X-Men #12

History

The issue was written by Jonathan Hickman, who had been announced at C2E2 2019 as the architect of a wholesale relaunch of Marvel's X-Men line following House of X and Powers of X. Leinil Francis Yu, the regular artist on Hickman's X-Men ongoing series, provided both pencils and inks, with Sunny Gho on colors and Clayton Cowles on letters; Jordan D. White and Annalise Bissa served as editors under editor-in-chief C.B. Cebulski. The issue shipped on September 16, 2020 — the same week as Excalibur #12, which reviewers and collectors noted should be read alongside or slightly before this issue — and its release was shaped in part by pandemic-related delays that reshuffled the broader X of Swords crossover schedule throughout 2020.

Trivia · 8 facts

• Written by Jonathan Hickman with art by Leinil Francis Yu (pencils and inks), colors by Sunny Gho, and letters by Clayton Cowles; edited by Jordan D. White and Annalise Bissa.
• Published September 16, 2020 (cover-dated November 2020) as X-Men Vol. 5 #12, part of Marvel's Dawn of X initiative.
• First full appearance of Genesis (also known as Annihilation), the omega-level mutant wife of Apocalypse and mother of the original Four Horsemen — Famine, War, Pestilence, and Death — who ruled the ancient mutant island of Okkara alongside her husband.
• First appearance of the High Council of Arakko, and first appearances of Isca the Unbeaten and White Sword of the Ivory Tower (also called Purity), all characters who went on to play significant roles in 'X of Swords' and the subsequent Reign of X era.
• The origin of the Summoner is revealed and told in full: he is established as the grandson of Apocalypse and Genesis, and a high-ranking summoner mutant born centuries ago in Amenth.
• The issue establishes the foundational cosmology of Krakoan-era mutant history: the ancient island of Okkara was cleaved in two by the Twilight Sword, creating Krakoa and Arakko, with Arakko sealed into the dimension of Amenth to hold back the Daemon armies of the entity Annihilation.
• Marketed internally as 'X of Swords — Prelude 2: Amenth,' the issue served as the second direct narrative lead-in to 'X of Swords,' the first crossover event of the Krakoan Age, which ran from September through November 2020 across more than a dozen X-titles.
• Collected in the X of Swords hardcover and paperback omnibus editions, which gather X-Men (2019) #12–15 alongside X of Swords: Creation, X of Swords: Stasis, X of Swords: Destruction, and tie-in chapters from Excalibur, Marauders, X-Force, New Mutants, Wolverine, Cable, Hellions, and X-Factor.

Full credits

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