5 Marvel Heroes Who Got Their Own Version of Cyclops’ Costume

The leader of the X-Men, Scott Summers’ Cyclops is instantly recognizable by his glowing visor and yellow and blue costume. However, over the years, a handful of Marvel heroes have bitten Scott Summers’ style. Here are the best heroes who did something new with Cyclops’ iconic look.

5

Cyclops-Lass, aka Beatrice “Buddy” Bartholomew

Created by Vita Ayala and Bernard Chang

Cyclops-Lass is the leader of the Children of the Atom. While this team of teen heroes masqueraded as mutants, they were actually human kids who stumbled across an alien ship. Stealing advanced tech, the team fashioned costumes which hid the true source of their powers, each inspired by a classic X-Men hero.

Beatrice’s visor fired blasts of concussive energy similar to Cyclops’ powers, with Cyclops-Lass deliberately basing her look on the X-Men’s leader. Her team was composed of the winged Cherub (honoring Angel), teleporting Daycrawler (Nightcrawler), pheromone-controlling Marvel Guy (Marvel Girl/Jean Grey) and explosive Gimmick (Gambit).

Cool-headed outsider Beatrice saw herself in Cyclops and did her best to honor his legacy. Cyclops-Lass proved herself as a hero, fighting crime during a time when young heroes were being pursued by the government. Sadly, her team lost a key player when the X-Men discovered that Gimmick actually was a mutant and recruited her into their ranks.

4

Cyclops 2099

Created by Steve Orlando and Kim Jacinto

In the Marvel 2099 continuity, the Cyclops of the future was inspired by Scott Summers’ legendary heroism. After discovering his mutant powers (and losing an eye in the process), Cyclops 2099 went on the run, joining this timeline’s version of the X-Men. His costume echoes Scott’s classic look, but with a different take on the visor that delivers on the ‘Cyclops’ name with a single round eye.

Cyclops 2099 has a tragic backstory, with the first emergence of his powers killing his mother. Unlike Scott Summers’ optic blasts, Cyclops 2099 unleashes energy that transmutes matter, allowing him to turn his enemies to stone or – in the case of his mother – salt.

Cyclops 2099 is also an ally of the original Wolverine, who is still alive in the future, now infused with cosmic energy as the new Nova.

3

Gwenclops

Created by Todd Nauck

Part of a variant cover initiative combining Spider-Man heroine Gwen Stacy with various heroes, ‘Gwenclops’ is a classic merging of designs. However, the Super-Gwens aren’t just onetime gags – they’ve appeared in various comics since, with Tim Seeley and Jodi Nishijima’s Spider-Gwen: Gwenverse uniting heroes including the goddess Thorgwen, Gwen Howlett’s Wolverine and the villainous Nightbird.

2

Cyverine, aka James Howlett

Created by Kabam for Marvel Contest of Champions

A minor character in Marvel’s Contest of Champions videogame, Cyverine is a variant of Wolverine who killed Cyclops. The stress of their fight triggered a secondary mutation, with Logan guiltily manifesting Scott Summers’ optic blasts. Ultimately, the design is mostly just Wolverine with Cyclops’ glowing eyes.

This isn’t the only time that Marvel has combined Wolverine and Cyclops – in Kieron Gillen and Josh Cassara’s Sins of Sinister #1, the evil geneticist Mister Sinister creates a ‘Chimera mutant’ with a combined version of their powers – one hand has claws, the other fires optic blasts. Sinister also created a Cyclops/Nightcrawler chimera named Summernight.

The pair also combined in Fabian Nicieza and Emilio Laiso’s Godzilla vs X-Men, with a Super-Adaptoid mech uniting their powers in a single body.

1

Apollo, aka Ray Summers | Green Cyclops

Created by Ron Marz and Jackson Guice | Gerard Jones, Mark Waid and Howard Porter

During the short-lived era of Marvel/DC crossovers, Cyclops was combined with multiple DC heroes. In Ron Marz and Jackson Guice’s DC/Marvel: All Access, Cyclops briefly combined with Green Lantern. The transformation didn’t last long, but presumably allowed Scott to will his optic blasts into different shapes.

More significant was Cyclops’ transformation in the Amalgam Universe comics, where he was fused with DC superhero the Ray. The result was a ‘metamutant’ who could absorb and channel heat and light, and the leader of the JLX. This character’s costume keeps Cyclops’ design, while foregrounding the Ray’s golden detailing. While Apollo was created by merging two existing heroes, he’s considered a unique variant with his own backstory, relatives, allies and enemies.

Those are the five heroes who stole Cyclops‘ iconic look, from those who wanted to honor the X-Men leader’s legacy to those who were literally merged with Scott Summers.