On Monday, an unconfirmed rumor circulated via a now-closed thread on the CBR Community stating, among other claims, that Marvel plans to cancel all X-Men titles. When reached by CBR News regarding the post, the publisher declined to comment.

"All-New X-Men" and "Uncanny X-Men" writer Brian Michael Bendis addressed the situation Tuesday on his Tumblr. Rather than commenting on the bulk of the post's content, Bendis offered a historical perspective on the "persecuted" outlook of a "very small part" of X-Men readers, as a way of contextualizing the rumor and subsequent reaction.

"Somebody somewhere for whatever reason, be it a lack of attention at home, frustration with their own life, whatever it is that motivates such things, completely pulls something right out of their ass and posted it on the Internet," Bendis wrote. "And sometimes, no matter how outlandish the claim, no matter how many people point to the lack of logic, no matter how much evidence there is to the contrary... some people choose to believe it.

"I was told when I started writing the X-Men that there is a very small part of the readership that feels very persecuted," he continued. "That no matter what Marvel does these readers think that Marvel hates the X-Men with a fiery passion and are looking to destroy it. And this goes back way before movies or cartoons, this goes waaaay [sic] back, so even though the best artists on the planet and franchise writers have been put in charge of this very important part of the Marvel universe some people still think that Marvel is out to blow its own foot off.

"Whythathappens I cannot tell you. It just does."

Bendis did go on to state that "something exciting is coming next summer."

"Definitely. For sure. For the Marvel Universe and the X-Men which happen to be one and the same thing and have been for 50 years," he said.

The X-Men cancellation rumor comes in the wake of a report that a hiatus for the "Fantastic Four" property was planned, though no further developments have arisen on that front. Simply from a financial perspective, canceling the traditionally popular X-Men books would seemingly be a poor proposition for Marvel. "All-New X-Men" is a consistent seller for Marvel, appearing in the top 20 in April and May, while "Uncanny X-Men," "Amazing X-Men" and "X-Men" all appeared in the top 60 in the same two-month span. The X-Men, in conjunction with the Avengers, are also slated to play a large role in the upcoming "AXIS" event, starting in October.