Here are the last two storylines on the countdown, as voted on by you, the readers!! Here is the master list of all storylines featured so far.

2. "The Dark Phoenix Saga" by Chris Claremont, John Byrne and Terry Austin (X-Men #129-137) - 1472 points (59 first place votes)



The last few issues of the Dark Phoenix Saga, where Phoenix actually BECOMES Dark Phoenix, almost overshadow the importance of the issues that lead up to Phoenix turning evil.

To wit, those issues (which actually were a bit of a cause for celebration for the X-Men, as they were finally reunited after being split up for a year or so - real time - as Jean Grey and Professor X thought that the rest of the team had died after a battle with Magneto) introduced the following characters:

Kitty Pryde

Emma Frost

Dazzler

Sebastian Shaw

The Hellfire Club, in general

Think about that - Kitty Pryde and Emma Frost are two of the more memorable additions to the X-Men since Giant Size X-Men #1, and they BOTH debuted in this storyline!

Not to mention the fact that the lead-up contains the fight against the Hellfire Club where Wolverine is thought dead, only to turn up at the end of #132 vowing revenge, in a panel that you readers voted the #4 Most Iconic Panel in Marvel Comics History!

And then we get to the actual revelation of the Dark Phoenix (which also landed in the Top 20 Most Iconic Panels at #18).

John Byrne really does a marvelous job on the battle sequences involving Dark Phoenix as the X-Men do their best to take down their friend. They try their best in #135, but she quickly defeats them and flies off into outer space. Her traveling makes her yearn for sustenance, which she gets by entering and imploding a star, soaking in the energy of its destruction. She does not care that the destruction of the star also destroys the planet it orbits. A starship of the Shi'Ar Empire notices, though, and challenges Dark Phoenix.

She destroys the ship easily, but not before it gets off a message to the Shi'Ar Royal Throneworld, where the Empress of the Shi'Ar Empire, Lilandra (Professor X's current lover) springs into action.

Meanwhile, in #136, Dark Phoenix returns to Earth where her teammates and her love, Cyclops, await her with a device meant to shut down telepaths. She destroys it and once again takes care of her teammates with ease, but Cyclops manages to calm her down by appealing to her still human side. At this point, Professor X attacks, and he and Phoenix have a telepathic battle, where ultimately, due to the aid of whatever vestiges of Jean Grey remain in Dark Phoenix, he manages to shut Dark Phoenix's powers down.

The X-Men do not have a moment to rest, though, as they're instantly teleported to a Shi'Ar battleship orbiting Earth, where the Shi'Ar Imperial Guard and Empress Lilandra demand Jean Grey be delivered over to them for punishment for her actions as Dark Phoenix. Professor X utters a Shi'Ar ritual challenge, which Lilandra is duty-bound to accept. Therefore, in #137, the X-Men will fight the mighty Shi'Ar Imperial Guard for the fate of Jean Grey.

The next day, the teams meet on the Moon for their battle. The X-Men are heavily outnumbered and outclassed by the Guard, who are made up of the most powerful heroes of the Shi'Ar Empire. Although the X-Men fight valiantly, they are slowly picked off, one by one, until only Cyclops and Jean remain free. When Cyclops is taken out as well, Jean begins to panic and the limits Professor X placed on her begin to crumble – Dark Phoenix frees herself and wants revenge. The X-Men stand ready to battle Dark Phoenix, but Jean manages to take control long enough to intentionally trip a defense mechanism laser, killing herself so that Dark Phoenix can hurt no one else ever again. It's a terrible poignant moment, expressed beautifully by Claremont and Byrne.

That moment, by the way, was #17 on the panels countdown.

This storyline also provided THREE of the Top 30 Favorite Comic Book Battles when I did THAT countdown.

People sure do love the Dark Phoenix Saga.

1. "Watchmen" by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (Watchmen #1-12) - 2003 points (78 first place votes)



To give you an idea of how much of a game changer Watchmen was, note that the PROOFS for the issues were passed around the DC offices - that's how much even the other DC employees were enthralled in the story that Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons were producing. Everyone knew that this comic was special, and now almost 25 years later, it remains a very special story.

A remarkable aspect of Watchmen is the fact that, past the fairly straightforward plot about an older superhero getting murdered, with his former teammates investigating his murder only to find out that it is all tied to a mysterious conspiracy, there is just so much detail and nuance.

You can examine a single scene and get something new out of the scene practically every time you read it.

And that's even counting all of the famous scenes that are awesome just on a straightforward reading of the book, like Ozymandias' famous "I did it 35 minutes ago" line or Rorschach's fight against the police (as I noted recently, Watchmen was clearly VERY influential on the work of Frank Miller - in fact, there's a very strong possibility that Miller's reading of Watchmen helped influence the ending of Dark Knight).

Dave Gibbons does not get enough credit for his amazing artwork in this story. There's a sequence set in the past when the heroes were still all pretty naive (Rorschach was not even using his scary voice as of yet), and Gibbons gives us, ALL IN THE BACKGROUND, a beautiful depiction of Doctor Manhattan flirting with the Silk Spectre, all while his wife is right next to him. As the panels go by, not one doesn't show some sort of interaction in the background of the panel - all of it is important to their characterizations, but none of it is central to the main story being delivered in those panels - so Gibbons basically was giving us two stories at once. The one Moore is telling with the speech balloons at the "front" of the panel, plus the one Gibbons is telling in the "back" of the panel through body language. Granted, as great as Gibbons is, Moore DOES work full script, so while I am praising Gibbons, I have to make sure I do give Moore credit for the details, as well.

All in all, there is a reason that this was one of Time magazine's Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century - it's a masterpiece of comic book fiction, both in story and art - and twenty plus years later, it is STILL influencing comic book writers.

Okay, folks, that's it!

Hope you enjoyed the countdown! Thanks for coming out to vote in such great numbers!