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X-Men Novelizations #2
X-Men 2
The action-packed adventure continues as simmering tensions explode with a vengeance.
They live among us, each possessing special superhuman abilities—sometimes a blessing, sometimes a curse. Mutants. Since the discovery of their existence, they have been regarded with fear, suspicion, and often hatred. Across the planet, the debate rages: Are mutants the next link in the evolutionary chain or simply a new species of humanity, fighting for their share of the world?
Either way, one fact remains: Sharing the world has never been humanity’s defining trait.
There are two sects of mutants: One aims to coexist peacefully with a world that despises them; the other group strikes at intolerance with a relentless, often murderous force. But now there is a new insidious enemy, and no one will be safe. . . .
They live among us, each possessing special superhuman abilities—sometimes a blessing, sometimes a curse. Mutants. Since the discovery of their existence, they have been regarded with fear, suspicion, and often hatred. Across the planet, the debate rages: Are mutants the next link in the evolutionary chain or simply a new species of humanity, fighting for their share of the world?
Either way, one fact remains: Sharing the world has never been humanity’s defining trait.
There are two sects of mutants: One aims to coexist peacefully with a world that despises them; the other group strikes at intolerance with a relentless, often murderous force. But now there is a new insidious enemy, and no one will be safe. . . .
408 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2003
22 people are currently reading
416 people want to read
About the author
Chris Claremont
3,273 books891 followersChris Claremont is a writer of American comic books, best known for his 16-year (1975-1991) stint on Uncanny X-Men, during which the series became one of the comic book industry's most successful properties.
Claremont has written many stories for other publishers including the Star Trek Debt of Honor graphic novel, his creator-owned Sovereign Seven for DC Comics and Aliens vs Predator for Dark Horse Comics. He also wrote a few issues of the series WildC.A.T.s (volume 1, issues #10-13) at Image Comics, which introduced his creator-owned character, Huntsman.
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.
Claremont has written many stories for other publishers including the Star Trek Debt of Honor graphic novel, his creator-owned Sovereign Seven for DC Comics and Aliens vs Predator for Dark Horse Comics. He also wrote a few issues of the series WildC.A.T.s (volume 1, issues #10-13) at Image Comics, which introduced his creator-owned character, Huntsman.
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.
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
October 15, 2025
This is a novelization of the second X-Men film, but it has several small (and one very big) differences and adds a lot to the depth of the characters. It's based on a screenplay by Dan Harris and Mike Dougherty, which was based on a story by Zak Penn and David Hayter and Bryan Singer, all of which was based on stories and characters, of course, which were created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and expanded by many comics writers, the most notable of which had to have been Chris Claremont. I was a little surprised that Claremont stuck so closely to the script rather than changing it to the way he would have chosen to write it, though I shouldn't have been since he was obviously hired to do an adaptation, not an original. On the other hand, had he simply novelized what was in the screenplay the book, which is over four-hundred pages long, would have been less than half of that. He provides a lot of background and insight into motivation and history... which is quite valuable to a X-comics fan and is probably somewhat boring to a casual movie buff. The big difference I mentioned is a completely different ending, and I wonder if he was given an earlier version of the script to use or if the film company wanted to keep the surprise intact. All in all, it's not a quick summary, but rather a rare eXpansion of a film. eXcelsior, true believers!
December 13, 2014
Amazing. As far as film adaptations go. The writer had done an amazing job. I loved how wonderful the writing was done as well as how detailed it was in fleshing out certain scenes.
You sympathize a little bit with Stryker when he recounts how his wife was killed or how Magneto flashes back to his torture and the payback for it, here you can almost remember Michael Fassbender in the bar killing those SS-guards. How Logan finds a weird connection with liking Japanese music from The Wolverine. Or just how amazingly deep the scene when Jean flashes back to her childhood friend Annie's death.
I can see now the disappointment with Nightcrawler being taken out of the third movie, he was truly a great character and it was a shame the costume couldn't be made more comfortable and a man has his limits.
I love how the Dark Cerebro scenes that caused the near deaths of both every human and mutant across the planet. One of the nicest little things is that Secret Service agent Vargas was a mutant who suffered at first not knowing why until her boss was dying. Or how we got to know about Beast probably when his serum was still working or Remy Lebeau older but still a charming card-shark. I couldn't help but imagine Kelsey Grammar and Taylor Kitsch in this small but obviously unfilmed scenes.
