Five Best Things We Learned from the All-New All-Different Marvel Panel

All New All Different Marvel Artwork — Image Courtesy: Marvel

Comics fans showed up early to get a seat at the All-New All-Different Marvel Panel on Saturday morning and they weren’t disappointed. Not only were a few lucky cosplayers picked by moderator and Marvel Senior Editor Nick Lowe to read next week’s new Spider-Gwen #1, but everyone else got to hear what’s coming up to their favorite characters post-Secret Wars. Here’s the 5 best things we learned:

Power Man and Iron Fist is all about the friendship

Writer David Walker was on hand to talk about the revived title, which was announced a few days ago, and insisted that it would dig into the relationship between the titular characters. “We all have that friend that everybody else looks at and asks, ‘Why are you friends with this person?'” he said of the unlikely duo. However, he also said that other characters will be just as excited to see the duo back together as readers. Walker also promised this incarnation would be a little different than past versions because Luke Cage is now married and has a young child. “He’s just grown a lot and that makes him a really interesting character to play with,” he said.

A Spider-Women event is coming in April

Thanks to the popularity of titles like Spider-Woman, Silk and Spider-Gwen and the meeting of the the women who headlines those books meeting during the Spider-Verse event last year, the characters will meet again in a limited series next year. Spider-Woman writer Dennis Hopeless explained that the characters have visited each other in their different universes (Gwen Stacy and is from Earth 65 and Ciny Moon and Jessica Drew are from Earth 616) and a big part of the series is the issues they face when Drew gets stuck away from her 11-month-old twins. Speaking of Drew’s impending motherhood, editor Axel Alonso said she’ll have a difficult time trying to balance being a hero while also remembering she has real life obligations. “It’s tough for Jess not to just barrel in and kick the crap out of people,” he said. As for the identity of the kids’ father, Hopeless was coy, saying, “Jessica doesn’t want to talk about it.”

Lizards are coming

Spider-Gwen writer Jason Latour said that the “first arc is directly related to the night Peter Parker died.” A group of mysterious lizards will start terrorizing the city and Gwen will become obsessed with stopping them. “The last thing on earth she wants is for Peter to be found out as the Lizard,” he said. Lowe showed a few pages from the issue, but one key character was blued-out to keep their identity and, sadly, the cosplayers who got to read the issue during the panel were sworn to secrecy.

The X-Men are OK

At least in terms of prominence in the Marvel Universe. Multiple fans expressed concern about the various mutants, but the panelists assured them that the various X-titles will keep the characters as prominent as ever. “This is not the first time the X-Men have had rough luck,” Lowe said but he argued that, “you always get the best stories when you put them in the roughest places.” He also assured that what fans have seen so far is only “the tip of the iceberg” of what they have planned. Speaking of those plans, All-New Wolverine writer Tom Taylor promised that Laura Kinney aka X-23 will be, “just as kickass as you know her, but she’s trying not to kill.” One audience member expressed disappointment at this news and Taylor then teased him about it saying, “it’s not the worst thing.”