The X-Men and Swordbearers of Arakko Clash in 'X of Swords' Key Art

X of Swords: Creation Trailer

X of Swords: Creation kicks off "the biggest X-Men story since House of X/Powers of X"

Newsarama: The X-Men line's first crossover of the 'Dawn of X' era is about to kick off in X of Swords: Creation #1 by writer Jonathan Hickman and artist Pepe Larraz, which provides some backstory and lead-up for the Tarot-themed, sword-wielding X-Men event.

Before Creation hits on September 23, Newsarama spoke with X-Men group editor Jordan D. White to discover what's ahead for mutantkind as they grapple with the ominous events of 'X of Swords,' how Tarot informs even the story of the event itself, and a few cryptic secrets about what to expect.

Along the way, we've also got a brand new page from X of Swords: Stasis #1 by Pepe Larraz debuting right here.

Newsarama: Jordan, 'X of Swords' is finally about to kick off, and in the time since it was first announced, the crossover has grown in scope significantly. What led to the expansion?

Jordan D. White: There were a lot of factors. The first and foremost reason is that when we were digging into the story, there was a lot more we wanted to do than we thought we could fit in one month of comics. We were pretty committed to a schedule though, at that point, so we would have made it work... except the publishing schedule being blown up gave us more time to develop things that we wouldn't have had otherwise.

Plus, I think we were looking at the world around us and things were really looking down - I don't need to tell you about all the strife and problems the world was facing, you were there, you know it as well as we do - but we saw all this and said 'Let's do something bigger and make a bigger splash! The world is bad right now. Let's give people somewhere else to be for a while.'

And believe me - we used all the extra time. We've had regular video conferences, gone through drafts and drafts of plots and scripts, worked to make sure everything fits together as seamlessly as humanly possible in one giant 22-part story, not nine connected stories. It was way more work than we were anticipating... but we're so happy with the results so far.

Nrama: With Pepe Larraz stepping back in for X of Swords: Creation #1, I can't help but feel some significance in bringing back one of the artists who helped launch 'Dawn of X' to also kick off its first crossover. What's it like bringing Pepe back together with Jonathan for this one-shot?

White: It was great! Pepe is amazing! If it were up to us, he would never draw anything but X-Books for the rest of recorded history. Seriously - we knew it would be a big deal bringing him back onto this book, and that is on purpose. He, along with RB Silva, defined this new era visually.

He and Jonathan teaming back up is something special, and this is the biggest story Jonathan has done since House of X and Powers of X ended. We all know how amazing Pepe is - if you see him down as the artist of an X-Book, you know it's going to be an important one.

Nrama: The solicitation for X of Swords: Creation #1 reads, ominously, "A tower. A mission. A gathering of armies." What can you tell us about what all that means?

White: The name of 'X of Swords' comes from the Tarot. Tini Howard is our resident Tarot expert, and she came up with the name for the story. As soon as I heard it, I knew it was what we were going with. It is perfect.

When it came time to write the solicits for the series, we decided to lean into the Tarot theme. Tini wrote the solicits as little prophetic fortunes based on what happens in each issue. So, what does it mean? It's up to you to interpret the prophecy... but you'll only know how right you were after the fact.

Nrama: The Tower from the traditional Tarot deck can symbolize a great ruin that can lead to a rebirth. Given the glimpses we've seen of 'X of Swords' so far, and what you just told us, how much should we read into that potential symbolism?

White: Like I said, Tini knows her stuff.

Nrama: Storm has been going through some stuff leading up to 'X of Swords,' and you recently said there would be big things ahead for her. What can you tell us about that? How does all this connect to the techno-organic virus Storm has been suffering in her Giant-Size X-Men one-shot?

White: There is a lot going on with Storm! First off, I don't want to spoil anything from the Giant-Size X-Men: Storm #1 issue! So that'll be the first place you should check out.

She does also have some great moments in 'X of Swords,' especially in Vita Ayala's Marauders #13. But, I think you might be referring to a really amazing Storm development that I cryptically mentioned recently.

That is in the very early stages, but... it's amazing. Unfortunately, it's something that won't be happening until next year. But I think you will know it when you see it - it's pretty huge.

Nrama: Obviously you can't reveal the identity of the 'classified' Swordbearer of Arakko (unless you really want to surprise us!). But what goes into deciding how to put a character fans may already know in a new role like that?

White: There's really no way to answer this without spoiling things! You'll just have to wait until Skids reveals herself as – Damn it, you got me!

Nrama: Huh. We'll take that as a joke... for now.

Mutants have switched sides many times – especially when Apocalypse is involved. Will that come into play here?