For me of course the most epic scene is the truth that Wolverine hears from Striker, that HE volunteered for the adamantium procedure and that he had done terrible things before that. I like how the book mentions Stryker tempting Logan with the answers to his past, especially if SHE is still alive. Kayla depicted by the lovely Lynn Collins. But this was the here and now and he needed to save his friends.
The only reason this isn't a full five star rating is because they remove the best part of the ending: What happens to Jean. My guess is that this book was released first before the movie and in order to avoid spoilers Bryan Singer had the novelist pull the scene from the book. Other than that great book. B+
You sympathize a little bit with Stryker when he recounts how his wife was killed or how Magneto flashes back to his torture and the payback for it, here you can almost remember Michael Fassbender in the bar killing those SS-guards. How Logan finds a weird connection with liking Japanese music from The Wolverine. Or just how amazingly deep the scene when Jean flashes back to her childhood friend Annie's death.
I can see now the disappointment with Nightcrawler being taken out of the third movie, he was truly a great character and it was a shame the costume couldn't be made more comfortable and a man has his limits.
I love how the Dark Cerebro scenes that caused the near deaths of both every human and mutant across the planet. One of the nicest little things is that Secret Service agent Vargas was a mutant who suffered at first not knowing why until her boss was dying. Or how we got to know about Beast probably when his serum was still working or Remy Lebeau older but still a charming card-shark. I couldn't help but imagine Kelsey Grammar and Taylor Kitsch in this small but obviously unfilmed scenes.
For me of course the most epic scene is the truth that Wolverine hears from Striker, that HE volunteered for the adamantium procedure and that he had done terrible things before that. I like how the book mentions Stryker tempting Logan with the answers to his past, especially if SHE is still alive. Kayla depicted by the lovely Lynn Collins. But this was the here and now and he needed to save his friends.
The only reason this isn't a full five star rating is because they remove the best part of the ending: What happens to Jean. My guess is that this book was released first before the movie and in order to avoid spoilers Bryan Singer had the novelist pull the scene from the book. Other than that great book. B+
July 18, 2009
Another novelization that provides a more in-depth look at the characters than what was afforded on the big screen. Claremont has written many of the X-Men comics, so his knowledge of the characters is quite intimate. This comes through well in the story ~ there is a real sense that the author knows the characters inside and out, and wasn't a newcomer to the series.
June 14, 2009
Not as good as a novelization as the one for X-Men 1. Still, not bad. The ending here is different than the movie. In fact, I think I like it a bit better, considering how badly X3 messed up the wonderful Dark Phoneix saga.
September 11, 2016
3.5.
The second X-Men film novelization is much better than the first. Handing the reins to longtime X-Men writer Chris Claremont was a smart move, as he knows these characters inside and out, and writes them with such a comfortable ease that it's hard not to get involved in it. Surprisingly, this is actually a decently written book, especially for a movie novelization, most of which are pretty artistically worthless. But Claremont shows a keen eye for detail in not only getting into the environments and sensations of the world, but also the individual character's heads, their thoughts and feelings, even going so far as to offer bits of development for background characters like George McKenna and Alicia Vargas. Overall, this was much more fun to read than the first book, and went into much more plot and character detail, making it able to stand on its own two feet rather than seeming like a dry relation of the events of the movie. In fact, one of the most interesting things about this book is what's not in the film version, such as cameos from Gambit and Beast, and a radically altered ending. It's not perfect, there's quite a few unnecessary adverbs and the occasional clunky line, but compared to the first book, this was really fun, and served as a proper extension to the film version, rather than feeling like a cheap tie in. Recommended for X-Men fans.
The second X-Men film novelization is much better than the first. Handing the reins to longtime X-Men writer Chris Claremont was a smart move, as he knows these characters inside and out, and writes them with such a comfortable ease that it's hard not to get involved in it. Surprisingly, this is actually a decently written book, especially for a movie novelization, most of which are pretty artistically worthless. But Claremont shows a keen eye for detail in not only getting into the environments and sensations of the world, but also the individual character's heads, their thoughts and feelings, even going so far as to offer bits of development for background characters like George McKenna and Alicia Vargas. Overall, this was much more fun to read than the first book, and went into much more plot and character detail, making it able to stand on its own two feet rather than seeming like a dry relation of the events of the movie. In fact, one of the most interesting things about this book is what's not in the film version, such as cameos from Gambit and Beast, and a radically altered ending. It's not perfect, there's quite a few unnecessary adverbs and the occasional clunky line, but compared to the first book, this was really fun, and served as a proper extension to the film version, rather than feeling like a cheap tie in. Recommended for X-Men fans.
