Posted in: Comics | Tagged: jonathan hickman, marvel, relaunch, x-men

Jonathan Hickman's X-Men Will Kick Off a Line-Wide X-Men Relaunch

Published Tue, 14 May 2019 11:07:39 -0500

Last updated Tue, 14 May 2019 11:10:00 -0500

Jonathan Hickman has confirmed that his upcoming X-Men comics, House of X and Powers of X, will be the start of a line-wide X-Men relaunch, with Hickman writing the main ongoing X-Men title. Hickman made the comments in an interview on ComicBook.com:

At the conclusion of our 12 weeks of HOX and POX, we'll be launching an entire new universe of X-books. Some will be traditional fare, some carry through on ideas presented in HOX and POX. Some books are completely new concepts. I, personally, will be writing the ongoing flagship X-book.

Now, we're already in production on all of these 'Wave 1' books and our plan at this moment is to introduce the titles, creative teams, and publishing details around SDCC, which is a week before HOX #1 goes on sale.

We also just finished our plans for our 'Wave 2' books that will debut in 2020 and we're getting ready to hire talent for those.

It's pretty exciting, and this kind of long-term planning is one of the benefits of knowing what direction you're headed for the next few years.

We already know that Jonathan Hickman would launch two bi-weekly X-Men series in July, House of X and Powers of X, which will run for three months. The Age of X-Man event is also ending that month, and perhaps most importantly, looking at July's solicitations, we predicted that both Uncanny X-Men and X-Force could also end with their July issues, and Deadpool is also likely getting relaunched. X-23 will end this month, and Mr. and Mrs. X will end in June. The rest of the X-Books are mini-series. That clears the stage for one of Marvel's patented X-Men relaunches, just under a year since the last one, and that's apparently exactly what we're getting.

We won't hold our breath for Marvel to let Chris Claremont write something on a regular basis, even though they pay him to remain Marvel EX-X-XCLUSIVE. However, we do know, based on Jordan White's recent comments, that there's a very Emma Frost heavy story coming up, in a comic that we don't know about yet. What else can we expect?

Marvel will probably try to keep some most things under wraps, especially since Hickman's series will run for three months. That will give them some stuff to talk about during convention season, as Hickman noted in his comments, as well as to distribute as "scoops" to their media partners. Of course, we'll do our best to spoil it first.

So what do you think? Are you X-cited for the new era of X-Men? Let us know in the comments.