White: Apocalypse does seem to always have his secret goals, doesn't he? That said, I don't know if any Krakoans would be willing to change sides, given the stakes that are established in 'X of Swords.' Generally speaking, no one is confused as to what needs to be done, they only disagree on how to do it.

Nrama: There's a criticism that death has become meaningless in superhero comic books, and the X-Men are known for breaking that barrier. But 'Dawn of X' has turned that on its head with the mutant Resurrection Protocols. How do you ensure that death has story weight in a world where you can come back to life? What goes into deciding who dies when?

White: You hit the nail on the head - a lot of the weight of comic character death has dissipated. At this point I think the list of characters who have not died and been brought back can probably be counted on one hand... and I don't even mean that as an exaggeration, as Jonathan literally killed everyone in the universe but one ship's worth of characters in Secret Wars, and the bulk of those have died and returned at other times.

The Resurrection Protocols are an attempt to battle that very thing, by shaking up and changing the game. If a character dies as a part of the normal sequence of events, readers expect they will come back, and now yeah, they will, that's how Krakoan Resurrection works. But we're very early in the life of this idea. There are lots of story possibilities that come from this that bring all new stakes in ways no one is expecting.

And at least one of those will factor into 'X of Swords' in a big way.

Nrama: How did everyone decide which swords to use, and who would wield each blade?

White: Meetings and spitballing!

Honestly, we really have something special going on in the X-Office right now in that all the writers are in much more of a collaborative relationship than I have ever seen across a line before.

We've had our X-Slack in place for a long time, and that has opened everyone up to one another in a big way... but honestly, I think the one good thing to come out of this terrible situation we're all in is that with everyone on Earth doing more video calls, we started up these X-Office group calls and it's been awesome.

We used to get together once, maybe twice a year for an X-Summit. But now we have these calls every two weeks and everyone can share ideas, ask questions or advice, spitball... it really has been so great to see how wonderful everyone has been about it.

To answer your actual question... I think we actually locked in the choices of what characters had what swords back at C2E2. Some were in place long before that, of course, but I think we had more awesome ideas for who it could be than we had open slots.

So everyone was throwing out ideas and then knocking them around, talking about the benefits of this character instead of that one, what awesome things this one could do if they were in the story, what great story beats we would get out of that one, what thing spinning out of the story we'd get if we used the other, all of that.

I have said that the story of 'X of Swords' grew out of the combination of the stories Jonathan and Tini were planting since House of X, and it's true... but even beyond that, I think it would not be the shape it ended up without every one of our writers, because everyone really did hone it together.

It's been a little grueling, but I know all of us are proud.

Nrama: Now that we're right on the verge of X of Swords, what can you tell us that you haven't told anyone else?

White: Not everyone brings the right sword to the fight.

Tini Howard Teases Battle Ahead in Preview of 'X of Swords'

SyFy Wire: Next month, the mutant world will erupt into an epic new story as Marvel Comics launches X of Swords, a crossover event enveloping every single X-Men title across 22 chapters releasing in September, October, and November. It's a massive story in the grand tradition of past X-Men crossovers, but with a fantasy angle that aims to set it apart from anything we've seen in the X-books before. And, of course, it carries with it the promise that by the time the swords are sheathed, nothing will be the same.

We've been hearing about X of Swords (pronounced "Ten of Swords," as in a tarot card) since the event was first announced in February, but despite various teasers, the event remains shrouded in mystery. Some of that mystery will persist right up until we read the last issue of the event in November, but it all kicks off this September with the X of Swords: Creation #1 one-shot from writers Jonathan Hickman and Tini Howard and artist Pepe Larraz. Now, SYFY WIRE is pleased to reveal an exclusive preview of this opening chapter, along with commentary from Howard, whose run on Excalibur has laid the groundwork for this event for months.

X of Swords will unfold in the classic crossover style, with chapters appearing in every X-book over the course of the next few months, but the story really took root in Howard's 11 issues (and counting) of Excalibur. In that title, Howard and artist Marcus To have taken readers through the more magical elements of mutant adventures, from making Betsy Braddock into Captain Britain to a struggle with Morgan le Fay for the rule of Avalon to clashes with Majestrix Opal Luna Saturnyne in Otherworld. It's all served as a potent and gripping reminder that there is magic in the mutant world that goes beyond power sets you might see described on the back of a classic trading card, and according to Howard, that's how much of what we'll see in X of Swords began.

