Created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, Jean Grey first appeared as Marvel Girl in the original team of X-Men (1963) with the ability of telekinesis and, later, telepathy. However, under the authorship of Chris Claremont and the artwork of first Dave Cockrum and then John Byrne in the late 1970s, the character underwent a significant transformation from the X-Men's weakest member to its most powerful. The storyline in which Jean Grey died as Marvel Girl and was reborn as Phoenix is usually known by fans as "The Phoenix Saga" (1977), while the storyline of her corruption and death as Dark Phoenix has been termed "The Dark Phoenix Saga" (1980). This storyline is one of the most well-known and is widely considered a true classic among the many epic stories conceived by the House of Ideas. The Jean Grey Phoenix statue is another, outstanding piece realized by XM Studios (released in 2015, with the usual edition size of 999 samples), which demonstrates, once again, the indisputable and innovative creativity of the Singaporean Company. The piece was designed by Stanley Lay and sculpted by Adam Ross in collaboration with Erick Sosa; it has a remarkable height of 80 cm, with a size of 48 x 45 cm and a weight of approximately 12 Kg, and comes with three interchangeable heads, an art print and a (limited) silver plate coin. The mutant heroine is depicted in a dynamic, flight pose, with the right leg bent, the left fully elongated and both arms open, as to simulate a pair of wings. The body is very elegant, characterized by sinuous curves, seductive bosoms, long and slender legs and a well-defined, flat belly, pointed out by the green close-fitting suit, very faithful to Comics. The heroine exhibits two long, golden gloves and boots (covering the arms up to biceps and the legs well above the knees) and a soft, flowing belt knotted at waistline, with an attractive buckle representing a stylized phoenix; the same symbol is located on the V-shaped black patch on chest and notably enhances the chromatic contrast of the whole figure. There is no doubt, however, that the most attractive and impressive feature of this piece is the huge phoenix located behind the character! The bird is vertically placed, with two enormous and open wings pointing upwards and slightly tilted towards the body, as to surround and protect the heroine. The phoenix is made of a transparent resin and shows an orange tonality at the bird's head and a bright red at the central part of the body, which gradually blurs into yellow at the endings of the wing. The resulting visual effect is breathtaking: the bird just looks like a fire entity and if you are able to place it with a suitable backlight (possibly the sun), it literally turns on and catches the eyes as a true piece of furniture! The phoenix body completely covers the upper part of the character and connects to the base along two distinct (and well sculpted) fire wakes, characterized by very attractive flames and a deeper red tonality of the transparent resin. The base depicts the ruins of a robot (no doubt a Sentinel) and shows inner mechanisms and cables, a lot of dents scattered everywhere and colors with a metallic tone. All the three heads exhibit a rather tapered shape, lips colored with a very bright red and a long, flowing red hair; one face has a more aggressive look, pointed out by curved eyebrows, while another shows more relaxed and younger somatic traits, with a soft and well painted make-up. My favorite head, however, is the one with two white eyes and the long hair moved upwards, whose expressiveness appears more befitting to the power and majesty of the whole figure. Regardeless of the fascination for the character and even the general appreciation or interest for the piece, the Phoenix statue (in my opinion) represents a further line of demarcation for this kind of collecting imposed by XM Studios, in terms of concept, design and production: a statue which simply moved the idea of top collectible to another (and higher) level.