This summer the Avengers, X-Men, and Eternals will square off in Marvel’s latest epic crossover event, A.X.E.: Judgment Day. The series by writer Kieron Gillen and artists Valerio Schiti and Marte Gracia will see the Eternals declare war on the X-Men, having determined that mutants are are actually Deviants, with the Avengers caught in the middle. This week Marvel has been announcing tie-ins to the event series, and today The Beat is pleased to reveal that X-Men Red #5 by Al Ewing, Stefano Caselli, Federico Blee, and Ariana Maher will explore the impact of the Judgment Day event on the residents of Mars Arakko.
Here’s how Marvel describes X-Men Red #5, which sports a cover (seen above) by Russell Dauterman:
EXCESS DEVIATION!
No one who is not an Omega-level mutant has ever taken one of the nine seats of the Great Ring. Together, they are the greatest power Arakko has ever known – and it’s nine against one. So, if the nine are losing…what does that say about the one? Judgment Day has come to the Red Planet – and it’s Arakko’s greatest test since X OF SWORDS!
Arguably the biggest move Krakoa’s mutants have ever made was during last year’s Hellfire Gala when they annexed Mars, transporting the residents of their sister island, Arrako, to the planet and claiming the world for mutantdom. The X-Men Red series, which launched yesterday, is exploring what that means for the planet and for mutantdom as a whole. Given the cosmic scale of the Eternals it’s not a huge surprise that the battle between them and the mutants would expand off of Earth, but are the Eternals prepared for the battle-hardened Arrakoans?
Al Ewing told The Beat how the crossover event plays into the story he’s already been telling in the pages of X-Men Red:
“Judgment Day presented a golden opportunity to shake things up on Arakko in a very, very big way, and as it turns out, the story playing out in X-MEN RED will have a similarly seismic effect on mutantkind as a whole. If you’ve been following the story of the Broken Land, this is where it kicks into high gear – and you can expect plenty of nice, meaty consequences for the Red Planet and beyond.”
Ewing’s one of the best in the game at event tie-ins that both build on the larger event and serve the story already being told in a series, so X-Men Red #5 should definitely be one to look out for. A.X.E.: Judgment Day #1 (of 6) arrives in early July, and X-Men Red #5 follows in shops and digitally on Wednesday, July 20th.
