Rob Liefeld is no stranger to Marvel's X-Men Universe, having made a huge impact on The New Mutants and X-Force in the early 90's, creating a stable of new characters that have since gone on to become pop culture icons and box office phenoms with the likes of Deadpool, Cable, Domino and X-Force (and that's not even counting his DC and Image comics contributions). Now, Liefeld is dipping his toe back in the X-waters with the creation of a new character and a whole new universe that collides with the current line of X-Men books and characters with MAJOR X, a six-part mini-series that will ship twice a month starting in April (as revealed earlier via EW) Who is Major X and what does he bring to the world of the X-Men? Read on to check out our exclusive interview with Liefeld and check out some designs from the upcoming mini-series to get an idea of what's in store from this new endeavor.
The idea for the book began with a phone call, as many things do, with Marvel EIC C.B. Cebulski, following up with Liefeld on the success of last year's Deadpool: Bad Blood OGN. "About a year ago C.B. Cebulski took over as Editor-in-Chief at Marvel. I've known C.B. 20 plus years, always had a good relationship with him in every capacity he's occupied at Marvel and he called me up and said he wanted to do something with me and the X-Men and to follow up on the graphic novel I did before that was Deadpool focused. We talked over a couple of things and I said, 'I actually would like to float this by you and it's a concept that was on my outline for had I stayed at Marvel and stayed with X-Force- this character Major X- and everything that goes with Major X and the continuity' and he said, 'Yeah, good, let's make this happen!' And I was like, 'That was easy!'"
Liefeld explains that Major X will be a component to current continuity of the X-books, so this isn't a one-off or what if? kind of story, but an in-continuity addition to the X-Men mythos with some very new ideas that will introduce the X-Men into a whole new world they've never encountered. "I've done guys that come from the future and knew all the secrets and had the secret family lineage with Cable and then I did the guy who came from the experimentation and followed the Wolverine pattern with Deadpool. So, I didn't want to do anything along those lines, So, going back almost 27 years-it's pretty ambitious- and introduce a different realm that is occupied by mutants called The X-istence. And, the people there refer to it as such, The X-istance. And, it's a shang-ri-la; it's everything the mutants hope for. They all live in harmony, peaceful, away from all of the suffering that has been so perilous to the mutants that we know month-to-month in the Marvel books. So, he has lost his home, his home was destroyed. The X-istance has collapsed, he escaped and hits Marvel continuity, but in the first issue he has landed at the wrong time; he crash lands into 1991-somewhere between New Mutants #98 and X-Force #1 is how I describe it. He's an unknown entity to these characters and they don't know if he's friend or foe and ultimately he's seeking out allies to restore his home. Many lives were lost and the home that he had known has been shattered and he knows that it was somebody on the inside and we will deal with an answer-what the X-istance is, how it came to be, what powers and fuels it."
"The X-Men is my favorite comic-book series of my lifetime," Liefeld continues, "I spoke and continue to speak fluent X-Men. I'm really good at it and I've got a nice legacy built out in that office. It's another swing for the fences. I think the time's right, though. It feels like time for a new wrinkle. It's exciting." Liefeld definitely sounds like he's got some surprises in store, adding, "Honestly, man, I just can't wait for the first issue to come out and for people to get to the last page. That will get us fired up. That should fire everybody up."
Liefeld will be writing the entire series and drawing the bookend issues i.e. the Alpha and the Omega (#1 and #6) with veteran X-artist Whilce Portacio and newcomer Brent Peebles supplying art for the middle books.
As someone who grew up in the heyday of the early 90's comic explosion that Liefeld helped revolutionize (along with the likes of Jim Lee, Marc Silvestri, Whilce Portacio, et. all), it's an exciting prospect to revisit the art and storytelling of that era again. You can check out MAJOR X at your local comic shop starting this April!