... X OF SWORDS ...

Marvel's Next Great X-Men Crossover Is X OF SWORDS

Marvel's X-Men are going to find ten legendary swords that change everything in this July's line-spanning X of Swords saga.

Marvel announced a major X-Men crossover starting in July titled X of Swords. The storyline will be the first crossover event in the Dawn of X era that began in July 2019 and celebrate the relaunch's one-year anniversary. The event will take place over fifteen issues and be written by every author currently involved in the X-Men franchise.

The announcement came at the C2E2 comics convention's X-Men panel on Friday. Marvel teased a major reveal on Twitter with an image resembling a sword with an X for a crossguard and the word "July" in the alphabet of the Krakoan language spoken by mutants. Near the end of the panel, the publisher revealed the X of Swords title, pronounced "ten of swords", and described it as a massive story in the tradition of line-wide sagas like Mutant Massacre and Age of Apocalypse.

According to Marvel, X of Swords will be about ten mutants receiving legendary swords that they will use in a battle for the future of Krakoa, the island nation the world's mutants now call home. Some of the blades will be new to continuity, while others will be familiar to Marvel readers. The company also released promo art for X of Swords from artist Mark Brooks which features a host of X-Men wielding swords, some of which are clearly recognizable (like Wolverine's deadly Muramasa katana) and others which are more unfamiliar, notably Cyclops' lightsaber-like sword that seems to channel his powers. Xavier himself wields the Cerebro sword, made by Magneto in a recent issue of X-Force from the scraps of Xavier's destroyed Cerebro helmet after the psychic leader was assassinated. That said, the promo image depicts more than ten mutants, suggesting that this is far from an exact roster of the ten blades and wielders which will be featured in the storyline proper.

The announcement describes mutantkind as meeting "its mystical destiny", suggesting that the storyline will heavily involve magic. Tini Howard, current writer of Excalibur, was mentioned in the C2E2 panel as writing much of the overall storyline, which fits in perfectly with the series' current trajectory. While the new Captain Britain doesn't wield the legendary blade of King Arthur, her brother Brian once bore it. Brian Braddock is shown in the promo art wielding the Sword of Might, a magical artifact related to the Captain Britain title that he was bestowed with after losing the mantle himself. Even the title X of Swords is an occult reference; the Ten of Swords is a tarot card representing betrayal, destruction, and martyrdom, classically depicting a man with ten swords buried in his back. As exciting as it is for readers' favorite mutants to get new weapons, the new event is an omen of world-shattering things to come.

Readers will discover the legendary blades of Krakoa when X of Swords begins in July 2020.