CGC Registry

THE rarest Dark Phoenix Saga on Earth.


Set Type: X-Men Dark Phoenix Saga Run (1980) U.K. Editions
Owner: DaveNix
Last Modified: 1/5/2026
Views: 167

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Rank: 1
Score: 3615
Leading by: 3577
Points to Higher Rank: N/A
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Set Description:

A lifelong love letter to the Claremont/Byrne X-Men, told entirely in UK Price Variants.

John Byrne brought me into comic collecting with the cover of Fantastic Four #239 — the first comic I ever bought off the rack at my small-town neighborhood drug store. I was a little late to the party to catch Byrne and Claremont's magic on X-Men when it was coming out, but I made up for it. As a young man serving in the U.S. Navy, I hunted those back issues with a paper checklist tucked in my back pocket. That was comic collecting. The thrill of the hunt.

Years later, comics fell to the wayside — until COVID gave me time to fall in love with them again. But now? The hunt felt different. Too easy. Just a matter of narrowing down your eBay filters. And then... I saw her — Phoenix, rising from the water on the cover of X-Men #101.

Breathtaking. And as a UK Price Variant? Extremely rare. I had to have it. That first 9.4 CGC slab became the cornerstone of a new passion. UK price variants typically make up just 3–5% of the U.S. print run, and even fewer survive in high grade. As a collector based in the US, the hunt was back on. It's taken five years to assemble this Dark Phoenix Saga set in high grade, and there's still room for improvement.

The death of Phoenix, issue #137, was not published as a UK Price Variant, so for the penultimate chapter of Phoenix, I tracked down a CGC 9.8 copy signed by both Chris Claremont and John Byrne. I've also added a 9.8 Canadian Price Variant of Phoenix: The Untold Story for good measure.

Forty years after that drug store rack, the hunt is still the best part.

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