Saturday at Comic-Con International in San Diego, Marvel Comics Editor-in-Chief C.B. Cebulski was joined by X-Men Editor Jordan D. White, Executive Editor Nick Lowe and writer Jonathan Hickman (House of X, Powers of X) to discuss what's next for the Marvel Universe, especially for the X-Men.
"Marvel's had a really good couple of years building upon characters' past and building upon them," Cebulski said. "The next character we're gonna take a hard look at is Ghost Rider."
"It's gonna feature Danny Ketch and Johnny Blaze," White added as designs and art from Aaron Kuder was displayed.
On Absolute Carnage, Lowe said, "This is one of our biggest Spider-Man stories ever. This is huge. Issue #1 is 60 pages, it's so gigantic that we had to go big on this issue. There's so much red stuff. Is it blood? Is it symbiote good? Nobody knows."
Writer Donny Cates then joined the panel via FaceTime.
"You guys are so not ready for what's about to happen to you in Absolute Carnage," he said. "Cletus Kasady is back, he's got essentially the power of a god and he's gonna be hunting down anyone who's ever been a symbiote. This is an event that's gonna be affecting the entire Marvel Universe. It's pretty brutal."
Lowe then brought up J.J Abrams, Henry Abrams, Sara Pichelli and Dave Stewart's Spider-Man.
"Over 15 years ago, I started emailing J.J. Abrams," he said. "I had been emailing him every few months for the past 15 years. And so 10 years later, we met in a coffee shop in Times Square. So [J.J. and Henry] pitched me the story and it blew my mind."
Lowe then showed off Olivier Coipel's cover for Issue #2.
Regarding Marvel Comics #1000, Cebulski said, "It's a monster, 80-page comic. 80 creative teams, one story. We haven't really revealed which creators are working together." (Jonathan Hickman and Dustin Weaver on Apocalypse, Kieron Gillen and Doug Braithwaite on Loki, Saladin Ahmed and Steve Rude on The Thing, Christopher Priest and Brian Stelfreeze on Black Panther and Al Ewing and Cafu on a mystery character.)
Marvel will also release Marvel Comics #1001 in September to address the mystery character.
The conversation then turned to X-Men.
"House of X and Powers of X aren't the end of your X-Men plans, are they Jonathan?" Cebulski asked.
"No, they're not," Hickman said.
"After the 12 weeks of HoX and PoX, we're gonna launch a whole new X-Men line," White added.
The panelists then revealed the new X-Men titles:
- Marauders, by Gerry Duggan and Matteo Lolli and featuring Pyro, Iceman, Storm, Bishop, Emma Frost and Kitty Pryde
- Excalibur, by Tini Howard and Marcus To and featuring Rictor, Jubilee, Gambit, Rogue, Psylocke (aka the new Captain Britain) and Apocalypse
- X-Force, by Benjamin Percy and Joshua Cassara and featuring Wolverine, Marvel Girl, Domino, Beast, Kid Omega, Sage, Colossus and Black Tom
- Fallen Angels, by Bryan Hill and Szymon Kudranski and featuring X-23, Cable and Psylocke (but a mystery character other than Betsy Braddock taking on the mantle)
- New Mutants, by Jonathan Hickman (writing the first arc), Ed Brisson (taking over after the first arc) and Rod Reis and featuring Magik, Sunspot, Cypher, Mirage, Karma, Wolfsbane, Chamber and Mondo
- X-Men, by Jonathan Hickman and Leinil Francis Yu and featuring every Marvel mutant.
During the Q&A, a fan asked how Iceman hid that he was gay from the telepaths.
"All of that can be answered in Heroes in Crisis #8," Hickman joked.
"Those answers will keep coming," Cebulski added.
Another fan asked if there's more Weapon X content planned.
"There might be more developments with that," White said.
The next fans asked how connected all the new X-books will be.
"The large connection will from the status quo set up in HoX and PoX," White responded. "Everything's pretty tight," Hickman added.