The big announcement at the X-Men panel this year was that Marvel have finally decided to pass their Amazing adjective across to their merry mutants: Amazing X-Men #1 is coming out later this year, from the creative team of Jason Aaron and Ed McGuinness.

AMAZINGXMEN_1_COVER

The main starting hook of the series will be the return of Nightcrawler, who died of severe arm-through-the-chest back in X-Men: Second Coming. It seems as though this will build off the similar return of his ‘father’ Azazel, whom Kurt is swashbuckling in the image above. Also a member of the team? Firestar!

This will likely be the book taking the place of the soon-departing Astonishing X-Men, harkening back to the ‘A-List’ squad doing their best to make mutants look great. Rather than being Cyclops in charge, Wolverine will be picking his own all-star team to help him track down Nightcrawler and bring him back to life. Firestar, Storm, Northstar, Beast (Beast?!) and Iceman will make up his team.

Now, it looks like the first storyline is going to basically pick up on the idea of Hell first seen in Aaron’s Wolverine run from a while back. It sounds very much as though the team are going to jump down into Hell, and pull Nightcrawler out – Wolverine’s pulled himself out, so now he’s going to do the same for Nightcrawler.

The book will start in November, after the X-Men: Battle of the Atom mini-event finishes. The press release also says that the Uncanny X-Men are likely to find out about Nightcrawler’s return sooner rather than later. Somebody get Kitty and Colossus in on this story, please! And where’s Amanda Sefton?

18 COMMENTS

  1. Definitely my top dead Marvel character up for a resurrection, but I haven’t been a fan of Aaron’s X-work, so I’m on the fence. certainly pretty art, though.

    (Also slightly disappointed that they still aren’t using the next new X-launch to give Uncanny/Cyclops’s side some company.)

  2. With Firestar and Iceman both being on this team, a Spider-Man appearance is inevitable, don’t you think?*

    * I mean, this is factoring out that a Spider-Man appearance in any random Marvel comic is essentially obligatory. I would hope that said inevitable/obligatory Spider-Man appearance would involve time-travel so that it’s Peter Parker that re/unites with his Amazing Friends and not Octo-Spider.

  3. This looks completely awesome! Aaron did brilliant work on Wolverine and has been great on Thor, so I have no doubt that a book that looks almost like the classic Gold Team done by him will be incredible (or amazing?). And Nightcrawler is back! That’s the BEST news from the X-Men franchise in ages!

  4. FIRESTAR an X Man? Finally! So great to gave her back. Keep her away from Justice and the Avengers please!

    Destined for mainstream greatness!

  5. Good creative team, though I hope McGuinness has plenty of lead time/doesn’t bolt after a few issues like he usually does. Also hoping this is supplementing not replacing Wolverine & The X-Men, which Aaron is doing an excellent job on.

  6. As always I’d buy the phone book if Ed McGuinness drew it so I’ll certainly buy the first arc until he moves onto his next launch! (bye Nova!)

  7. “Why would Nightcrawler be in Hell?”

    In the comics, Azazel isn’t a mutant, he’s a demon. The story that introduced Azazel is much-hated in X-Fandom for a very good reason: it made Nightcrawler half-demon and all-but mooted the poignant irony of his merely looking like a demon. I hope that as they bring him back, they at the very least re-retcon Nightcrawler’s origin to wipe out the familial tie to Azazel, if not also work in Chris Claremont’s original plan for Kurt’s parentage: namely, that Mystique would be Nightcrawler’s *father* and Destiny his mother.

  8. Strange how everyone commenting here is really accepting of Marvel releasing ANOTHER X-Men book (which makes it 5 books in total – All New, Uncanny, X-Men, Wolverine & The X-Men and now this (to replace Astonishing). And yet, when DC releases anything Bat-related (which ISN’T even specifically about Batman – like Talon), they go apeshit and accuse DC of flooding the market!!!

    Talk about double standards.

  9. Strange how everyone commenting here is really accepting of Marvel releasing ANOTHER X-Men book

    For what it’s worth, part of this may be because Marvel’s spin-offs at least start with A-listers for the first 12 issues or so while DC throws them at dudes that don’t have a lot of heat among fans.

    I’m personally surprised they haven’t convinced some big names to go all Tom Clancy and pay them to put their name on the product no matter who really made it.

  10. Firestar and Iceman were both X-Men in Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, right? Can’t believe it took 30 years for that to happen in the comic books.

    Or that it was 30 years ago that I was watching that on Saturday mornings. Man, I’m old.

  11. “Or that it was 30 years ago that I was watching that on Saturday mornings. Man, I’m old.”

    Join the club! LoL

    I always wished that Marvel had made an ongoing title based on the Spiderman & his Amazing Friends cartoon show. All they did was the one issue adapting the first episode, vs the Green Goblin… :-(

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