Marvel Comics has just dropped five full weeks of December 2021 solicitations, and if that’s not enough, the publisher is also offering up a brief preview of some titles coming on January 5, including Sabretooth #1, Devil’s Reign: Villains for Hire #1, and Fantastic Four: Reckoning War Alpha #1.
Though the publisher has included the January titles on the schedule published with their December solicitations, it didn’t include full solicitation text, or even cover images at the time.
Still, we’ll break down everything we know about the few titles Marvel has advance solicited for January 5, starting with Sabretooth #1 by writer Victor Lavelle and artists Leonard Kirk and Rain Beredo.
According to Marvel, the five-issue series reveals what Victor Creed has been up to … and that it’s not what readers will expect.
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No stranger to Marvel fans of all media, Sabretooth/Victor Creed is one of the most popular X-Men villains and is Wolverine’s arch-enemy. Violent, bloodthirsty, and sociopathic, Sabretooth was the first mutant banished under Krakoa’s laws against killing humans in House of X, suffering the nightmarish threat of being trapped in an organic oubliette in the depths of Krakoa for all eternity.
“All eternity” seems to be up in January however, as he returns with his own title (whether it’s ongoing or a limited series, we can’t yet say). Perhaps his newfound release will come as a result of the upcoming Inferno limited series, which brings many of the themes of the Krakoa era X-Men titles to a head.
Sabretooth #1 will have a cover by Ryan Stegman, JP Mayer, and Frank Martin, seen above.
Sabretooth also got mashed up with Black Panther in Marvel’s December’s Villains’ Reign’ variant cover theme.
Then there’s Devil’s Reign: Villains for Hire #1, which was briefly mentioned as an upcoming tie-in to Daredevil-centric limited series Devil’s Reign, in which Kingpin sets his own team of Thunderbolts after Matt Murdock and Elektra. In this case, though little is known about the exact content of the issue, we know Devil’s Reign: Villain’s For Hire #1 is a one-shot, thanks to the previous mention of the title.
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Finally, there’s Fantastic Four: Reckoning War Alpha #1. Marvel often uses the ‘Alpha’ designator to signify the start of a crossover or event story, so it stands to reason that this issue marks the launch of the previously announced FF-centric ‘Reckoning War’ story.
Interestingly enough, Fantastic Four writer Dan Slott has been mentioning the concept of the Reckoning War as a future Marvel Universe event since his She-Hulk series all the way back in 2005, with the latest mention coming at the hands of members of the Time Variance Authority in September 15’s Fantastic Four #35.
Stay tuned to Newsarama for more information on these titles as it’s revealed.
Did Sabretooth make our list of the best X-Men villains of all time? Okay, we won’t clickbait you. He didn’t. But check out who did…