"It might sound silly, but a very simple desire from my earliest Excalibur concepts was that I wanted a book about fantasy and magic. And I was thrilled when we decided to do this Excalibur-heavy, sword-flavored linewide event — it felt like a canonization of the work I'd been doing on Excalibur," Howard said. "I'm very careful about my storytelling; this is a book about Krakoan magic more than it's about the fun of 'what if the X-Men played D&D,' but the 'X-Men playing D&D' part of it is really fun, and I'm consistently thrilled to see X-Men characters with swords and goblets, alongside dragons and things. It's really unexpected, but so fun. These are fantastic heroes and they do fantastic things. Yes, it is super rad to see the X-Men with swords. Thank you all for understanding that."

  

Because the story of X of Swords is so connected to Howard's work on Excalibur, she has risen to co-shepherding the event alongside Hickman, who launched the new era of X-Men last year and has been proclaimed "Head of X" by Marvel. Though she and Hickman have taken point on shaping the event, though, Howard is quick to point out just how much of X of Swords' storytelling was shaped by the other X-creators through regular conversations to determine the direction of the event and the X-line overall. In fact, it was through one of those conversations that the conceptual hook of the event, and its connection to tarot, came about.

"It's one of those magical things about us all just getting to sit in a room and brainstorm," Howard explained. "I happen to have a pretty thorough knowledge of tarot so I offered up my knowledge when it seemed like it fit an idea we were all shaping, and it was one of those moments where I realized I'd pitched a whole thing just kind of out loud — and then we all just set to working on it. The X-Room is that kind of room — we do backflips off of one another every time we're in the room together. Some of our best ideas come about there".

"Anyway, I do love tarot, I think it's one of those things that gets often flattened as 'fortune telling' or whatever, but I think it's a really special narrative tool. There's something to tarot and superhero comic — sequences of archetypal images that tell a story, how we interpret them and apply them to ourselves as guidance — that's been in the back of my mind the whole time I've been crunching on this event."

So, that's the groundwork for X of Swords, but what about the actual plot? Marvel has been careful to divulge few details about the story itself, but here's what we do know: Ten mutants will arm themselves with "legendary blades" to face the biggest threat to the nation of Krakoa yet, brand-new characters will emerge as enemies, and key to the story are the arcs of Apocalpse and the realm of Otherworld in general. Though Howard couldn't divulge much, she did note that the Otherworld story in Excalibur will be a cornerstone of what's to come.

"We've been building toward Saturnyne's power in the Otherworld since the very first issue of my and Marcus' Excalibur run. We'll start to see more clearly what's been going on, and the roots of the strife in Otherworld that allowed people like Morgan le Fay to come to power in the first place," she said. "It's all connected. It's connected and it's bigger in ways you haven't even considered. It's going to be like that moment in Wizard of Oz where it all turns to color: stuff is about to change."

But what of these new villains? Marvel has revealed already that they're called the "Swordbearers of Arrako," Arrako being the still-mysterious "sister" to Krakoa first introduced in Hickman's Powers of X miniseries. In the preview pages in the gallery above, we can see some of these Swordbearers preparing for battle, and some of them adorn the cover of X of Swords: Creation. Teaser art for X of Swords: Stasis -- a middle chapter of the event arriving in late October -- has even revealed some of their names. Beyond that, Howard couldn't tell us much, but she did tease that thanks to the collaborative nature of the event, each of them is going to emerge fully formed.

"I'll talk more about the wonders of the X-Room here because it's so relevant to these characters without being a spoiler — so many of us work on these books together that big casts like these feel really real, because we all fill in bits of each character here and there. Or someone 'adopts' a favorite and tells the rest of the room a concept about them, like 'hey, I don't know if anyone had a plan for Crocodile Guy, but I have this idea-' and it gets canonized," Howard explained. "So it's more than just getting an artist to turn in a bunch of sick designs, or one-line concepts, it's that we live with them in our heads. We give them names and histories and pasts, we crack jokes, and we get to know these big casts. So by the time you meet them, they've been loved by a whole roomful of creative weirdos for months. They're full of that energy and they feel real. You're going to meet a lot of new characters like that in X of Swords."

The rest of what's in store in X of Swords will have to wait until the event is upon us, as Howard and the rest of the X-team are still keen on keeping much of the story secret. What's especially clear as we near the event's debut, though, is that this is more than just a pair of lead writers and a few other creators doing tie-in books. This is, as Howard emphasized to us over and over again, a story that comes from the strength and imagination of the entire X-line.

"We've known from the beginning that this was how the event was going to be done, and had every book team willing to join in. So it absolutely affects the structure in that we designed the event we all wanted to write, and if that hadn't been the case, we would have done it differently," Howard said. "Almost nothing that happens in that room is a prescription or an order, and I know fans don't always believe that, but it's true - we write what we want to write, not because Jonathan or [X-books editor Jordan D. White] or anyone had some sort of mandate. If that sounds like magic to you maybe it is, but it's the truth. We do what we do because we love doing it, and we make great comics together."

