaggert, Senator Robert Kelly, and Mark III Sentinels — effectively the debut roster of Mystique's new Brotherhood of Evil Mutants in full action.
- Second X-Men story ('Le retour de Cyclope!', 22 pages) reprints Uncanny X-Men #144 (April 1981), 'Even in Death...' by Chris Claremont with art by Brent Anderson and Joe Rubinstein — a key Cyclops/Lee Forrester character study set in the aftermath of Jean Grey's death.
- Spider-Man feature ('Dans l'arène!', 17 pages) reprints Marvel Team-Up #89 (January 1980), a Spider-Man and Nightcrawler team-up written by Chris Claremont with art by Michael Netzer (as Mike Nasser) and Rich Buckler.
- The Thing feature ('Mission accomplie!', 17 pages) reprints Marvel Two-in-One #59 (January 1980), The Thing and Human Torch story by Ralph Macchio and Marv Wolfman.
- Characters carry French localized names throughout the Lug run: Wolverine as 'Serval,' Nightcrawler as 'Diablo,' Storm as 'Tornade,' Kitty Pryde as 'Etincelle,' and in the earliest Strange issues Jean Grey was listed as 'Strange Girl.'
- Issue #36 was later collected in Spécial Strange Relié Album #12 (June 1984), which bound issues #34 through #36 together as a hardcover album for the French market.
Cast · 40 characters
Full credits
Full plot ⚠ may contain spoilers
▸ Reveal full plot — may contain spoilers
The Brotherhood makes its play against Senator Kelly. Kitty's future self, which is in possession of her present body, helps the X-Men defeat Mystique and her crew (thus changing the future). As soon as Kelly is saved, Kitty's psyche returns from the future to her own body. A month later, in response to the attack, Kelly puts Gyrich in charge of a top secret Sentinel program called "Project Wideawake."
Plot details indexed by the Grand Comics Database (CC BY-SA).