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Chris Claremont

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Chris Claremont (born November 30, 1950 in London, England, United Kingdom) is a comic book writer, best known for his 16-year (1976-1991) stint on Uncanny X-Men, during which the series became one of the comic book industry's most successful properties. 



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Writer profile

Claremont is regarded as one of the hallmark Marvel Comics writers, having written one of the flagship titles, the Uncanny X-Men, for sixteen consecutive years. Claremont excelled at the task of writing good "team" arcs, in which every member of the ensemble cast of X-Men had her/ his moment to shine. He was lauded for writing action-packed stories with strong characters, both heroes and villains, mixing it with soap opera elements and always bringing in the social undercurrent of mutants being a harassed minority. Claremont also promoted strong female characters such as Jean Grey, Storm and Moira MacTaggert, who were a far cry from the token roles usually reserved for women at that time. Claremont's approach set the standard for team-based comic books for decades. 


The most common criticism of his work is his overly descriptive writing style.  Claremont's characters tend to speak in long paragraphs that are often called forced or unrealistic.  He frequently employs third-person omniscient narration to describe events that might easily be conveyed in the art and (to some) unneeded thought bubbles to spell out character motivation and personality, especially during action scenes.  


However, Claremont is seen as one of the most historically important writers ever in X-Men.



Marvel Comics biography

As an entry into comic writing Claremont was given the fledgling title, Iron Fist in 1974 that also teamed him with John Byrne for the first time. Len Wein then gave him the writing duties for the relaunched X-Men. Claremont also found narrative excuses to sideline Professor X, as one of the problems with the original X-Men series was that the Professor would appear at the end of the story to magically correct the situation no matter how dire.





Cover to Uncanny X-Men #94, Claremont's first issue.

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Cover to Uncanny X-Men #94, Claremont's first issue.





During his years as X-Men writer, Claremont wrote or co-wrote many classic X-Men stories such as the "Dark Phoenix Saga", and "Days of Future Past". He also co-created numerous important X-Men characters, including Rogue, Psylocke, Shadowcat, Phoenix, Sabretooth, Mystique, Emma Frost, Jubilee, Rachel Summers, Mister Sinister, and Gambit.  In addition, he helped launch best-selling spin-offs such as X-Men, New Mutants, Excalibur, and Wolverine.  In 1985 Marvel launched an X-Men spin-off, X-Factor, that changed the Phoenix/Jean Grey continuity that Claremont had established.  In 1991 he left Marvel over differences with the editorial staff. 


In 2000 he returned to Marvel (as part of the company's "Revolution" event) and wrote Uncanny X-Men and X-Men until he moved to X-Treme X-Men with penciller Salvador Larroca.


As of 2005, he is again writing Uncanny X-Men,  the miniseries , and New Excalibur for Marvel Comics.  However, he will be handing the reins of Uncanny X-Men to Ed Brubaker in summer 2006, moving over to Exiles, replacing writer Tony Bedard, who will be sticking around at Marvel a little longer, because Chris Claremont's takeover of Exiles and his series' GeNext have been postponed because Claremont has been diagnosed with cardiac stress. Bedard will script Uncanny X-Men and the Annual with plots from Claremont; Tony Bedard will continue writing Exiles for a few months, Frank Tieri will take over New Excalibur, and GeNext is arriving at a later date.





Cover to Uncanny X-Men #445. Art by Alan Davis.

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Cover to Uncanny X-Men #445. Art by Alan Davis.








Career outside Marvel Comics

Claremont has written many stories for other publishers including the Star Trek Debt of Honor graphic novel, Sovereign Seven for DC Comics and Alien vs Predator for Dark Horse Comics.


Outside of comics, Claremont co-wrote the Chronicles of the Shadow War trilogy, Shadow Moon (1995), Shadow Dawn (1996), and Shadow Star (1999), with George Lucas. This trilogy continues the story of Elora Danan from the movie Willow. In the 1980s, he also wrote a science fiction trilogy about female starship pilot Nicole Shea, consisting of First Flight (1987), Grounded! (1991), and Sundowner (1994).  Claremont was also a contributor to the Wild Cards anthology series.


He has a cameo in X-Men 3 during the Jean Grey prologue, credited as "Lawnmower man".



Awards

Claremont won the Comics Buyer's Guide Fan Award for "Favorite Writer" in 1983, 1984, 1988, 1989, and 1990. Also, he won CBG Fan Awards for "Favorite Comic Book Story" in 1990 (The X-tinction Agenda) and "Favorite Graphic Novel or Album" in 1992 (Star Trek: Debt of Honor). [link]



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