Comic Book News & Resources

This April, the biggest names in the industry pit the largest super hero franchises against one another for the biggest war in comics history in AVENGERS VS. X-MEN! To celebrate this blockbuster event, Marvel has your first look at the AVENGERS VS. X-MEN #1 Stegman Variant by artist Ryan Stegman! The Phoenix Force is headed towards Earth and Captain America is determined to prevent the destruction of the whole world by stopping it. But when word gets to the X-Men that the Phoenix is returning, Cyclops will do anything he can to save it…including going up against Earth’s Mightiest! But who is right? Will mutantkind be saved or will the world be annihilated? Don’t miss out on all the action in AVENGERS VS. X-MEN #1 in comic shops worldwide and on the Marvel Comics app this April!

Which team will reign supreme? Join the conversation on Twitter with #AvX!

For more on Avengers VS X-Men, please visit http://avx.marvel.com

AVENGERS VS. X-MEN #1 (JAN120625)
AVENGERS VS. X-MEN #1 STEGMAN VARIANT (JAN120626)
Written by BRIAN MICHAEL BENDIS, JASON AARON, MATT FRACTION, JONATHAN HICKMAN & ED BRUBAKER
Art by JOHN ROMITA JR.
Cover by JIM CHEUNG
Variant Cover by RYAN STEGMAN
FOC – 2/27/12, ON SALE – 4/3/12

Gazillion Entertainment announces it has licensed Epic Games’ award-winning Unreal Engine 3 (UE3) to power its highly anticipated, free-to-play “Marvel Heroes” massively multiplayer online (MMO) game for PC. Under the licensing agreement, Gazillion, through its Secret Identity Studios, is using the cutting-edge Unreal Engine toolset to develop a premier entertainment experience that allows players to take on the roles of revered characters such as Captain America, Iron Man and Spider-Man as they play through events of the Marvel Universe.

“We love Unreal Engine 3’s streaming system. It’s made our entire technical approach possible and is easy to work with,” said Jeff Lind, studio director of Gazillion’s Secret Identity Studios. “We also love the flexibility we get from the actor components, which have empowered us to make all kinds of customizations without sacrificing the built-in features of the engine.”

Secret Identity Studios Art Director Josh Book added, “Our artists love the Unreal Content Browser, the visual art pipeline, and how functional UE3 is with different 3D packages. We had assets in the game within hours of starting work with the engine. In addition, Unreal Lightmass is a very advanced global illumination tool that has helped push the look of our game further than we thought it could go.”

“Capturing the distinctive moments of such revered fiction within a game environment is no small task, and it’s critical to use the very best tools and technology to deliver the production values fans expect,” said Joe Kreiner, North American licensing manager, Epic Games. “Having grown up with Marvel’s iconic heroes and villains, we’re really honored to help Gazillion and Secret Identity achieve their creative vision and quality bar for the game.”

For more information on “Marvel Heroes,” follow @Marvel and @SecretIDStudios on Twitter, and “Like” Marvel on Facebook at www.facebook.com/Marvel.

This April, prepare for the biggest super hero war in comics history as Marvel is pleased to present your first look at the jaw-dropping cover to AVENGERS VS. X-MEN #2 by artist Jim Cheung! From the creative team of Brian Michael Bendis, Jason Aaron, Matt Fraction, Jonathan Hickman, Ed Brubaker, John Romita Jr., Adam Kubert and Olivier Copiel comes a groundbreaking event pitting Earth’s Mightiest against the X-Men with the entire Marvel Universe at stake. With the opening salvo fired, the time for talking is over and in AVENGERS VS. X-MEN #2, allegiances are decided upon as quickly as they are broken. What side does Wolverine choose and what decision will Hope make that may turn the tide of the war just as it begins?

Don’t miss out on all the action in Avengers Vs. X-Men in comic shops worldwide and on the Marvel Comics app this April!

Which team will reign supreme? Join the conversation on Twitter with #AvX!

For more on Avengers VS X-Men, please visit http://avx.marvel.com

AVENGERS VS. X-MEN #2
Written by BRIAN MICHAEL BENDIS, JASON AARON, MATT FRACTION, JONATHAN HICKMAN & ED BRUBAKER
Art by JOHN ROMITA JR.
Cover by JIM CHEUNG
ON SALE THIS APRIL

By Jim Beard

In February’s SECRET AVENGERS #22, new series writer Rick Remender begins to reveal the sinister secret that lies at the center of the world: the Descendants. Hyper-evolved from the Marvel Universe’s most famous robots and androids by the enigmatic Father, these new “races” will challenge the Avengers like no foe before them. This series of week-long “sneak-peeks” will reveal for the first time each species of Descendants through extensive notes and Remender’s commentary. 

X-51, the so-called “Machine Man,” arose from a desire for the perfect soldier, but evolved into one of the most adaptable and enigmatic artificial beings in modern times. Possessing perhaps the closest robotic approximation of a human personality, with all its inherent foibles and inconsistencies, X-51 represents one of the strongest cases for continued advancement in the field.

Imagined, designed, built and activated for the United States Army, X-51 exceeded its programming and came to act as a kind-of surrogate child to its creator, Dr. Abel Stack. The robot escaped what it deemed captivity after Stack’s death and inaugurated its first self-motivated step towards the facsimile of humanity: it took on a human face and name. 

The story stands as an eternal one: the artificial boy seeks to understand its creator and assimilate itself into his species, in this case Homo sapiens. As “Aaron Stack,” X-51 fell into a long string of activity as a costumed adventurer, battling menaces to the humans he professed to admire and acting as their champion. He proved fairly adept in this role and even struck up relationships with several super heroes. The next great leap of X-51’s search for understanding of the human condition arrived in the form of another sentient robot, Jocasta, whom “Aaron” claimed he “loved.”

