Marvel Comics Universe and August 2019 Solicitations Spoilers follows.
House Of X & Powers Of X ONLY X-Men / X-Force and Related Books From July To September 2019?!
CB reveals some interesting tidbits about Marvel’s X-Men franchise plans from House of X and Powers of X writer Jonathan Hickman:
- Okay, so, for the most part, I don’t believe incrementalism works in fictional universes, and that, I think, is why almost every big franchise change that occurs has a delineated starting point. I mean, it does work, which is why the industry often abuses it as a sales tactic.
And in the spirit of ‘what works’ and also ‘what the market is used to’, I didn’t feel like just doing a new number one was enough. I also didn’t think that if we were serious about what we were trying to do we should have a mixed message in the market about what an X-book is.
So I argued for cancelling the entire line: Why it would work, why it was a good idea, and most importantly, why it was what we needed to do narratively to return the X-Men to their rightful prominent position in the Marvel Universe.
We needed to sell the idea that this is what we’re going to be doing for the next few years. So if you want to read X-Men books during the run from late-July through September, House of X and Powers of X are the only new X-books available and everything that’s going to follow is based on them. We wanted to be clear to the fans, to the stores, and just as importantly, to the creators who are going to be staffing these books in the future. We wanted the message to be very clear: This is a whole new era for the X-Men. This is what we’re doing now.
And so, POX and HOX is how we’re starting. It’s a solid plan, I think…
…One, House of X, is a story about a pivotal month in the history of the X-men where everything changes for mutants on Earth. And the other, Powers of X, is a story about the history of mutants in the Marvel Universe. It works as a series of reveals and revelations where each issue of HOX that follows POX — and vice versa — makes you reinterpret the issue you had previously read.
And then, obviously, at the end they crash together in a way that propels us forward into a new X-Universe…
…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….
August 2019’s House of X #2 and #3 covers below.
August 2019’s Powers of X #2 and #3 covers below.
Preview art for July 2019’s House of X #1.
Preview art for July 2019’s Powers of X #1.
Intrigued?
