"Death!" Cries the Phoenix!

Depending on how much stock you put in the new Phoenix who came on the scene in late 1985--embodied this time by Rachel Summers, the daughter of Scott Summers and Jean Grey from a different timeline, sent to our own from the future--then this clash that took place the following year either had you sitting a little more upright in your chair, or shrugging your shoulders in indifference.

And I doubt we're even talking about a matter of power levels, are we. To put it bluntly, even if Rachel wielded the Phoenix power to its fullest--or at fifty, a hundred, a thousand times that level--the might of the Phoenix is as nothing to the likes of the Beyonder. Show me the last time the Phoenix obliterated an entire galaxy, in a matter of seconds.* Go ahead, rifle through those back issues. Your doctor will be treating you for carpal tunnel before you can say "I am fire, and life incarnate."

*Writer Mary Jo Duffy obviously thinks that the Phoenix power can do a lot more damage than destroying a mere galaxy.

The real draw of such a clash would be if it were Jean Grey (as Phoenix) battling the Beyonder, since she brings more to the table than the bull-in-a-china-shop approach that Rachel would take here to no avail. As inevitable as Jean's defeat would be, I'd much rather see her in the driver's seat of the Phoenix power when fighting this kind of battle than her cocky, angry daughter who really doesn't care about the collateral damage her attack will cause. (And that's putting it mildly--more on that in a moment.)

But that's what we've got, and that's what the X-Men have got--with Rachel not only doing this over their objections (with the exception of Shadowcat and Wolverine), but making two separate attempts on the Beyonder's life in two back-to-back issues. Needless to say, Rachel really, really wants the Beyonder dead.

The rest of the X-Men are skeptical that Rachel can harm the Beyonder in any way, but they proceed to intervene regardless, since their worry is based on Rachel making the Beyonder angry--at which point he could lash out and conceivably destroy the entire planet. But what's interesting in their planning session is that, like X-Men readers, they've never seriously regarded her status as Phoenix as being as ominous or potentially uncontrollable and life-threatening as they did in Jean's case (which apparently also holds true for the Shi'ar, who would otherwise have come after Rachel in force). Yet as they home in on her position, they seem to be re-evaluating their stance on the subject.

(Considering that Rachel is closing in on the Beyonder, however, the spike in energy readings might be attributable to himself, instead--though the panel art appears to point the finger to Rachel.)

The Beyonder, for his part, is lost in thought, spending his time in Secret Wars II in human form and striving to understand himself on that basis. His points of view are often in conflict, at times making conclusions on incomplete facts which lack perspective--but his time for musing is swiftly running out, because death is on the wing!

Or not.

Annnnnd, strike two.

Taking his cue from Rachel, the Beyonder takes her on a heartless tour through her own brushes with death while watching her friends die at the hands of the Sentinels in her own timeline. In doing so, he demonstrates that he knows far more about her reasons for acting as she does than she can admit to herself--and he uses that knowledge to satisfy his curiosity as to other choices that she might make, should her circumstances change.  Something he can facilitate.

(The scene provides another example of why it remains unclear if Rachel is anything more than "Phoenix-lite," courtesy of its narrative: "And she wonders if this is how her mother felt... when she became Phoenix?" I.e., if Rachel is truly Phoenix, she would already know how Jean felt at the moment of her own transformation, without benefit of the surge of power which the Beyonder provides to her.)

When the his experiment has run its course, following the X-Men's pitched battle with the Sentinels he's unleashed on them from Rachel's future, Phoenix returns to the Beyonder, who feels she's learned an important lesson from the experience and one that he can help her understand. But the perspective he feels he's gained for himself in the process is woefully incomplete, given the fast track he's taken toward self-awareness--while Rachel is not amused by his methods, regardless.

What the Beyonder has accomplished, however, is to prove to the X-Men that he's a clear and present danger--and when he takes revenge against Illyana Rasputin for her rejection of him by wiping knowledge of the New Mutants' existence from the minds of the X-Men (with the exception of Shadowcat), Rachel seizes the opportunity to take extreme steps to put an end to him once and for all. The trouble is, she plans to kill everyone in the universe to do it.

And while her warped, twisted rationale for causing genocide on a universal scale is horrifying enough, the fact that Rogue acknowledges the plan as "horrible beyond comprehension--almost obscene" but still joins Shadowcat (along with Spider-Woman) in supporting it makes the Beyonder look like a godsend next to the knee-jerk decisions of the X-Men.

Thankfully, not all of the X-Men are signing off on this insane course of action. Rachel stops by the rooms of those who are sleeping and conscripts their life force while assuming they'd agree with what she plans; but she's forced to take different measures with Storm, whose objections are very clear.

Phase 2 of Rachel's plan involves traveling with their spirit forms (and a few others she snags along the way) to the world on which rests the M'Kraan Crystal, where Jean as Phoenix had once prevented universal armageddon. Considering the forces that Rachel is preparing to unleash, it's becoming clear that the apple fell miles from that tree.

Despite Storm's pleas to consider the cost of what she's doing and desist, Rachel is heedless and bulldozes ahead; yet once inside the sphere, she becomes one with every single life she seeks to snuff out, and is overwhelmed with the magnitude of what she's about to do and the terrible loss of life involved in her decision. Faced with becoming a slaughterer and, in Wolverine's estimation, an executioner, she aborts her mission and casts herself out of the sphere, restoring the life-essences she took possession of and returning to Earth.

Yet there is one who waits to hold the X-Men accountable--that is, for failing in their task, a goal it seems the Beyonder was fully on board with. And while the reckoning eventually leads to another confrontation between himself and Phoenix, her power this time has a more profound impact.

There comes a point when the scripting of Chris Claremont reaches "blechh!" levels, and I think we've reached it. Suffice to say that the story has done its job in terms of tying in with Secret Wars II, and the Beyonder returns to those pages to continue with his efforts to comprehend humanity. As for Phoenix, did the tie-in also do its presumed job of raising her profile? I tend to defer to the Shi'ar on the matter, who, even now knowing this girl broke into the M'Kraan Crystal in an attempt to wipe out the universe, are still content to live and let live in regard to Rachel Summers.