The arrival of the X-Men to the MCU has been a hot topic for many fans since Disney bought Fox Studios, acquiring the rights to the mutant characters after years of division between the two superhero franchises. And, while Marvel has confirmed that the X-Men are indeed on the live-action docket, plans and details have been kept strictly under wraps.
The currently running Marvel Comics event, the Hellfire Gala, which is running as a back-up story in 12 issues of various X-Men comics for the months of June and July, alludes to a MCU and mutant eventual crossover. One of the notable features of the Hellfire Gala story, outside of the fact that it is set to relaunch the X-Men comics and introduce a new X-Men team to publication, is the fact that it features real life celebrities drawn into the crowd scenes. Mostly, these celebrities don’t have any featured dialogue or scenes–people like George R.R. Martin, Conan O’Brien, and rapper Method Man can be seen dancing or chatting it up in the background, just as fun Easter Eggs for readers. Among these cameos, however, came a more notable one–MCU boss Kevin Feige was drawn into the Hellfire Gala portion of X-Men #21, released this week, and he actually gets some dialogue balloons of his own.
In a trip to the Gala’s ritzy bar, Feige happens to stop X-Men leader Cyclops for this exchange.
“It’s complicated,” is certainly putting it delicately.
While it’s unlikely that this is actually referencing or setting up anything legitimate for the MCU’s future with the X-Men, it does serve as a nice reminder that no, Marvel hasn’t forgotten which franchises they own now, and yes, plans are still in the works. Unfortunately, those plans probably don’t involve swanky, high fashion parties and literally having conversations with fictional characters, but it’s definitely fun to pretend.
Most recently, fans were worked into a frenzy at the cameo appearance of Evan Peters, reprising his role as Pietro (the Fox version) in MCU TV show WandaVision. However, by the season finale, it was revealed that Peters was not, in fact, bridging the gap between the MCU and Fox X-Men movies, but was instead a very drawn out dick joke–he was just a character named Ralph Bohner (yes, really) who had been magically brainwashed into believing he was Pietro.
X-Men #21 is on sale now.
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