December 1, 2014
I enjoyed this novelization. It included some nice bonus material not in the film. Yes, the editing was shoddy in some places, but oh, well. My main complaint is that there is a major change to the end. It'll be interesting to see how the plot of the next novel will be affected by the omission in this one.
October 26, 2012
As you read, you actually see the film scene by scene. Such is the effect. My fav is the one where Eric Lensherr(Magneto0 escapes from his plastic prison.
August 9, 2024
Look I know that a mid-2000s blockbuster movie was never going to consider polyamory as the solution but seriously if you're all so in love with each other then literally what is the issue here. Why are we angsting why is Jean having to choose why are we being so silly
I wouldn't describe this book as being particularly well written. It's clear that Claremont's skills don't lie in prose or narration, and maybe getting a novel writer to write the novelisation might've been a better choice? But also this is literally a movie novelisation from the mid 2000s so who am I kidding
The way that Mystique was written was pretty interesting. Claremont made the choice of always writing that the character she's portraying is the one doing things right up until the moment that she reveals herself. For instance, the first time that Mystique appears in the story it's in the guise of the late Senator Kelly, and through this scene she is entirely referred to as Kelly and with he/him even when told from her perspective. It's an interesting narrative choice, but raises the question as to why Claremont does this. Is it scratching the surface of Mystique's own feelings on and relationship with her own identity and gender? Or is it merely a visual artist's attempt to portray the visual trickery that the movie is able to indulge in by not making it explicitly clear from the jump that a character we're looking at is in fact someone else, despite the medium shift making that trick nigh-impossible to pull off if the scene is being told from that character's point of view? Unfortunately my bet's on the latter, because if it had been the former then there surely would've been some introspection on it, because this book is definitely not short on introspection for anybody else
This also includes a bunch of the deleted scenes which is cool, as well as incorporating a minor plot point near the end that got abandoned partway through filming the movie. It also, famously, changes the ending in a big way, which makes sense for the way that the book changes Jean's feelings towards her powers throughout the story. Book!Jean has been enjoying the expanse of power, and is confident enough in her own ability to wield it that she doesn't see any need to sacrifice herself to save the others because she can save them all. Movie!Jean has been terrified of her rapid growth in power, and many of her attempts to wield it thus far have gone wrong. Of course movie!Jean left the plane. Of course book!Jean didn't. The divergence in characterisation is subtle, but it's there.
I wouldn't describe this book as being particularly well written. It's clear that Claremont's skills don't lie in prose or narration, and maybe getting a novel writer to write the novelisation might've been a better choice? But also this is literally a movie novelisation from the mid 2000s so who am I kidding
The way that Mystique was written was pretty interesting. Claremont made the choice of always writing that the character she's portraying is the one doing things right up until the moment that she reveals herself. For instance, the first time that Mystique appears in the story it's in the guise of the late Senator Kelly, and through this scene she is entirely referred to as Kelly and with he/him even when told from her perspective. It's an interesting narrative choice, but raises the question as to why Claremont does this. Is it scratching the surface of Mystique's own feelings on and relationship with her own identity and gender? Or is it merely a visual artist's attempt to portray the visual trickery that the movie is able to indulge in by not making it explicitly clear from the jump that a character we're looking at is in fact someone else, despite the medium shift making that trick nigh-impossible to pull off if the scene is being told from that character's point of view? Unfortunately my bet's on the latter, because if it had been the former then there surely would've been some introspection on it, because this book is definitely not short on introspection for anybody else
This also includes a bunch of the deleted scenes which is cool, as well as incorporating a minor plot point near the end that got abandoned partway through filming the movie. It also, famously, changes the ending in a big way, which makes sense for the way that the book changes Jean's feelings towards her powers throughout the story. Book!Jean has been enjoying the expanse of power, and is confident enough in her own ability to wield it that she doesn't see any need to sacrifice herself to save the others because she can save them all. Movie!Jean has been terrified of her rapid growth in power, and many of her attempts to wield it thus far have gone wrong. Of course movie!Jean left the plane. Of course book!Jean didn't. The divergence in characterisation is subtle, but it's there.
