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[tenequalstian]

Fancasting the Flagship X-Men Books

So, with the reveal of the post-HOXPOX X-books coming next month at SDCC, I figured I’d have some fun and make some guesses at what we could be getting.

I’m not one of those people that continually says Joe Mad should come back and draw X-Men again, I know he never will. I like to be realistic with this stuff, because it keeps me from being disappointed when the actual books come out.

So, we already know Hickman is doing the flagship post-HOXPOX, but he usually does these things in twos. Fantastic Four/FF, Avengers/New Avengers, so... two X-Men books. One double shipping, the other not. One starts everything off and the other comes later.

Based on what Hickman has said in interviews, I don’t think this will be called Uncanny X-Men or X-Men. I think we’re getting a new adjective to symbolize this new era, but since there’s so many adjectives, it’s hard to pinpoint what exactly it could be. It could even be a previously used adjective that doesn’t get used often (ex. Extraordinary or Amazing).

Again, this is NOT a leak. I am a FAN. I like to GUESS THINGS.

So, I’ll call this first one...

All-New, All-Different X-Men

W: Jonathan Hickman (duh doy)

A: Giuseppe Camuncoli

Why Camuncoli? Dude’s been on a break for a while now since Darth Vader wrapped up. He’s only done covers since then, and his first interior work since then just hit the stands (Star Wars #108) and there’s also The Green Lantern Annual #1 in July - well before the relaunch in October - but he sometimes does a DC book on the side. While he was drawing Amazing Spider-Man during the ANAD Marvel era, he did two issues of Snyder’s All-Star Batman. He’s also doing some covers for DC, but I think that’s just a similar situation to when Yu was doing some covers for DC recently.

As for why he’s a good fit? Well, his work on Darth Vader and Amazing Spider-Man is consistently stunning and the fact that he did all twenty-five issues of Darth Vader without needing to take a break means that he can handle the workload of a double shipping title (he would need breaks on this though). His action is clear, he’s worked with editor Jordan D. White extensively, and his and Ramos’ usual spots on Amazing Spider-Man has now been taken by Ryan Ottley and Pat Gleason.

He’d be the perfect X-Men artist.

As for the cast of the book, Hickman has mentioned that there would be no need to have specific teams anymore, so I expect some fluidity in the lineup. If there are mainstays, I expect them to be Cyclops, Wolverine, Jean, Nightcrawler, and Monet, with characters like Storm, Sunspot, and Cannonball appearing frequently.

I think this book will primarily explore the new status quo set up within House of X. The fallout of that pivotal month in X-History that changes everything for the mutants.

The second flagship is the one that starts with the second wave and comes out once a month. I have no idea what anything in Wave Two will look like as I believe that’s where all the weird shit is gonna come out. But, let’s make a guess anyways.

The X-Men

W: Jonathan Hickman

A: Dustin Weaver

I’m not even gonna try to guess an adjective for this one. If it has one, I can see this one being Uncanny X-Men. Or Astonishing X-Men. Or Immortal X-Men!

Weaver has said he isn’t involved in any X-Men stuff, but he did do a cover for Powers of X and has a good relationship with Hickman. However, he also an anthology series for Image that he writes and draws himself, so he may want to focus on that. If not him, then probably Silva, Larraz, or Molina. 

I believe that this will focus on the new information about the past, present, and future of mutantkind revealed in Powers of X.

As for a cast, I think this one will be a little less fluid. While many characters can come and go as needed, I think this book will primarily feature Xavier, Magneto, Emma Frost, Red Nightcrawler, and the Rasputin/Moonstar hybrid.

Next up, the third, ancillary X-Men title...

[tenequalstian]

Theory Crafting for Jonathan Hickman’s X-Men Run

So, this account was originally going to have only one post. That post would be a response to the (wonderful and awesome) theory presented by Xavier Files (TL;DR the X-Men go to Mars and meet Ex Nihilo from Hickman’s Avengers). I had another theory - one that still worked with Zack’s theory - but, one that assumed some connections to another Hickman story.

My theory was that Xavier would use Krakoa to make a new “Tian” (it might not be called Tian though, as Warren Ellis and Simone Bianchi already created the 616 Tian in Ghost Box). This “Tian” would be the new homeland for mutants, eventually bringing about Red Nightcrawler and Moonstar/Rasputin hybrid we see in Powers of X.

Why did I think this? Because I felt that the color palette for the cover of House of X #1 was more similar to the color palette of Tian’s depiction in Ultimate Hawkeye. I then made up a theory all about how Hickman was using ideas from his Ultimates run (which used a lot of X-Men terminology to begin with). Basically, doing a spiritual successor to the only run he never got to finish (this theory is where the name comes from).

But, then I found something that blew that up.

I was wandering around the internet. I’ve never been on Something Awful until this past week. Hickman made a witty twitter comment about something and one of the replies stated that they thought he lurked in the Batman’s Shameful Secret boards. I checked it out, and went straight the X-Boards.

On the last page, I saw Blockhouse’s post.

Now, I’m sure we all remember BC’s reporting on this. They had no real concrete information on the books and even made it seem like Hickman wasn’t writing X-Men. But, I never heard this rumor before. I don’t know where it came from. Blockhouse makes it sound like the rumor was before the announcement but doesn’t elaborate on whether or not this rumor only pertained to HOXPOX or the whole relaunch. I’m cheap and refuse to pay money to join a forum, so, if you see this and have a Something Awful account, would you kindly ask Blockhouse where they got that rumor from? Or if Blockhouse sees this, please reach out and share the rumor. I’d be very grateful.

But anyways, without any proof or context, I put in the back of my mind and thought, “Immortality? In my X-Men? Okay, Jonathan.” Then, the gears in my mind began to turn. Hickman loves the Eternals, who are all currently dead and potentially being replaced with the Olympians. It explains beings like Apocalypse. And it wouldn’t be the weirdest thing to happen to mutants as a whole (*cough cough* AIDS immunity).

If true, this could also tie into Hickman and Weaver’s SHIELD and the Elixir of Life. That’d be dope.

As for what I’ll do after posting this? Gonna take some guesses as to what some of the new books will be. Do some fancasts for the creative teams. Come up with some fun titles for these hypothetical books. Gonna make some educated guesses, and avoid listing what I would do with the X-line (No, Clay Mann will not be drawing the X-Men anytime soon. Stop saying it).

First up, All-New, All-Different X-Men...