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When Marvel Comics relaunched its entire X-Men line in 2024, one of the guiding principles was a desire to bring the mutant franchise closer to the wider Marvel Universe — and this week’s X-Manhunt: Omega #1 underscored just how well that goal has been achieved. 

Spoilers for X-Manhunt: Omega #1 follow. Keep reading at your own risk.

X-Manhunt: Omega concludes the month-long storyline that has run through Marvel’s X-Men comic book line, in which Charles Xavier — the erstwhile Professor X who founded the X-Men, but has spent recent months in captivity following his actions at the end of the Krakoa era of the X-Men comic book line — escaped and traveled through the various X-comic books looking to resurrect his deceased alien wife Lilandra, and then find a space ship able to take the two to the heart of the alien Shi’Ar Empire she is from, to rescue their child.

And, at the end of the issue, it’s revealed that the entire storyline has been prologue to something else that Marvel has been promoting in recent weeks. The issue ends with this announcement:

Imperial is a four-issue series by Jonathan Hickman, Federico Vicentini, and Iban Coello that Marvel is promoting will “revolutionize Marvel’s galactic canon.”

Marvel’s description of the series runs, “Imperial finds the galaxies of the Marvel Universe on the brink of major upheaval, following the elimination of several of its most prominent leaders. Nature abhors a vacuum, and empires fall, rulers are overthrown and power is seized in a saga of intrigue, mysteries and war, all taking place against the backdrop of the formation of new galactic order in the Marvel Universe. With groundbreaking developments for HULKS, BLACK PANTHERS, NOVAS, GUARDIANS and COSMIC KINGS and QUEENS, Imperial lays the foundation for an entire new landscape of interconnected space-set stories, making it the must-read comic book of the summer!”

By bringing in Xavier, Imperial will reunite Hickman with one of the core cast of his acclaimed X-Men relaunch of 2019, House of X/Powers of X, which created and introduced the Krakoa era. Think of it as an unexpected next chapter of Hickman’s X-Men run: Outer Space of X, if you will.

X-Manhunt: Omega #1 is available now. Imperial #1 (of 4) will be released June 4.

Keep up to date on Popverse's Marvel coverage, with these highlights:

• The MCU needs Anya Taylor-Joy's Magik in it (and not just for the X-Men connection)
• How Disney+'s What If...? is the moonshot for the next 50 years of Marvel Studios & the MCU
• Marvel Studios has accidentally created a new Phase that predates Phases 1 - 6: the MCU Phase Zero
• Overgrown children of the atom: Marvel's X-Men can't evolve past their '90s commercial peak
• The biggest outstanding questions of the Marvel Studios' movies & TV shows
• Donald Trump is the landlord for Marvel's House of Ideas
• Marvel Studios swapping out Doctor Doom for Kang offers the chance to jettison the Multiverse Saga
• What Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige is saying (and not saying) about the MCU X-Men franchise says a lot about the future of the Mutant Saga
• If Marvel is going to bring Loki back for Secret Wars, it's time to give him an upgrade
• In 2021, Sony's boss said people won't miss Spider-Man in its Spider-adjacent movie. Turns out, they do.