X of Swords: Creation #1 arrives September 23.

Follow the Path to X of Swords in "Excalibur" #12

The secrets of Apocalypse’s grimoire. The High Lord Rictor. Mysteries in the Starlight Citadel. Don’t miss the Prelude to X of Swords in "Excalibur" #12, on sale in September!

Excalibur #11 Art

Excalibur #11 Spoilers

Spoilers: Shogo has been badly wounded by the attack of Saturnyne’s white priestesses. At the forest, Saturnyne’s green priestesses nurse him back to health while holding Jubilee captive. Priestesses of the white caste live within Starlight Citadel while those of the green caste act as healers, hunters and keepers of the land outside the Citadel and tend to be more moderate. After a brief intercalation with the green priestesses, Excalibur finds Jubilee; and Betsy calms her down. Excalibur decides to spend the night with the priestesses. Rictor wakes up and runs into two druids. They explain that more war is coming soon and let Rictor touch a mysterious stone. The stone connects Rictor’s thoughts to Apocalypse’s mind back at Krakoa. Apocalypse points out that the Krakoan gate is but one element, but there’s another. Back in the 12th century C.E., Apocalypse’s first coven, the Eternals or High Lords, met to place Candra’s life energy into a stone as per her wishes. He further adds that power over the earth is power over all of mutantkind. Once the sun rises, Excalibur decides to head to Starlight Citadel while Jubilee stays behind to keep an eye on Shogo. Rictor takes the team to the mountains and uses his powers to plant the Krakoan gate nearby the Citadel while Captain Britain, Rogue and Gambit fight off Saturnyne’s minions. Once the gate is ready, Rictor heads back to Krakoa to meet Apocalypse. Saturnyne wishes to have a word with Betsy alone. Gambit and Rogue explore the palace and run into Saturnyne’s closet. Gambit steals some of her items and finds a red stone, much like the one where Candra’s essence was placed into centuries earlier.

X of Swords: Creation #1 Launch Variant Cover by Russell Dauterman

X-Solicits for November 2020: X of Swords

	X-Men #14 Jonathan Hickman (W) Mahmud Asrar & Leinil Francis Yu (A) Cover by: Leinil Francis Yu X of Swords, Chapter 12 The Lovers. A Garden. A chasm of secrets.
	Marauders #14 Gerry Duggan & Benjamin Percy (W) Stefano Caselli (A) Cover by: Russell Dauterman X of Swords, Chapter 13 A toast. A dance. A dinner served: Part I
	Marauders #15 Gerry Duggan & Benjamin Percy (W) Stefano Caselli (A) Cover by: Russell Dauterman X of Swords, Chapter 14 A toast. A dance. A dinner served: Part II
	Excalibur #14 Tini Howard (W) Phil Noto (A) Cover by: Mahmud Asrar X of Swords, Chapter 15 Two swords. Two cups. Two must answer.
	Wolverine #7 Benjamin Percy & Gerry Duggan (W) Joshua Cassara (A) Cover by: Adam Kubert X of Swords, Chapter 16 Endurance. Survival. The true lesson of pain.
	X-Force #14 Benjamin Percy & Gerry Duggan (W) Joshua Cassara (A) Cover by: Dustin Weaver X of Swords, Chapter 17 Chivalry gives way to fury. A knight must kneel.
	Hellions #6 Zeb Wells (W) Carmen Carnero (A) Cover by: Stephen Segovia X of Swords, Chapter 18 Chaos. Deceit. A hero returns.
	Cable #6 Gerry Duggan (W) Phil Noto (A/C) X of Swords, Chapter 19 A son. The stars. A Fool and his bravery.
	X-Men #15 Jonathan Hickman (W) Mahmud Asrar (A) Cover by: Leinil Francis Yu X of Swords, Chapter 20 A great division. Bitter victories. Bitterer hearts.
	Excalibur #15 Tini Howard (W) Mahmud Asrar (A/C) X of Swords, Chapter 21 A game abandoned, but a great gamble remains. A Tower answers.
	X of Swords: Destruction #1 Jonathan Hickman & Tini Howard (W) Pepe Larraz (A/C) X of Swords, Chapter 22 The wheel of fortune turns. The unfortunate fall. A sword against the darkness.

Excalibur #11 Preview

Excalibur #11

Writer: Tini Howard

Art by: Marcus To

Cover by: Mahmud Asrar

The Story:

Blood of the Changeling!

The Citadel has committed an act of war and Excalibur must respond. While they lick their wounds deep in Otherworld, Apocalypse takes steps toward his ultimate goal.

In Stores: August 19, 2020

Captain Britain by Mike McKone