The X-Men Regenesis #1 one-shot ushers in the post-Schism status quo for Marvel’s mutant heroes that will be introduced across the X-Men line this Fall. We didn’t say much about details of the recently concluded Schism mini-series here at MLD, and much of that had to do with taking a wait-and-see approach after the Prelude to Schism series didn’t connect to it at all. I still enjoyed Prelude, but it was a point of frustration that put me off discussing the details here. Thankfully, Kieron Gillen’s issue chronicling the upcoming changes has put things back on track.

Spoilers for the dawn of Marvel’s X-Men: Regenesis era may follow.

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I had already planned to write about the X-Men today with the movie premiering last weekend and lots of other X related stuff always on my mind, but Marvel’s announcement that they’re canceling Uncanny X-Men at issue #544 in October took things in an “all new, all different” direction.

I haven’t said much about it here, but a big summer X-Men event called Schism is starting next month under Marvel’s MMXI – Year of the Mutants banner. The premise is that Cyclops and Wolverine will finally reach an irreconcilable point of disagreement and the X-Men will be divided as never before. The creative team of writer Jason Aaron and artists Carlos Pacheco, Frank Cho, Daniel Anuña, Alan Davis and Adam Kubert sounds phenomenal, but as a mini series announced in the midst of three other major events affecting the X-Men line (Fear Itself, X-Men: First to Last and Age of X) I wasn’t sure what to make of it. I certainly didn’t expect it to lead to the “cancellation” of the flagship Uncanny X-Men.

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I didn’t pay a lot of attention when Marvel announced their “Point One” Initiative, or at least that’s what I’m assuming since I clearly didn’t understand how it all works. Starting in February, a series of issues with a “.1” appended to the previous issue number started appearing and I thought these were simply special editions of the regular book. In other words, I was under the impression that Amazing Spider-Man #654.1 was the same story as Amazing Spider-Man #654 with additional pages to attract and inform new readers. It turns out the “Point One” issues are new stand alone stories produced specifically to fit into current continuity as well as bring new readers up to speed on where titles currently stand and where they’re headed. Thankfully, I became aware of all this because this week’s Uncanny X-Men #534.1 may be the best issue of Uncanny X-Men I’ve read in years.

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When Marvel’s May solicitations appeared earlier this month a group of books were very conspicuous by their absence. Four X-Men titles (Uncanny X-Men, X-Men: Legacy, New Mutants, and Uncanny X-Force) had no listings and it was clear that something was up. Last week Marvel released a set of teaser images for these titles and they’re giving more details all this week on Marvel.com. Every day at 3PM Marvel will host a series of “liveblogs” focusing on what they’re calling MMXI: Year of the X-Men featuring X-editor Nick Lowe and the creators behind each of these titles kicking off yesterday with New Mutants.

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