One of the most exciting things about the X-Men’s Krakoa era was the annual Hellfire Gala. The looks, the voting for new team members, the big events! Sure, the last one ended with a lot of dead Krakoans and the island under attack, but before that, the Gala was pretty rad. Now that the mutants are in their From the Ashes period, Marvel’s giving the event the send-off it never got to have.
Come July, the X-Men are reuniting for the Hellfire Vigil special from nearly all the creative teams handling the current X-books. (So writers Gail Simone, Jed Mackay, Murewa Ayodele, and artists Javier Garrón, Sara Pichelli, Netho Diaz, and plenty more.) To commemorate the one-year, in-universe anniversary of Krakoa’s fall, the mutants will reflect on their mutant nation and look forward amid a night of “joyous celebration, delicious drama, and, of course, super hero high fashion!” And of course, it’ll help set the stage for the next phase of the “Ashes” era that’ll continue into 2026.
According to executive editor Tom Breevort, this has been in the works for a year, and will hopefully give fans interactions they’d wanted since the characters went their various separate ways. “If you’ve been wondering when somebody was going to encounter somebody else, the answer is right here in this book,” he said. It’s an interesting time for the Hellfire Gala, which recently became a map for Marvel Rivals and is now considered part of X-Men lore.
The Hellfire Vigil special releases on July 2. Hopefully, those ‘fits live up to their predecessors.
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