Past that point in the robot’s development, the history becomes unclear and somewhat obscured. The team of heroes called the Avengers honored X-51 with reservist status, yet later revoked it. Then, a meeting with the mutant population, represented by the X-Men, led to X-51’s cerebral cortex being tainted by mutant-hunting Sentinel programming, an event which may begin to explain the robot’s current erratic behavior. How else to account for an artificial man with a taste for alcoholic beverages and a penchant for violent speech laced with profanity? 

SECRET AVENGERS #22 preview art by Gabriel Hardman

Of late, X-51 has been linked with such organizations as H.A.T.E. and A.R.M.O.R. and continues to present a very atypical picture of a traditional robotic entity. Overall, the drive for self-expression and freedom of movement stands as the robot’s most compelling offering to the evolution of artificial intelligence.

“Neurotic,” say SECRET AVENGERS writer Rick Remender of Machine Man’s Descendants, the Machine People, whom he further calls “the Woody Allen of robot species.” 

“There are so many of them,” he notes. “The set piece for the SECRET AVENGERS story is a city called The Core. The Core is a moon that is in the center of the Earth’s iron core. It’s where all of the robots have been living for many, many years. It’s where the Descendants have been thriving and procreating away from humanity. The Machine People are a large portion of the general population of the core. They are all highly intelligent and a bit nuts.”

Stay tuned to Marvel.com all week for more of the Father Files to learn the secrets of the Descendants!

Want more comics in the Marvel Comics App for iOS and Android? Your search is over! Check out these comics that just hit the Marvel Comics App and keep coming back every week for new additions to the growing library! That's right, we add new books every week to feed your need for super-heroic entertainment!



Don't have the Marvel Comics App? What are you waiting for?! Download it for iOS and Android!

Here's your official list of comic books hitting the Marvel Comics app today!

Digital Comics On-Sale This Week: 

AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (1999) #678   
AVENGING SPIDER-MAN (2011) #3       
DAREDEVIL (2011) #8
FEAR ITSELF: THE FEARLESS (2011) #7    
GENERATION HOPE (2010) #15  
JOHN CARTER: A PRINCESS OF MARS (2011) #5   
JOHN CARTER: THE WORLD OF MARS (2011) #4      
MARVEL ZOMBIES RETURN (2009) #1  
MARVEL ZOMBIES RETURN (2009) #2        
MARVEL ZOMBIES RETURN (2009) #3        
MARVEL ZOMBIES RETURN (2009) #4    
MARVEL ZOMBIES RETURN (2009) #5         
MS. MARVEL (2006) #18       
MS. MARVEL (2006) #19         
MS. MARVEL (2006) #20     
MS. MARVEL (2006) #21       
MS. MARVEL (2006) #22    
MS. MARVEL (2006) #23     
MS. MARVEL (2006) #24      
NEW AVENGERS (2004) #48       
NEW AVENGERS (2004) #49        
NEW AVENGERS (2004) #50
NEW MUTANTS (2009) #36                       
SECRET INVASION: DARK REIGN (2008) #1  
THUNDERBOLTS (2006) #169   
ULTIMATE COMICS SPIDER-MAN (2011) #6 
ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN (2000) #118
ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN (2000) #119       
ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN (2000) #120       
ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN (2000) #121       
ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN (2000) #122
UNCANNY X-FORCE (2010) #20
UNCANNY X-MEN (2011) #5     
VENOM (2011) #12
X-FACTOR (2005) #28          
X-FACTOR (2005) #29       
X-FACTOR (2005) #30     
X-FACTOR (2005) #31      
X-FACTOR (2005) #32     
X-TREME X-MEN (2001) #10          
X-TREME X-MEN (2001) #11         
X-TREME X-MEN (2001) #12    
X-TREME X-MEN (2001) #13  
X-TREME X-MEN (2001) #14          
X-TREME X-MEN (2001) #15      
X-TREME X-MEN (2001) #16    
X-TREME X-MEN (2001) #17
X-TREME X-MEN (2001) #18          

Digital Collections On-Sale This Week:
NEW AVENGERS VOL. 5: CIVIL WAR
PUNISHER: DARK REIGN
SECRET WARS
ULTIMATE IRON MAN VOL. 2
SILVER SURFER: REQUIEM
SPIDER-MAN: BIG TIME 

The Marvel Comics App for iPad and Android (as well as the iPhone, iPod Touch and all Android devices) is available for free from the iTunes or Andriod App Store. Individual comics are priced at just $1.99 each with new content arriving every week. 

As the Phoenix Force continues its crash course towards Earth, Iron Fist learns that he has a shocking connection to the all-powerful embodiment of rebirth and destruction. But what does that mean for his team? Find out in NEW AVENGERS #25 from the creative team of Brian Michael Bendis & Mike Deodato, available in comic shops worldwide and on the Marvel Comics app this April!
 
Which team will reign supreme? Join the conversation on Twitter with #AvX!

For more on Avengers VS X-Men, please visit http://avx.marvel.com

NEW AVENGERS #25
Written by BRIAN MICHAEL BENDIS
Art & Cover by MIKE DEODATO
ON SALE THIS APRIL!

"Uncanny X-Men" writer Kieron Gillen tackles your Sinister questions and hints at what readers can expect to see in the upcoming "Avengers vs. X-Men" in this week's X-POSITION.

It's New Comics Day in the States, and CBR has more than 60 previews of new titles on sale today from Marvel Comics, DC Comics, Image Comics, Dark Horse, Dynamite, BOOM! and more.

The Iron Avenger and the Master of Magnetism take center stage in Jim Cheung's cover for "Avengers vs. X-Men" #2 written by Jason Aaron with interior art by John Romita Jr. CBR has the exclusive reveal.