May 23, 2019
The reason I chose this book to read is because I am reading an AtoZ Reading Challenge this year and my husband is a science fiction/fantasy fan who happened to have a book with a title with X. Since it is a novelization of a movie, I think this time I prefer the movie. It was action packed, but I did not understand how Professor X controlled the Cerebro or how Jean used her power to fix the jet. I think I will have to watch the movie.
January 19, 2022
So by now everyone has at least seen this movie and knows how it has ended with the death of Jean grey. But in the book she lives. Which I fully understand how she grew up in the power of the Phoenix in this book. I’m just disappointed that they had her dead in the next book and never kept her alive though.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 25, 2024
Having Claremont write this novelization makes a huge difference in the quality. All the extra cameos are great but the difference in the ending regarding Jean was disappointing. That, along with his continued references to her profane vocabulary and the overly romantic chemistry between her and Logan dropped an easy 4 star read to a 3.
December 1, 2024
In my opinion the superior version of the story. Far more character introspection and time spent on moments that were missing in the movie. Claremont's prose was enjoyable as well, a great example of POV switching done right. Though I will say some scene's could have been spiced up just a tad with a bit more content. Great book for fans of the movie!
January 19, 2018
Super Doctor Astronaut Peter Corbeau makes an appearance on page 366, and it's possibly one of the best moments. Other than that, this is a good novelization of the film. I could see the characters and hear their voices as I read.
December 5, 2024
love the additions to the movie’s plot. lots of interesting little background bits and pieces from the comics that add a lot to the story. i think the major change towards the end with jean was very very interesting. loved this book, a great companion piece for any xmen movie fan.
June 14, 2025
This book chock full of extra story points that aren't in the movie. In some ways that makes the story more interesting, in others, they tend to slow it down a bit. However, it's obviously a labor of love from Mr. Claremont who's written a fair number of X-Men stories in his day.
September 16, 2019
Interesante ejercicio el de plasmar en novela las andanzas de nuestros superhéroes favoritos. Muy entretenido.
February 2, 2023
complete with an alternate ending
April 20, 2019
This one, of the three original novelizations, was my favorite. I loved all the new characters, and learning more about Wolverine’s origins. The story also had an interesting twist with the Mutants and Magneto working together, and Charles facing a very personal enemy. It was Charles's storyline, above all else that, I felt, was explored the most in-depth in this adaptation. The whole plot of the movie was expanded, but Charles, and secondly Wolverine's lives, and histories were really flushed out.
On the flip side of that, Jason and Stryker were even more menacing in the book than the film. It really conveyed the creepiness of those two characters,. In terms of "villains" we also got to explore a new side of Magneto, when he pooled his talents to help the X-Men stop Stryker and rescue Charles and Scott.
One of the best comic movie adaptations I have read.
On the flip side of that, Jason and Stryker were even more menacing in the book than the film. It really conveyed the creepiness of those two characters,. In terms of "villains" we also got to explore a new side of Magneto, when he pooled his talents to help the X-Men stop Stryker and rescue Charles and Scott.
One of the best comic movie adaptations I have read.
June 8, 2009
Fairly excellent for a movie novelization, even featuring a different ending than the movie. One teensy little problem - who ever edited this/failed to edit it needs to be taken out and shot. The minor story points can't even stay in continuity within the book itself. Characters vanish from one page to the next, kids who were roommates swap beds fifty pages later. It almost feels like someone went back in after the original story was done and tried to shoehorn in a few more minor characters, but failed to take note of the surrounding narrative.
May 1, 2008
Very good book, especially if you liked the movie. Sad to think how badly the third one sucked, though. Oh well. Atleast we have this excellent novelization of the second movie to help make us feel better.
November 12, 2012
I wish they would have delved just a bit more into the psychology of Pyro (my favorite from the movies), but as he's little more than a background character, I can't complain. [return]Well written and entertaining.
July 15, 2012
It's an okay book. I just prefer an x-men movie to a novelization of it. The book would have been better if the movie plot didn't include some unnecessary themes, and cuss words.
April 7, 2013
Who doesn't like super heroes and supper villains? I loved this book and I think you will too.
December 13, 2013
Novelization of the second movie. As such, Chris Claremont did a good job. But considering his (writing) history with the characters, one would expect more.
October 22, 2015
i really like this boy book but i still read it :)
Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews